- Femme nue couchée
Infobox Painting|
title=Femme nue couchée
artist=Gustave Courbet
year=1862
type=Oil on canvas
height=75
width=97
city=
museum=Private collection"Femme nue couchée" ( _fr. Nude Reclining Woman) is a 1862
painting by French Realist painterGustave Courbet (1819–1877). It depicts a young dark-haired woman reclining on a couch, wearing only a pair of shoes andstocking s. Behind her, partly drawn red curtains reveal an overcast sky seen through a closed window. The work is likely influenced byGoya 's "La maja desnuda ".The painting was initially owned by Alexandre Berthier and later by
Marcell Nemes . In 1913, it was bought by the Hungarian collectorFerenc Hatvany . At one time, he painted a copy of the painting and, as a practical joke, sent it to be exhibited as the original at aBelgrade exhibition.Akinsha (2008)] Together with the rest of Hatvany's collection, the painting was looted from aBudapest bank vault during the 1945Soviet conquest of the city inWorld War II . After it was briefly seen attached to the tarpaulin of a Soviet military vehicle onBuda Castle Hill, the painting appeared to have vanished without a trace.It surfaced again in 2000 and 2003, when it was offered for sale first to the
Budapest Museum of Fine Arts and then to theCommission for Art Recovery (CAR) by a Slovak man claiming to be an antiques dealer, but who appeared to his interlocutors to be involved with the Slovakorganised crime scene. The dealer produced anaffidavit , judged reliable by the CAR, stating that the painting was given by Soviet soldiers to a doctor from a village nearBratislava in return for his medical treatment of a wounded soldier. [Lichfield (2007)] An inspection of the picture'scraquelure determined that the painting was indeed the original and not Hatvany's copy.After five years of negotiations,
Interpol involvement and diplomatic wrangling between the US and Slovakian government, the CAR managed to acquire the painting for Hatvany's heirs in exchange for a USD 300,000 reward. It was shown to the public for the first time since the 1930s in a 2007 Courbet exposition at theGrand Palais inParis .References
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