Finding a Painting in Argentina

This episode of Search Engine is brought to you in part by NPR's Planet Money Whether you're an expert or just curious, Planet Money from NPR is the show that makes sense of the economy through stories you'll actually want to hear I still remember their classic Planet Money Makes a T shirt series where they tracked the global supply chain from a cotton farm in Mississippi to a factory in Bangladesh. It turned a massive abstract concept like globalization into something human and intangible. That's their superpower, making the complex feel simple Their hosts go to unusual lengths to explain the world to you They have published their own book, shot a satellite into space to understand the private space industry. They even went inside a live book auction to show how ideas get to market This the kind of show where you learn something, probably laugh, and walkay seeing the world a little differently It's a space where the complex economy somehow makes sense and the dismal science becomes anything but Follow NPR's Planet Money podcast and understand how money shapes the world This episode of Search Engine is brought you in part by Zapppier We cover a lot of trends on this show, and over the last few months, everyone has been talking about AI. But let's face it, talking about trends doesn't help you be more efficient at work. For that, you need the right tools. You need Zappier Zabi is how you break the hype cycle and put AI to work across your company for real Zaapier is truly for everyone, tech expert or not, and teams use it to automate everything from marketing to IT. It's how you actually deliver on your AI strategy with an AI orchestration platform that brings power to any workflow. so you can do more of what matters You can connect top AI models like Chat GBT and Claoud to the tools your team already uses, allowing you to build AI powered workflows or autonomous agents exactly where you need them Teams have already automated over three hundred million AI tasks using Zapier between the millions of businesses transforming how they work with Zapier and AI. Get started for free by visiting Zapier d. com slash search. That's Za eR. com slash search Hi search enngine listeners, are colleagues over at Odyssey, the network that distributes search engine haveave a new show, and we wanted to share an episode with you The show iss called Family Lore. Every family has stories that get passed down. On this show, the host, Lloyd Lockridge investigates those stories to find out what's true In this one, the granddaughter of a prolific Jewish art collector who fled Europe during World War II embarks on a quest to recover looted art. Without further ado, let me play you host Lloyd Lockridge's interview So could you tell me your name and where you're from Yes, my name is Charlene Voner and I was born in the UK and currently live in Connecticut in the US My family came over to the U.S. on the QE two. My sister parents and two dogs and the car all on the QE two I know my parents were and ready to start life in the US and We have been in Greenwich, Connecticut since nineteen seventy five. For Charlene von Sayer Growing up in Connecticut was a pretty idyllic experience She remembers learning how to ride her bike on Todd Lane, her parents running alongside her as she wobbled forward with nervous excitement In the winter, Charlene's mother Mariv on Sayer A retired figure skater taught her to ice skate. So When we joined the skating Cub, it was kind of a big deal for everyone to see my mom skate around And then You know, my sister and I took lessons there and I continued because I liked it She liked it and she was very good at it As she got older, she began competing at a very high level The highest in fact Charlene and Nancy Cerrigan trained under the same coach And in nineteen ninety three Charlene won the gold medal at the British Championships. In nineteen ninety four, she competed at the Olympics in Norway But unlike her friend Nancy Carrian Charlene didn't represent the United States Ultimately She decided to represent England herer place of birth And those probably weren't her only two options Because Charlinee's background is somewhat complex. She was born in England to a father who was born in Amsterdam but raised in America, and a mother who was born and raised in West Germany, which no longer exists Apparently my first language was German. But when my sister and I entered school in the U S, we didn't understand anything because we were speaking German and my mom said no more German in the house, only English Despite losing the German, Charline was always aware of her European roots As a young girl, she and her sister would go to Holland to visit their paternal grandmother, Daisy I loved my grandmother, Daisy very much My sister and I I visited her in the summers often And there in Holland, Charlinee would pick up bits and pieces about what her grandmother's life was like growing up Her mother was a very famous soprano in Vienna and Daisy grew up in Vienna amongst a very affluent inner circle people like Freud Climped. Clim in fact, drew a portrait of her and I think she learned her first you know, braststroke from him. Yeah, they were socializing among a very elite class Tell me as a grandmother. What was she like She was extremely generenous, gracious nurturing, loving, warm and cozy. You know, she was that sort of warm and fuzzy grandmother, but a little bit fancier She was easy to hug, let's put it that way. And occasionally Charlene's grandmother would talk about life in the nineteen thirties when she was still married to Charlene's grandfather. a man named Jacques Goutsticker In a sense, Jockqu was one of the reasons Daisy had moved back to Holland in the first place I think she just felt pererhaps closer to Jques, who was her true love But she spoke about Jacques and how wonderful he was and how much he would