VIENNA | Sat Jan 5, 2013 11:24am EST

VIENNA (Reuters) - Vienna's Jewish Museum holds hundreds of books and works of art that may have been stolen by Nazis, a newspaper reported on Saturday.

A screening program that started in 2007, years after other Austrian museums began combing their collections for works taken from their rightful owners, has determined that about 500 works of art and 900 books are of dubious origin, Der Standard said.

It cited in particular paintings by Jehudo Epstein, who while abroad in 1936 entrusted 172 works to industrialist Bernhard Altmann for safekeeping.

Altmann fled the country in 1938 when Nazi Germany annexed Austria, and his factory was "Aryanised", the paper said.

The widow of Epstein, who died in South Africa in 1945, tried in vain after 1947 to track down the paintings, some of which were later routinely sold at auction in Austria, it said.

Several are now in the Jewish Museum's collection, it said, citing information it got from the museum after many requests.

It quoted Danielle Spera, who became director in 2010, as saying the museum had, despite tight finances, for the first time hired in December 2011 a part-time researcher to check the provenances of its artworks.

"Anything that was acquired illegally ought to be returned. There will not be a hint of hesitation," Spera told the paper.

Der Standard said leaders of Austria's Jewish community, whose collections are on permanent loan to the municipal museum, voted in October to return an Epstein painting called Italienische Landschaft (Italian Landscape) and a work in a separate museum to the painter's heirs, who now live in England.

That transfer could take place as early as this month, it said.

The Jewish Museum is closed on Saturdays and no one there could be reached immediately for comment.

It contains, among others, the Jewish community's own collection, bequeathed in 1992, a Max Berger collection bought by the city in 1988, the Sussmann collection, on loan since 1992, and donations from a collection by Martin Schlaff.

Other Austrian museums have already had to grapple with the issue of returning looted art to the proper owners.

A painting by Egon Schiele, which was seized by the Nazis on the eve of World War Two, was shown in public for the first time in more than a decade last year after the Leopold Museum reached a settlement with claimants that cost millions of dollars.

The dispute was the second of two restitution cases the Leopold settled with the help of funds raised by selling another Schiele painting, "Houses with Colourful Laundry, Suburb II", for 24.7 million pounds ($39.6 million) at auction in 2011.

($1 = 0.6236 British pounds)

(Reporting by Michael Shields; Editing by Louise Ireland)

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WASHINGTON | Thu Sep 27, 2012 9:51pm EDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A Virginia auction house on Thursday canceled the sale of a Renoir painting bought at a flea market for $7 after signs the work was stolen from the Baltimore Museum of Art decades ago.

The painting "Paysage Bords de Seine" by Pierre-Auguste Renoir was to have gone under the hammer on Saturday but ownership questions halted the sale, said Lucie Holland, a spokeswoman for Potomack Co, the Alexandria, Virginia, auctioneer.

"The rest of the auction will go on, but the Renoir has been withdrawn," she said.

A Virginia woman bought the signed French Impressionist painting at a West Virginia flea market a year or two ago, hoping the frame would be of some use.

She ignored the work until it turned up again while housecleaning and had it appraised by Potomack in July. The auctioneers verified it as a Renoir and estimated its worth at $75,000 to $100,000.

The Baltimore Museum of Art told Potomack on Wednesday that its records indicated "Paysage Bords de Seine," or "Landscape on the Banks of the Seine," was stolen while on loan to the museum in 1951, the auction house said.

Potomack told the FBI and a federal probe is under way. There is no known police report on the theft.

BOUGHT IN PARIS

The Renoir came to the Baltimore museum through one of its leading benefactors, collector Saidie May. Her family bought the painting from the Bernheim-Jeune gallery in Paris in 1926.

The Washington Post found records in the museum's library on Tuesday that showed May had lent the paintings and other works to the museum in 1937, Potomack said.

After the newspaper told it of the findings, the Baltimore museum checked its files and found a loan record showing the Renoir had been stolen on November 17, 1951. What happened to it after the theft is unknown.

Doreen Bolger, the museum director, said the museum's probe into what happened to the painting was in early stages but was centered on May.

She died in May 1951 and the art collection was willed to the museum. As its ownership was going through legal transfer, the painting was stolen while still listed as on loan.

"At this point we just want to make sure that the painting winds up where it belongs and that we provide all the information we can to law enforcement about this issue," Bolger said.

Potomack said the painting had not turned up when it checked London's Art Loss Register, a database of stolen and lost art. It also consulted the FBI's art theft website to confirm it was not listed as stolen.

(Editing by Mohammad Zargham)

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LOS ANGELES | Thu Sep 27, 2012 10:29pm EDT

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Police recovered a multimillion-dollar collection of paintings stolen from the Southern California home of superstar bond fund manager Jeffrey Gundlach, and two men are in jail on suspicion of possessing the stolen property, authorities said on Thursday.

The 13 paintings, which included works by Jasper Johns and Piet Mondrian, were taken from Gundlach's home in the coastal city of Santa Monica between September 12 and September 14, officials with the city's police department said.

Gundlach, who was in New York at the time, put forward a $1.7 million reward earlier this week for the recovery of all his stolen art, increasing his previous offer of $200,000.

Officers arrested Jeffrey Nieto, 45, at Al & Ed's Autosound in the Los Angeles suburb of Pasadena on Wednesday in connection with the theft, and recovered most of the paintings at that business, where Nieto is the manager, police said.

They took the second man, Wilmer Cadiz, 40, into custody at his home in nearby San Gabriel and found another four paintings there, police said. The last painting was recovered at a home in the Los Angeles bedroom community of Glendale. The person who had that painting has been interviewed and is cooperating with investigators, police said.

Police are still investigating the case, including whether Nieto and Cadiz committed the actual burglary at Gundlach's home, Santa Monica police spokesman Sergeant Richard Lewis said.

It was not immediately clear if Nieto or Cadiz have attorneys to represent them.

Gundlach, who is chief executive officer and chief investment officer of DoubleLine Capital, in a statement thanked the Santa Monica Police Department for "apprehending the criminals" and recovering "all of the artwork stolen."

"This is a great day for the art world and all those who seek order and justice in our society," Gundlach said. A representative for Gundlach did not immediately respond to an email about payment of the reward in the case.

The stolen art pieces included works by Frank Stella, Guy Rose, Hanson Duvall Puthuff and other artists.

The painting by Jasper Johns, who last year received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, is his 1956 "Green Target." The piece by the late Dutch artist Piet Mondrian is his 1936 "Composition (A) En Rouge Et Blanc."

The Mondrian piece alone is worth between $10 million and $15 million, Lewis said. The total value of the stolen paintings could be up to $39 million, but police initially valued all the items stolen from Gundlach's home at $10 million to be conservative about the price tag, Lewis said.

Police have not recovered a Porsche Carrera 4S sports car taken from Gundlach's home, nor have they found several luxury watches, a handgun and some wine that was also stolen, Lewis said. The car originally sold for $120,000 and the wine was worth $100,000, he said.

Nieto was being held in jail on bail of $500,000 and Cadiz was being held on $20,000, according to Los Angeles County inmate records.

(Editing by Cynthia Johnston and Eric Walsh)

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