German Master Drawings from the Koenigs Collection. Return of a Lost Treasure.

Sewn as issued, pictorial wrappers with flaps. Very fine / as new. Provenance: Ulf Cederlöf (1948-2021), chief curator of prints and drawings at the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm. Rotterdam, NAi Publishers / Netherlands Ministry of Education, 2004. 4to. 160 pp. 195 reproductions, most in colour. (Publisher:) "This lavishly illustrated book marks the return of a lost treasure to the Netherlands. As part of the renowned Koenigs Collection in Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam, these 139 drawings and 3 prints were unlawfully obtained by the Nazis during the Second World War, together with a further 389 drawings. During the aftermath of the war this part of the collection disappeared. After a long quest a substantial share of the missing drawings was eventually found in Kyiv, capital of Ukraine. Subsequently, the Ukrainian authorities, recognizing the Netherlands' claim of ownership, decided to return these works of art to the Netherlands. The drawings are now reunited with the Koenigs Collection in Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen as a loan from the Netherlands Institute of Cultural Heritage. - - - The vicissitudes of the missing drawings during and after the war are recounted in an absorbing essay by Albert Elen, Senior Curator of the Print Room at Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, who has been involved in the search for the missing drawings for many years. Most of the recovered drawings are by 15th- and 16th-century German artists, including works by such famous draughtsmen as Hans Holbein, Hans Baldung Grien and Lucas Cranach. They have not been on public view for more than 64 years. Fifty have never even been illustrated before and as such represent new discoveries. All are reproduced here in full colour for the first time, many at actual size, with revised material data and attributions. They are presented to the world audience to admire and enjoy." - - - Despite the recovery of most of the missing sheets, the book also lists and reproduces 25 works not yet located.…