Topic: “The Central Collection Point in Munich” – Collecting, Restoring and Returning of Art Stolen during WWII.
One of the most remarkable projects in the aftermath of World War II in Europe was the restitution of numerous works of art that had been looted by German National Socialist agents from museums and private collections in occupied areas. Iris Lauterbach has mined vast archives in Germany and the United States to reconstruct and illustrate the history and procedures of the U.S. Army’s Office of Military Government at the Central Collecting Point in Munich. Run by the so-called Monuments Men, this was the headquarters of the collection, restoration, and return of massive numbers of works of art.
In her lecture, Iris Lauterbach tells the story of the U.S. Central Collecting Point, set up in the former Nazi Party headquarters at Königsplatz in Munich. She uncovers the stories of the people who worked there at a time of lingering political suspicions, narrates the research, conservation, and restitution process.
Prof. Dr. Iris Lauterbach studied art history, French and Italian philology in Mainz, Pavia and Paris. Since 1991 she is a member of the research department of the Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte, München and an honorary professor at the Munich Technical University since 2012. Her fields of research are architecture and the visual arts in National Socialism, cultural policy in postwar Germany, and European garden history.