Vilnius, 31 October 2014. A selection of pictures and lithographs by the German expressionist Cornelia Gurlitt (1890–1919) are now part of the art collection of the Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum. 

Dr Hubert Portz, owner of an art gallery in Germany, has donated sixteen pictures and lithographs by Cornelia Gurlitt to the museum. Most of them are dated 1917. During WWI (1914–1918), Cornelia, a member of the artistic Gurlitt family, became a Red Cross volunteer and worked as a sister of mercy in Vilnius Antakalnis hospital. At that time she was already well known as a great expressionist, and during her free time in Vilnius, Cornelia devoted herself to her art. Historical sources confirm that she organised an exhibition of her works in 1917. Cornelia met her beloved, Paul Fechter in Vilnius, and he recognised her special talent. Unfortunately Cornelia Gurlitt died by suicide at the very young age of 29, having failed to overcome the existential crisis that plagued her during WWI when she struggled for recognition in Germany as an independent artist.

Dr Portz succeeded in acquiring the works of the undeservedly forgotten artist from Galerie Joseph Fach in Frankfurt, which had received them from the family of Paul Fechter. Dr Portz acquired other of her lithographs from her friends who answered the newspaper advertisement he placed. Dr Portz himself discovered the artist as a result of his interest in Dresden’s history of art. In April this year, an exhibition of Gurlitt and artists from her environment “Rooms Reserved for Cornelia Gurlitt, Lotte Wahle and Conrad Felixmueller” was opened at his private gallery Kunsthaus Desiree in Hochstadt.

According to Dr Portz, the Gurlitt family history has it that Cornelia’s mother destroyed a large number of Cornelia’s works in attempt to wash away the stain of suicide. Others were saved by her brother, art historian Hildebrand Gurlitt. In spite of his Jewish roots (one of his grandmothers was Jewish) Hildebrand Gurlitt was one of 4 trustees assigned by the Nazis to collect exhibits for the Fuhrer’s museum, which was intended for his native Linz. Hildebrand Gurlitt received generous funding to acquire items of art for that purpose. He would also confiscate what was referred to by the Nazis as “degenerate art” (works in avant-garde style or created by Jewish artists) from German museums. After the war he succeeded in convincing post-war experts that he himself was persecuted by the Nazis because of his Jewish roots, and that most of the works he collected during the war years had vanished. However, the notorious collection of “degenerate art” was finally discovered at the flat of Hildebrand Gurlitt’s son Cornelius in Munich where he lived in complete seclusion. Not all of the works found there were publicly acknowledged, and Dr Portz has grounds to think that there may be some works by Cornelia Gurlitt in the list of undisclosed items.

Cornelia Gurlitt’s works donated to the museum, as well as her other works from Dr Portz’s personal collection, will be exhibited in spring 2015 in the Tolerance Centre. If Hildebrand Gurlitt’s collection, so carefully hidden from the outside world, is eventually made accessible to the artistic society, perhaps we will have a chance to present other, not yet discovered works of the painter in the exhibition. Whatever happens, the works of the gifted expressionist are gradually finding their “room” in the history of art.