Kallman says he remembers seeing the painting as a child in his grandfather, Felix Kallmann’s, villa in Berlin. The work depicts Dr Théophile Peyron, the physician who treated Van Gogh during his stay at the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole psychiatric hospital in southern France.
Vincent Van Gogh's Hôpital Saint-Paul à Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, 1889 (Credit: Musée d’Orsay)[Missing Credit]
Kallmann has argued that the painting formed part of his family’s collection before it was stolen by the Nazis and dispersed.
While researchers have confirmed that the Kallmann family suffered widespread dispossession under Nazi persecution, they have yet to confirm whether this particular painting was sold voluntarily or under pressure.
The uncertainty stems from a gap in the painting’s documented ownership between June 1932 and February 1934.
Before then, records show that Felix Kallmann tried to sell the work to Berlin’s Staatsgalerie, which declined because it already had several Van Gogh paintings in its possession. The painting then disappears from the historical record until it resurfaces in the Paris gallery of Jewish art dealer Paul Rosenberg.
It has not been established whether the sale took place before Adolf Hitler came to power on January 30, 1933, or afterwards, when German Jews were already facing increasing restrictions on their rights and property.
Felix Kallmann was a prominent Berlin lawyer and collector who also held senior positions at major German production companies and a film company. He died in November 1938, just days after Kristallnacht.
His son, Hartmut, escaped deportation after marrying a woman classified as Aryan under the Nazi racial laws. After the war, he emigrated with his family to America.
Researchers have established that Felix bought the painting in 1914 from Berlin’s Paul Cassirer Gallery, together with another Van Gogh now held by Madrid’s Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum. Both paintings appear to have followed similar paths until the early 1930s, when they were acquired by Paul Rosenberg, although exactly how and when remains unclear.
One theory suggests the works passed through the Cassirer Gallery’s network as parts of its collection were transferred to Amsterdam to protect them from possible Nazi confiscation. However, no surviving documents have confirmed this.
The painting later passed through several owners before being donated to the Louvre by Jewish art dealer Max Kaganovitch, who was also persecuted by the Nazis. It entered the Musée d’Orsay’s collection when the museum opened in 1986.
Kallmann maintains that his grandfather’s collection was still intact when Hitler took power and that its dispersal resulted directly from Nazi persecution.
His lawyers argue the claim falls within the 1998 Washington Principles, which France has endorsed, recognising that sales made under antisemitic persecution may be treated as involuntary transfers.
