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November 16, 2020 - Droog Magazine periodical for investigative journalism

The Hitler Forgery Industry

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1979 | 'More Hitlers' | Certificates of Authenticity

The strange business of selling fakes, forgeries and other concoctions attributed to Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) and other Nazi criminals.

Introduction

In the 1970's the trade in Nazi militaria intensified, and thus the activities of forgers and shady dealers and auctioneers. The German forger Konrad Kujau flooded the market with fake Hitlers: oil paintings, watercolors, drawings and sketches and even poetry.

Content

"Hitler" sold for 25.000 D-mark (September 1979)

"Hitler sold for 25.000 D-mark

The Munich based auction house Graf Klenau sells the alleged Hitler watercolor "The Charles church in Vienna" for 25,000 D-mark. Start price was 14,000 D-Mark. It was bougt by an undisclosed person from a “western foreign nation”.

As the work is dated "07" for "1907", it must be a forgery, as Hitler started only in 1910 to produce city sights of Vienna. No “Hitler” watercolor originating from 1907 was traced by the NSDAP Hauptarchiv in 1939.

Graf Klenau changed its name in the early 1980s into Hermann Historica. It is notorious for the stream of fake Hitler works and Nazi objects it auctioned and auctions..

According to the auction house, this particular work was in 1939 bought by a Viennese businessman, after mediation by the theatre actor Hans Moser. An Austrian newspaper article, in which the history of this work was described, accompanied the watercolor.

MÜNCHEN - ( DPA ) Adolf Hitlers Aquarell «Die Karlskirche in Wien» war einem interessierten Sammler am Samstag in München 25 000 Mark wert. Das 30 x 25 Zentimeter grosse Bild , im Katalog des Auktionshauses Graf Klenau in München zunächst für 14 000 Mark ausgeschrieben, ist rechts unten signiert und datiert «A. Hitler 07». Das Haus teilte am Samstag lediglich mit, das gerahmte und mit Glas versehene Aquarell sei «ins westliche Ausland» gegangen. Zu dem Bild gehört auch das Exemplar einer österreichischen Tageszeitung mit ausführlicher Schilderung der wechselvollen Geschichte des Werks, das 1939 von einem Kauf-mann in Wien durch die Vermittlung des Schauspielers Hans Moser erworben worden.

Aquarell Hitlers auf Auktion. Walliser Volksfreund, Brig (Schweiz), 24-09-1979.