have loved us She always said that And she also told me that he loved food and he would sort of satisfy his cravings by reading cookbooks. So he was like, way ahead of his time. Nowadays everyone sits around watching the cooking channel or reels or Exactly. And what else did you tell you about them that he was romantic and you know, gave her Lots of beautiful little gifts and jewelry and was very loving I don't know why, but I didn't think to ask more in depth questions Maybe because we were just enjoying each other's company and present. So I don't know why I didn't and I do regret not asking more. But clearly she didn't want to tell me or talk about it, otherwise she would have. But still, Daisy would take Charle and her sister down Memory Lane And we would jump in her car and drive by Nine Rhod a castle And Ostamir, which was their actual home that they lived in, and Harrenacht four hundred and fifty eight, which was my grandfather's place of business, his art gallery And she would tell us that these properties were once Hers. And I guess as a kid I never understood than why they weren't still hers. and I do clearly remember She would look at me and my sister she called us like her sweet. She would say, my sweet Things were different before the war And that's really all I got from her on that As a child, Charlone didn't quite understand why her grandmother was reserved in talking about the love of her life, Jacques And she didn't pry. She had a loving relationship with Daisy, and that's all that really mattered to both of them In nineteen ninety six, when Charlene was in her twenties Daisy passed away and Charlene went to Europe to pay her respects While she was there, she obtained her grandmother's diary And in the pages of that diary Charlenene encountered for the first time a full picture of her grandmother's life especially the aspects of her life she didn't want to talk about Charline's grandfather, Jacques Gaudsticker to not merely run an art gallery. He was a prolific art collector, dealer, and aficionado with arguably the most respected business in Amsterdam Charlene now had an intimate account of what happened to that business. and what happened to Jacques Everything started to come together I understood why she didn't wantna talk about things I started to understand The magnitude of the situation And I just became really angry. This episode of Search Engine is brought to you in part by NPR's Planet Money Whether you're an expert or just curious, Planet Money from NPR is the show that makes sense of the economy through stories you'll actually want to hear I still remember their classic Planet Money makes a T shirt series where they tracked the global supply chain from a cotton farm in Mississippi. to a factory in Bangladh It turned a massive abstract concept like globalization into something human and intangible. That's their superpower, making the complex feel simple. Their hosts go to unusual lengths to explain the world to you They have published their own book, shot a satellite into space to understand the private space industry D even went inside a live book auction to show how ideas get to market This the kind of show where you learn something, probably laugh, and walkay seeing the world a little differently It's a space where the complex economy somehow makes sense and the dismal science becomes anything but. Follow NPR's Plet Money podcast and understand how money shapes the world This episode of Search Egine is brought you in part by Zapier. We cover a lot of trends on this show, and over the last few months, everyone has been talking about AI. But let's face it, talking about trends doesn't help you be more efficient at work For that, you need the right tools. You need Zppier. Zabier is how you break the hy cycle and put AI to work across your company for real Zappier is truly for everyone, tech expert or not, and teams use it to automate everything from marketing to IT. It's how you actually deliver on your AI strategy with an AI orchestration platform that brings power to any workflow. so you can do more of what matters You can connect top AI models like Chat GPT and Clodd tools your team already uses, allowing you to build AI powered workflows or autonomous agents exactly where you need them teeam have already automated over three hundred million AI tasks using Zaapier. between the millions of businesses transforming how they work with Zapier and AI. Get started for free by visiting Zapier d. com slash search. That's ZaP ER. com slash search So prior to obtaining her grandmother's diary, there were details Charlenene knew about her grandmother's background She knew that her grandmother Daisy was in Holland when World War II broke out She knew, of course, that because Daisy and Jacques were Jewish, They had to flee when the Nazis invaded But the details were shrouded in mystery Then, after Daisy passed away and Charlene came into possession of the diary The shrouds lifted And Charlene got a firsthand account of their lives I think they were again, part of the upper class. and I truly believe that they didn't think the war would really affect them. they would not be you know, taken to a concentration camp Simon Goodman wrote a great book called the Orphheus Clock. It was quite evident in that book that a lot of the upper class Jews were even socializing before the war with people that ended up being Nazis, but it was just not even recognized So I think they kept waiting and waiting because they really didn't think anything was going to happen. Then on the morning of may tenth, nineteen forty. Dutch citizens woke up to the roar of German bombers flying overhead toward the North Sea As the planes passed, the residents of Amsterdam would have assumed that the Luftwaffe was headed to England. But soon after passing by Pes began to bank turnurning one hundred and eighty degrees. headed straight for the Netherlands