Herbert M. Gutmann

Herbert Max Magnus Gutmann (* October 15, 1879 in Dresden; died December 22, 1942 in Paignton, United Kingdom) was a German banker and collector of Islamic art, persecuted by the Nazis because of his Jewish heritage.

Professional life

Dresdner Bank share for 100 Reichsmark, issued on April 3, 1928, in Dresden, with the signature of banker Franz Friedrich Andreae as Chairman of the Supervisory Board. The share bears the signatures of Henry Nathan and Herbert M. Gutmann on behalf of the Management Board.

Memorial plaque on the house, Golfweg 22, in Berlin-Wannsee

Son of Dresdner Bank board member Eugen Gutmann, Herbert Gutmann studied economics before joining Dresdner Bank. As co-founder, director and later president of the Deutsche Orientbank, he was involved in the economic activities of the German Empire in the Orient in the period before the First World War. As part of this business activity, he traveled extensively between 1905 and 1910, including to Morocco, Egypt, Syria, Asia Minor and Persia. In 1910, he was elected to the Board of Dresdner Bank. In the same year, he joined the Society of Friends.

Gutmann was President of the Berlin-Wannsee Golf and Country Club. 1913 he leased a villa from Dr. Ernst Heller in Bertinistrasse in Potsdam, which he bought in 1919 and subsequently extended. The country-style villa with 80 rooms was initially his summer residence and he later settled there with his family.^[1]

Gutman was an important German banker in the 1920s.^[2] There are indications that Gutmann was forced out of his position as a concession to the emerging National Socialists.^[3] At the same time, however, Siegmund Bodenheimer and Samuel Ritscher were appointed to the new Board of Directors,^[4] although, unlike Gutmann, whose father had converted from Judaism to Christianity in 1889, they were Jewish.

Nazi era

Gutmann still held 16 supervisory board mandates in 1933, when the Nazis first came to power, but he was then gradually ousted under Nazi anti-Jewish laws because of his Jewish origins. Forced to pay the confiscatory anti-Jewish Reichsfluchtsteuer (Reich Capital Flight Tax) and Judenvermögensabgabe (Tax on Registered Jewish Assets),^[5] he emigrated after 1936 and finally arrived in England, where he died in 1942, impoverished.

Art collector

Inspired by his art-loving father Gutmann became a knowledgeable collector of oriental and East Asian art objects. During the Nazi era he would be forced to sell the collection at auction after the Nazis removed him from his positions and imposed special taxes on him.^[6]

He was president of the German-Persian Society and an external expert for the Islamic department of the Kaiser Friedrich Museum in Berlin (now the Museum of Islamic Art in the Pergamon Museum).

The most important object in Gutmann's collection was a wooden paneling in the Turkish Rococo style acquired in Damascus, which is still preserved and was referred to in the family as Arabicum. Even in the Middle East, interiors of this type have become very rare. As early as the 19th century, economic and social changes began to affect living habits and the design of homes. Some interiors found their way into public and private collections, but the Second World War was one of the reasons for their loss. Today, Syrian rooms can only be found in a few museums outside the Arab world.

Claims for restitution of Nazi looted art

Gutmann owned a portrait of Bismarck by Franz von Lenbach until 1934; looted by the Nazis, it was restituted in 2010.^[7] The painting Pappenheim's Death by Hans Makart, also looted, was restituted to Gutmann's heirs in 2009.^[8]

In 2020 the UK Spoliation Commission rejected a claim by Gutmann for a Rubens, The Coronation of the Virgin, located at the Courtauld Institute.^[9]

In 2019 the Dutch Restitutions Committee recommended the restitution of fourteen Meissen porcelain objects.^[10]

Herbert's younger brother Friedrich had been appointed by their father as managing director of the British branch of Dresdner Bank in London and from 1918 ran the branch of Dresdner Bank in Amsterdam under the name Proehl & Gutmann. As Eugen Gutmann's youngest son after his brother Herbert, he became the family trustee of his father's collection.

