by Fern Smiley
My problem with provenance. 
I saw the movie A Citizen Above Suspicion years ago and have thought about the premise with respect to art confiscated and dispersed during WWII. Although it was a thriller about murder, the concept is that some of us are simply too superior in stature to be considered suspects even in the face of blinding evidence. Or, from an earlier memory, the Emporer could actually strut naked while his court of followers oohed and awed pretending to admire non- existent finery- at least until someone too young to know better told it like it was.
I feel like that young girl.
When I noticed the catalogue acquisition dates of several fine impressionist paintings coming to Canada in the summer or 1998, the purchase date of 1941 that appeared in their provenances seemed curious. In November I was following the news that MOMA in New York received claims during a visiting exhibition of pictures from Vienna. The Schieles, it was claimed, were originally from their ancestors homes and looted during the war by the Nazis. So it was with a new sensitivity, being an arts volunteer and a child of Holocaust survivors that I read the catalogue.
Pictured Above: Original Italian Poster - A Citizen Above Suspicion
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