Sotheby’s sells Klimt painting, stolen by Nazis and depicting a Jew, for $236.36 million
(JNS) — A painting, which depicts a Jewish woman and which the Nazis stole after annexing Austria, sold for $236.36 million — reportedly a record for Viennese decorative artist Gustav Klimt — at a Sotheby’s auction on Nov. 18.
Dated between 1914 and 1916, the oil painting is titled “Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer” and portrays the daughter of Klimt’s “most important patrons,” Serena and August Lederer, and captures “the social prominence and beauty of the sitter,” according to Sotheby’s.
The auction house described the work as having “lush ornament details, complex palette, dazzling brushwork and carefully choreographed iconography.”
Both Serena and August Lederer were Jewish. When the Nazis stole the family’s property, Serena “signed an affidavit swearing that Elisabeth was not Lederer’s daughter, but that she was the result of a sexual liaison with Gustav Klimt, and therefore only half Jewish,” wrote the author Laurie Lico Albanese. “As a result, the Nazis let Elisabeth live freely in Vienna until her death in 1944.”
The painting sold on Nov. 18 came from the collection of Leonard Lauder, the older son of Estée Lauder, who owned it for 40 years.
The portrait was part of an auction of 55 works from Leonard Lauder’s collection, valued at more than $400 million, according to ARTnews. Two phone bidders drove the price of the Klimt far past its $130 million starting bid, eventually landing at $205 million, before fees, the magazine reported.
Imam-led walkout over Jewish participant at CUNY interfaith event draws wide condemnation
(JTA) — Jewish groups and government officials are condemning an incident at a recent interfaith event held on the campus of the City College of New York, at which a Muslim leader reportedly led a student walkout against the Hillel director after saying he refused to be “sitting next to a Zionist.”
The incident took place last week and was first reported Nov. 19 by the Times of Israel, which obtained a recording of the event hosted by the college’s Office of Student Inclusion Initiatives.
The imam let loose a series of remarks about Shariah law and “the filthy rich” before stating, “I came here to this event not knowing that I would be sitting next to a Zionist and this is something I’m not going to accept. My people are being killed right now in Gaza.”
He then added, “If you’re a Muslim, out of strength and dignity, I ask you to exit this room immediately.” Roughly 100 Muslim students followed him out the door, according to the report, and the chaplain hosting the event expressed disbelief.
“This is not dialogue — it is harassment,” the Anti-Defamation League’s New York chapter wrote on social media. The chapter’s director Scott Richman called the incident “a truly disgusting display of raw antisemitism not only by the imam but by the huge crowd of people there for an interfaith event who followed him out the door because a Jew was present.”
Marjorie Taylor Greene is feuding with Donald Trump. Could she win over Jewish Democrats?
(JTA) — As the U.S. House prepared this week to take a pivotal vote to force the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files, one leading Jewish Democrat had words of praise for a prominent MAGA diehard who helped make the vote possible.
“This is a party that’s got room for Marjorie Taylor Greene, if she wants to come over,” Rep. Jamie Raskin told a group of Florida Democrats. “We got room for anybody who wants to stand up for the Constitution and for the Bill of Rights today.”
Raskin wasn’t the only influential Jewish Democrat to have recently offered praise for Greene, the congresswoman with a history of conspiratorial remarks about Jews, Israel and antisemitism.
Last month California Sen. Adam Schiff, who had called Greene part of the “lunatic fringe” when she first entered Congress in 2021, released a short video titled “I agree with… MTG?” The issue they agreed on, Schiff said, was rising healthcare costs, which Jewish Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer also said Greene was “absolutely right” about. Such Democratic praise came as a growing number of Jewish Republicans, including Florida Rep. Randy Fine, have taken the opposite tack and more forcefully denounced Greene as an antisemite.
Such praise for Greene from unexpected corners comes as she is generating positive press for her recent public break with President Donald Trump, which helped spur all but one Republican to ultimately vote on Tuesday to release the Epstein files.