Literature

Thomas Tunsch: Die syrische Innenraumdekoration in der ehemaligen Villa Gutmann in Potsdam. Untersuchungen zur Herkunft und Datierung. In: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin (Hrsg.): Forschungen und Berichte 29/30, 1990, S. 129–147 (Digitalisat).
Roland Mascherek: Die Gutmann-Villa Bertinistr. 16–16a. Baugeschichtliche und einwohnerbiographische Dokumentation unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Person Herbert M. Gutmann und seiner Familie. In: Mitteilungen der Studiengemeinschaf Sanssouci e. V. Verein für Kultur und Geschichte Potsdam 5, 2000, Nr. 2, S. 28–66.
Atje Uta Hartmann: Die Villa Gutmann. Gedanken zu einer möglichen Nutzung. In: Brandenburgische Denkmalpflege 11, 2002, Heft 2, S. 43–62.
Thomas Tunsch: Der Sammler Herbert M. Gutmann (1879–1942). In: Jens Kröger, Désirée Heiden (Hrsg.): Islamische Kunst in Berliner Sammlungen. 100 Jahre Museum für Islamische Kunst in Berlin. Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Berlin 2004, ISBN 3-86601-435-X, S. 27–30 (Digitalisat).
Vivian J. Rheinheimer (Hrsg.): Herbert M. Gutmann 1879–1942. Bankier in Berlin. Bauherr in Potsdam. Kunstsammler. Koehler & Amelang, Leipzig 2007, ISBN 3-7338-0351-5; (Rezension).

External links

Literature by and about Herbert M. Gutmann in the German National Library catalogue
Works by and about Herbert M. Gutmann in the Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek (German Digital Library)
Search for Herbert M. Gutmann in the SPK digital portal of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation (Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz)
Villa Gutmann – Artikel im PotsdamWiki
Provenienzrecherchen zur Kunstsammlung Herbert M. Gutmanns
Sammlung Gutmann
"Der "Herbertshof" und sein Bewohner. Vivian J. Rheinheimer edierte ein Buch über Herbert M. Gutmann bei Koehler & Amelang". PNN. 2007-03-21. Retrieved 2016-05-28.

References

^ "MANAGER: Kampf ums Arabicum", Der Spiegel, 3. August 1998, no. 32, 1998
^ "GERMAN BANKER ARRIVES.; Herbert Gutmann, of Dresden Bank, Says Dawes Plan Will Be Fulfilled". The New York Times. 1925-03-10. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-03-07.
^ McFadyean, Melanie (February 10, 2007). "'The Nazis sent him written demands for atonement of being Jewish'". The Guardian.
^ "Melanie McFadyean on her Jewish grandfather | Life and style | The Guardian". The Guardian. 2014-10-02. Archived from the original on 2014-10-02. Retrieved 2024-03-07.
^ "Herbert Gutmann". Restitutiecommissie. Retrieved 2024-03-07. Herbert Gutmann was forced by the Nazis to pay Reichsfluchtsteuer (Reich Capital Flight Tax) and Judenvermögensabgabe (Tax on Registered Jewish Assets). He paid RM 89,000 in Reich Capital Flight Tax. On 8 March 1939 Gutmann wrote to the Finanzamt Moabit-West stating that he had no more cash resources available and he referred the tax authorities to a previous letter of 12 December 1938, in which he made the mortgage on his country house Herbertshof available as security for payment of Tax on Registered Jewish Assets.
^ "Research on Herbert M. Gutmann". Retrieved 2024-03-07. Gutmann had to relinquish his place on several advisory boards of companies connected to the Dresdner Bank. The German State also cancelled all the contracts he had secured through the bank and, furthermore, the Dresdner Bank went to claim that Gutmann also owed them thousands of Reichmarks in unsubstantiated debts. For this reason, he was forced to auction his art collection at the auction house Paul Graupe in Berlin and sell other property as well.
^ "Raubkunst im Bundestag". Spiegel Online. 2009-11-12. Retrieved 2020-02-12.
^ Itzkoff, Compiled by Dave (2009-04-03). "Art Restitution Ruling in Vienna". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-03-07.
^ Doward, Jamie (2010-12-19). "Rubens painting once owned by victim of the Nazis is to stay in Britain". The Observer. ISSN 0029-7712. Retrieved 2024-03-07. The Coronation of the Virgin was sold in haste by its Jewish banker owner, who was forced to flee Germany when the Nazis took over in the 1930s. More than half a century later, his descendants launched a claim to recover it, in a move that could have seen it leave one of Britain's most prestigious galleries. But after hearing lengthy arguments, parliament's Spoliation Advisory Panel, which rules on the ownership of disputed artworks, decided in favour of its current owner, the Courtauld Institute in London.
^ "Herbert Gutmann". Restitutiecommissie. Retrieved 2024-03-07. Conclusion. The Restitutions Committee advises the Minister of Education, Culture and Science to restitute the fourteen claimed Meissen porcelain objects to the heirs of Herbert Gutmann.

