Nazi Art Looting During The Holocaust Topic Of UNH Lecture

Contact: Erika Mantz
603-862-1567
UNH Media Relations

Oct. 13, 2004



DURHAM, N.H. – The Endowed Fund for Holocaust Education at the University of New Hampshire will host the third annual Hans Heilbronner Lecture Wednesday, Oct. 27, 2004. Jonathan Petropolous, John V. Croul Professor of European History at Claremont McKenna College, will speak at 5 p.m. in the 1925 Room of the Elliott Alumni Center. His lecture is free and open to the public. A reception will begin at 4 p.m.

Petropolous, who is also associate director of the Center for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide, and Human Rights, will present “Culture and Barbarism: Nazi Art Looting and the Holocaust.” He served as research director for the Presidential Advisory Commission on Holocaust Assets in the United States until 2001 and serves as a consultant to the U.S. Department of State on looted artwork. He is the author of several books, including “The Faustian Bargain: The Art World in Nazi Germany,” which was named one of the 25 most memorable books of 2000 by the New York Public Library.

The Hans Heilbronner Lecture is named in honor of Hans Heilbronner, a retired professor of Russian history who taught at UNH for more than 30 years. He was one of the first Jewish faculty members at the university, and his family escaped Nazi Germany after his veteran father was released from a concentration camp.