Goering's Man in Paris: The Story of a Nazi Plunderer and His World

 

Today's post is on Goering's Man in Paris: The Story of a Nazi Art Plunderer and His World by Jonathan Petropoulos. It is 408 including notes and it is published by Yale University Press. The cover is a picture of a living room with a red picture in a frame on the wall. The intended reader is someone who is interested in Nazi art plundering, those who did it, and what happened to them after the war. There is some mild foul language, no sex, and no violence in this book. There Be Spoilers Ahead.

From the dust jacket- Bruno Lohse (1911-2007) was one of the most notorious art plunderers in history. Appointed by Herman Goering to Hitler's art looting agency in Paris, he went on to help supervise the systematic theft and distribution of more than thirty thousand artworks, taken largely from French Jews, and to assists Goering in amassing an enormous private collection. By the 1950s Lohse was officially denazified but was back in the art dealing world, offering masterpieces of dubious origin to American museums. After his death , dozens of painting by Renoir, Monet, and Pissarro, among others, were found in his Zurich bank vault and adorning the walls of Munich home. Jonathan Petropoulos spent nearly a decade interviewing Lohse and continues to serve as an expert witness for Holocaust restitution cases. Here he tells the story of Lohse's life, offering a critical examination of the postwar art world. 

Review- This a in depth look into one man's life and the people around him after World War 2. Bruno Lohse was a Nazi, who worked for Herman Goering, to help identify important works of art and get them to Hitler or Goering. Lohse was small time art dealer who became a very important man in Paris and a very mysterious one after the war. Lohse knew everyone who was involved in the art theft, hiding the art post-war, and in general still being a Nazi but in a silent way. The thing to remember when reading in this book, know that the reader is going to meet more than just Lohse, Petropoulos brings a lot of characters from the art plundering into the world, as they revolve around Lohse. So there are many different people and many different stories going on in this book. It gives a very full look into the art plunderers and their lives before, during, and after the war but at times it can be too much and I just wanted to get back to Lohse and what he was doing. If you are looking for a unique way to example the Nazi art plunder and those involved, then you should read this book.

I give this book a Four out of Five stars. I get nothing for my review and I borrowed this book from my local library.