The Annunciation

During next month, every Wednesday and Sunday, we will show you an artwork from the database of wartime losses (www.lootedart.gov.pl) conducted by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland. Due to World War II, Poland has lost over 70% of its material cultural heritage. This work of Jacob Jordaens - next to Peter Paul Rubens and Antoon Van Dyck, a representative of Flemish baroque painting - belonged to collections of a Danish consul and industrialist from Łódź , Karol Eisert. After his death, in 1938, the painting had been transferred to the City Council of Łódź along with 21 other works. Therefore, it became a part of the collection of the Julian and Kazimierz Bartoszewicz Museum of History and Art in Łódź. As soon as Łódź had been incorporated into the Land of Warta, the museum received new German management. Peter Braust - known for appropriating museum pieces - assumed the position of the institution's director. The Museum had been maintained by the occupier, though at the end of World War II some of the most valuable paintings were evacuated to the Third Reich and located in Schandau (in Saxony). However, a Soviet front moved up surprisingly quickly and the works of art stamped with "Łódź", which had been previously stored in a county courthouse, were intercepted by the Russians. The later history of the painting remains unknown.