The New York Times-20080126-Museum Seeks Ruling On Claim To Painting- -Brief-

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Museum Seeks Ruling On Claim To Painting; [Brief]

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The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, has turned to the courts to validate its claim to a 1913 Oskar Kokoschka painting sought by Claudia Seger-Thomschitz, an Austrian woman who says it was sold under duress during the Nazi occupation of Austria, The Boston Globe reported. Lawyers for Ms. Seger-Thomschitz contend that there is no doubt that the Kokoschka painting, Two Nudes (Lovers), was sold under duress by Oskar Reichel, a physician who ran an art gallery in Vienna. The Museum of Fine Arts, citing months of research, maintained that the sale in 1939 was voluntary and to another Jew, the Viennese art dealer Otto Kallir. The painting was never confiscated by the Nazis, was never sold by force as a result of Nazi persecution and was not otherwise taken from Dr. Reichel, the museum's complaint states. Ms. Seger-Thomschitz's lawyers said they would respond to the suit.