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June 19, 2020 - Droog Magazine periodical for investigative journalism

The Thies 'Hitlers'

to Hitler Forgery Industry main page - to Droog Magazine

Lot 1444 on the US Thies auction; falsely attributed to Hitler. Style, sort of depiction and signature do not even resemble any known authentic Hitler work.

2020 | 2019

Auctions | Press | Certificates of Authenticity

Introduction | special report

Covid 19 or not, the trade in fake Hitlers continues. However, after the police in Germany seized 67 alleged Hitler paintings and drawings in 2019, the trade seems to have shifted to the United States, where the Justice departments don't seem to care about auction houses selling objects which are clearly the work of forgers.

On April 16, 2020 Thies Military Auctions, the American branch of the German auction house Andreas Thies, organized a big online Nazi militaria auction at which 47 alleged Hitler paintings and drawings were offered, all from the collection of Wolfgang Schulze von Mertschinsky.

It is well known that this man, an US citizen born in Germany, was the American agent of Konrad Kujau, the forger who became famous by producing the fake Hitler diaries in the 1980's. It is also well known that Kujau's main business was producing and selling all kinds of fake objects, allegedly made or owned by high ranking Nazis: documents, uniforms, poems, paintings, drawings and sketches.

So it is hardly surprising that almost all of these 47 alleged Hitlers can be linked to Kujau. As none of the works bears the slightest resemblance to any of the known authentic Hitler 'watercolors' or drawings, all these works are clearly fake.

In this special report (pdf, 6 MB) all 47 alleged Hitlers are depicted and commented.

Andreas Thies, asked for comment, responded: “We did not feel that the attribution of certain works to Kujau is justified since this would oblige us to guarantee this attribution and the subject is certainly still open to research. My education as an art historian teaches me that scientific research and solid proof can never be replaced by the expression of an opinion only.”

This didn't stop Thies from stating that all works were attributed to Hitler. According to whom? Right, according to the (late?) representative of forger Konrad Kujau. Thies added: "Some might well be originals" and "I still have about 300 works from the Mertschinsky collection."