[spiegel-7956415-1] "MANAGER: Kampf ums Arabicum", Der Spiegel, 3. August 1998, no. 32, 1998

[2] "GERMAN BANKER ARRIVES.; Herbert Gutmann, of Dresden Bank, Says Dawes Plan Will Be Fulfilled". The New York Times. 1925-03-10. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-03-07.

[3] McFadyean, Melanie (February 10, 2007). "'The Nazis sent him written demands for atonement of being Jewish'". The Guardian.

[4] "Melanie McFadyean on her Jewish grandfather | Life and style | The Guardian". The Guardian. 2014-10-02. Archived from the original on 2014-10-02. Retrieved 2024-03-07.

[5] "Herbert Gutmann". Restitutiecommissie. Retrieved 2024-03-07. Herbert Gutmann was forced by the Nazis to pay Reichsfluchtsteuer (Reich Capital Flight Tax) and Judenvermögensabgabe (Tax on Registered Jewish Assets). He paid RM 89,000 in Reich Capital Flight Tax. On 8 March 1939 Gutmann wrote to the Finanzamt Moabit-West stating that he had no more cash resources available and he referred the tax authorities to a previous letter of 12 December 1938, in which he made the mortgage on his country house Herbertshof available as security for payment of Tax on Registered Jewish Assets.

[6] "Research on Herbert M. Gutmann". Retrieved 2024-03-07. Gutmann had to relinquish his place on several advisory boards of companies connected to the Dresdner Bank. The German State also cancelled all the contracts he had secured through the bank and, furthermore, the Dresdner Bank went to claim that Gutmann also owed them thousands of Reichmarks in unsubstantiated debts. For this reason, he was forced to auction his art collection at the auction house Paul Graupe in Berlin and sell other property as well.

[SPON-659857-7] "Raubkunst im Bundestag". Spiegel Online. 2009-11-12. Retrieved 2020-02-12.

[8] Itzkoff, Compiled by Dave (2009-04-03). "Art Restitution Ruling in Vienna". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-03-07.

[9] Doward, Jamie (2010-12-19). "Rubens painting once owned by victim of the Nazis is to stay in Britain". The Observer. ISSN 0029-7712. Retrieved 2024-03-07. The Coronation of the Virgin was sold in haste by its Jewish banker owner, who was forced to flee Germany when the Nazis took over in the 1930s. More than half a century later, his descendants launched a claim to recover it, in a move that could have seen it leave one of Britain's most prestigious galleries. But after hearing lengthy arguments, parliament's Spoliation Advisory Panel, which rules on the ownership of disputed artworks, decided in favour of its current owner, the Courtauld Institute in London.

[10] "Herbert Gutmann". Restitutiecommissie. Retrieved 2024-03-07. Conclusion. The Restitutions Committee advises the Minister of Education, Culture and Science to restitute the fourteen claimed Meissen porcelain objects to the heirs of Herbert Gutmann.

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