The Germans began dropping bombs and paratroopers all across the country I can't say exactly when, but I have some translations of Daisy's diary. and she talks about how the atmosphere is changing and she is feeling unsafe, but Jacques doesn't want to leave doesn't want to leave everything that he's built with his business and his life there But I guess at a certain point They had no choice What was their route of escape They took my grandfather's car I think it was like a Lincoln Zephie or something like that They had to leave it on the side of the road. There was too much traffic And they ultimately made it on the last ship out Daisy and Jacques fled on may fourteenth, nineteen forty Four days after the surprise invasion and one day before the Netherlands signed a capitulation agreement with Hitler leaving the nation under full Nazi control. They left with only a few personal belongings, including a little black book, which contained the inventory for all of Jacques's art Jack kept the book in his jacket pocket and strapped to Daisy's chest with Charlene's father, Ado who was only about a year old Everything else, their beautiful home, the gallery, the furniture, the art It was all left behind There was a lot a lot of beautiful things that were left behind I mean, my grandmother packed like a little beach bag and threw some jewelry in there and some diapers for my father and they left With regard to these possessions, especially the art that was left behind, what becomes of it? What happens next to the art collection in particular Hermaning had sort of scouted out all of the art collections, I think prior to the war. So he knew exactly where his first stops would be So Herman dururing and Alloice Mle Basically took over. and stole all of the artwork. Mele stayed and ran the gallery with Jacques, you know, entire infrastructure in place because he was very well respected The Nazis took over the gallery They sold some pieces and looted others The marvelous business Jacques ran was completely desecrated by Hitler's second in command, Hermann Goring in a man named Allooys Mele Midle was actually married to a Jewish woman And the couple had initially moved from Munich to Amsterdam for fear of rising anti Semitism in Germany But as the Nazis invaded Meedle was able to curry favor with Goring and his Jewish wife was designated an honorary Aryan And Alloy's Meatle not only commandeered Joc's gallery He moved into the Gout sticker home. where he once hosted a gala to celebrate Hitler's birthday But despite their best attempts, the Nazis did not erase all traces of Jacques Outsticker because on the back of each painting There was a literal gout sticker stamp of approval It was a little red wax seal which guaranteed the authenticity of each individual work and knowing the value of a g sticker imp Prater. The Nazis left the stamps alone I didn't understand at the time why all the labels on the backs of the paintings weren't peeled off you would think that would make sense that way no one could recognize where they once belonged. but My grandfather had stickers and a red wax seal that he put on the back. of each of the paintings and they left those in place because prove the value of the pieces since he was so well respected and The art field As the Nazis took control of Amsterdam Jack and Daisy were on booard an England bound ship And One evening A couple of nights after they were on there, my grandfather went up on the deck for some air. And the lights were turned off because the boats were being torpedoed all around And my grandfather fell into A hold and fractured his skull And my grandmother was down below with my Father and ask the crew members to find her husband And ultimately, one of the crew members also fell into the hold on top of my grandfather. did not die because he was cushioned by Jacques's body and Th then my grandmother had to continontinue on the journey without herer husband The ship arrived in Falmouth, England But Daisy was not able to get off This was because our passport was issued by Austria where she was born and she was considered an alien enemy So Jacques's body was taken off the ship And Daisy was not allowed to accompany him She was able to plan the funeral though in Falmouth. I think that's the southwestern coast. beautiful, beautiful place She was not allowed off the boat and She made sure that he had Good spot Overlooking the water and that they play His favorite song, which was Cole Porter's Night and Day at the funeral And she was lucky because at that time, most people were just thrown overboard if they died is just You know, I'm just trying to imagine what your grandmother must have been thinking. I mean weeks earlier You know, life was great. Yeah. life was amazing a few weeks earlier. It's hard to fathom such a swift and devastating turn of events It was spring in Amsterdam. I imagine the tulips were in full bloom cafes were exploding onto the sidewalk packs of cyclists poured through the streets like synchronized schools of fish Daisy and Shock were in love They had a beautiful home a thriving art business, a vibrant social life, and a newborn baby And over the course of just four days They have to leave it all behind then after escaping by the skin of their teeth Jacques, a loving husband and father, dies in a freak accident and Daisy can't even be there to lay him to rest The last time she sees him He is being carried off a ship. alone in a foreign land and with little money and even fewer options Daisy set sail to the Americas. She continues on She lands in Canada and spends some time there before making her way to New York. And that's That's where they stayed for quite a while In nineteen forty five, the war finally ended first in the European theater as the Allies converged on Berlin. Herman Goring, the Nazi leader who stole much of the Goutsticker collection surrendered in Bavaria U upon his