Analysis of information sources in references of the Wikipedia article "Universalmuseum Joanneum" in English language version.
After the Anschluss confiscated Jewish art and other cultural property were brought to different collecting depots by the Gestapo and others. Friedrich Dworschak, the Director of the Kunsthistorisches Museum, an NSDAP member, pursued a more coordinated effort through the establishment of the Central Depot for Jewish Cultural Property, (Zentraldepot für beschlagnahmten jüdischen Kulturbesitz), with the permission of the Chief of the Vienna Gestapo, SS Oberführer Stahlecker.46 The central depot was established in the fall of 1938, at the expense of the Museum of Art History on the first floor of the Vienna Neue Burg. By the fall of 1939, the inventory of the central depot, excluding medals and coins, included approximately 10,000 cultural objects. 47 Museums in Vienna, Graz, Salzburg, and Innsbruck all sought to benefit from acquisitions of looted property
And the stories about the art collection. Mitzi, Gottlieb and Mathilde Kraus discovered some of their paintings in the collection of the Joanneum museum in Austria after the war ended. But their claim for restitution, made in 1947, was rejected.
On 14 March 2000 a regional constitutional law based on the research report of the Styrian regional parliament was passed to govern the return of questionable acquisitions from Jewish ownership. Subsequently, with the help of the Jewish Community in Vienna, several heirs were traced and their rightful property was returned: until now (April 2008) these are 26 objects to eleven legal heirs.