capture He was carrying suitcases filled with stolen items and works of art Without much delay Daisy started the process of reclaiming her possessions The Allies had already begun returning stolen items across Europe But in Holland Things were not so simple The Allies returned a lot of the art that they found in Germany and other places to the country of origin and those countries Holland in our case was supposed to return everything to the rightful owners, and they did not do that And do we know why believe they felt the transaction was voluntary and not involuntary. And they I think we're more interested in their post war collections and kept things for themselves So following the war The Dutch government made the case that much of the Gdsticker collection was legally sold and no longer owned by his estate. And because Jacques Gaoutsticker was deceased They probably anticipated little resistance to that position I mean, my grandmother was a young single at this point Jewish woman, I think they just didn't think that she would fight They took the opportunity to portray this as a voluntary sale, which was obviously a coerced sale And because Jacques was no longer alive, they thought nobody would come back to reclaim it Exactly. And how much time and effort did she put into You know, dealing with the Dutch goverment recovering the art She tried very hard until nineteen fifty two and She signed an agreement In the agreement, she specifically states that she does not agree with how things were handled and that she does not give up her rights to the guring portion of the collection growing portion being the portion of the collection that was louded by Herman Guring Yes, the larger and more valuable portion of the collection Okay, so after signing that document, does she continue to try to track down the Guring portion Or does that just prove too difficult She ran out of money She couldn't You know, She was wealthy before the war, but not after and she ran out of money. She couldn't spend all of her money trying to get her possessions back. As you're learning this as an adult You're learning about these incredibly tragic events Your grandmother having this rich life and I don't mean just money. I mean this very vibrant life that falls apart very rapidly. resulting in her having to flee with the love of her life, who dies on the voyage and she has to go off on her own I'm wondering, guess you're learning all of that? How did it change the way you thought about your grandmother I think that I really learned What a tough cookie she was. likeike what a strong independent woman she was and how how sad she must have been I know she was depressed a lot I know that from my dad and I mean How could you not be Time of Daisy's death in nineteen ninety six Charlinee didn't know the half of this story And her father, who probably knew more than her died only six months after his mother Daisy, after a long battle with leukemia We were going about our lives. And a year after my father passed away, We received a call from a Dutch journalist named Peter Den Hollander And In so many words, he said, Do you realize you have a claim against the Dutch government and We looked at each other. And my sister was there too and we We're not quite sure what he was talking about So before we knew it, he was in Connecticut. He came over to our home And we had, you know, a long discussion. and then he said, Ohh, do you have any of the paintings in your home And we did. we had one small painting and he said, Can you please show it to me? And it was upstairs in my mom's bedroom. And we went up. and he the painting off the wall. turned it around and showed us the back which we had never done. We didn't even Think to look at the back of a painting And there was The red wax seal and the stickers that my grandfather used to identify his paintings And Peter then explained to us that There were many, many more of these that were in the possession of the Dutch government that shouldn't be and that we had a claim to them. But how would Charlan and her mother know which pieces of art to look for Yes, there was the red wax seal But what if those have been removed And what about the more scattered and elusive portion that was looted by Herman Goring Finding them would be hard enough even if they knew exactly what they were looking for Well, to deal with that challenge, they were left with an item Almost like a treasure map It was something that Daisy had been holding ono since the day Jacques died. day she died Back in nineteen forty After Jacques died tragically on the boat, he and Daisy had boarded to escape the Nazis Daisy had to identify his body And as she said her last goodbye to Jacques. She reached into his pocket. and removed something from his jacket when Jacques's body was recovered Daisy had the wherewithal to take his little black book out of his jacket pocket. which inventory the entire collection the entire collection Jacques had recorded everything in this little black book And Daisy had held onto it for all those years Maybe as a keepsake kind of totem that connected her to the love of her life Or maybe because somewhere deep down, she knew that someone might someday Pick up the torch This episode of Search Engine is brought to you in part by NPR's Planet Money Whether you're an expert or just curious, Planet Money from NPR is the show that makes sense of the economy through stories you'll actually want to hear. I still remember their classic Planet Money Makes a T shirt series where they tracked the global supply chain from a cotton farm in Mississippi to a factory in Bangladesh It turned a massive abstract concept like globalization into something human and tangible. That's their superpower, making the complex feel simple. Their hosts go to unusual lengths to explain the world to you They have published their own book, shot a satellite into space to understand the private space industry. They even went inside a live book auction to show how ideas get to market If the kind of show where you learn something, probably laugh, and walk awayay seeing the world a little differently It's a space where the complex economy somehow makes sense, and the dismal science becomes anything but Follow NPR's Plet Money podcast and understand how money shapes the world. This episode of Search Engine is brought you in part by Zapier. We cover a lot of trends on this show, and over the last few months, everyone has been talking about AI. But let's face it, talking about trends doesn't help you be more efficient at work. For that, you need the right tools. You need Zappier Zabi is how you break the hype cycle and put AI to work across your company for real Zapier is truly for everyone, tech expert or not, and teams use it to automate everything from marketing to IT. It's how you actually deliver on your AI strategy with an AI orchestration platform that brings power to any workflow. so you can do more of what matters You can connect top AI models like Chat GBT and Cloud tools your team already uses, allowing you to build AI powered workflows or autonomous agents exactly where you need them Teams have already automated over three hundred million AI tasks using Zappier betweensween the millions of businesses transforming how they work with Zapier and AI. Get started for free by visiting Zapier d. com slash search. That's ZapP ER d. com slash search This episode of Search Engine is brought to you in part by Atari Hotels Qick st that for you. Phoenix tourism is up twenty three percent Hotel occupancy is at eighty nine percent And a developer called Intersection Development, who already has fifteen properties live and operating on Roosevelt Row in downtown Phoenix has purchased the land for what might be the most interesting hotel project in the country It's the first ever Atari hotel. And before you write that off is a novelty concept, Consider that the gaming industry just cross four hundred fifty billion dollars, bigger than film and music combined This project sits at the crossover of that culture with one of the strongest hospitality markets in the US. Even more interesting is that they filed a reg A plus with the SEC. whichich means you can pull up the actual financials, projections, full deal structure, and become an investor Check it out attarihotels. com. that's Atarihotels d. com. When Charlene and her mother embarked on this journey to recover their family's possessions It was the late nineties Information in general was not as accessible as it is today And if you wanted something, you often had to go out and get it When they were approached by the Dutch journalist, Peter Den Hollander He invited Charlene to accompany him to the Washington Archive to speak to an elderly archivist who knew a lot about wartime theft And he pulled out after quite some time. came out with a large partart of files that somewhere I mean, they must have been unclassified at the time, but they had the stamps on them originally that they were classified Peter and I started to Go through them And Yeah, that's where I saw some of the correspondence and the dealings that had gone on and I think that is when I officially knew Things were not, know taken care of properly after the war and that my family was not treated properly felt a little bit like an investigator. And Peter, who was an investigative journalist We got to a point where we said, we can't keep doing this. Let's take what we have and let's move on You know, let's go home, let's come up with a plan on next steps And what plan did you come up with So we went my mom and I went back to Holland and We interviewed some attorneys and one of them laughed at us and said you will never get anything back that the Dutch government. possesses now, like don't waste your time But then we did find some attorneys that were great And around the same time, upon hearing that Charlene and her mother were up to something The Dutch government proactively reached out to the vonsaers I think we met at the Dutch consulate. They told us not to bring our attorney They flew all the way to New York to discourage us from pursuing our claim. and told us not to bring an attorney but brought their attorney It was just very odd. And I think at that moment, we kind of realized they were scared And it almost really fueled the fire But their first recovery did not come from the Dutch goovernment It was May of two thousand one And Christie's was auctioning a piece of art by the Flemish painter, Jan Wellellens D Coke The Vonsaerers's team cross referenceced the painting saw that it was on their list and swooped in Sure enough, there was a gap in the provenance And on the back of the painting a red wax sticker After sixty years, the painting was returned to its rightful owner descendants of Jacques Gautsticker. The title of the painting was The Temptation of S. Anthony That's Sain. Anthony as in the Patron Saint of Lost Items. That first painting coming back sort of set the stage. It's sort of made everything become a reality and att least for me, I thought, okay This really is happening. We really are going to do this And if it's one piece at a time or paintings from the Dutch government, whatever, we're going to keep going and We're going to fight for this. Right. So you've got some wind in your sails after this, right? And What's the pace going forward? Are you recovering things all the time? Is it slow and steady? No It's slow and frustrating Yeah, very slow and frustrating. And I know my mother at least along the way sometimes felt like we should throw the towel in But we didn't And I think she's happy that we didn't. and She's been pretty strong along the way. and It worked out. And it's still working From two thousand one to two thousand six, the paintings trickled in. It was frustrating, as Charmin puts it.