Arts in Brief: September 11

Looted painting restored to heirs; Streep among Kennedy Center honorees; London Film Fest lineup announced.

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
The Return of Tobias 311 (photo credit: Courtesy)
The Return of Tobias 311
(photo credit: Courtesy)
Looted painting restored to heirs
The Israel Museum announced on Thursday the restitution of the painting The Return of Tobias, c.
1934, by the German-Jewish artist Max Liebermann (1847-1935), to the artist’s heirs. The work was looted from the Jewish Museum in Berlin, where it was on loan from the artist, in the 1930s. The painting was received in 1955 by the Israel Museum’s precursor, the Bezalel National Museum, through the Jewish Restitution Successor Organization (JRSO), established after World War II to distribute to cultural organizations around the globe looted works of art whose owners or heirs were unknown.
Completed late in Liebermann’s life, the oil painting The Return of Tobias depicts a scene from the Book of Tobit in which Tobit’s son returns home with a cure for his father’s blindness. The restitution of the work to the heirs of Max and Martha Liebermann follows recent research that revealed that the painting was from the artist’s personal collection.
The collection of Max and Martha Liebermann comprised several thousand paintings and drawings, the vast majority of which were dispersed and lost between 1935 and 1943, either sold under duress or expropriated immediately following Martha Liebermann’s death. The family’s efforts to trace the collection in the 1950s and 1960s were unsuccessful, but recent research has identified several lost works, and The Return of Tobias is the third to be restored to the family. Following its restitution, the painting is being presented in the exhibition The Berlin Jewish Museum (1933-1938): Traces of a Lost Collection, curated by Chana Schuetz and on view at Berlin’s Centrum Judaicum.
• Jerusalem Post Staff
Streep among Kennedy Center honorees LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Actress Meryl Streep will add another honor to her illustrious career as one of the five artists recognized by the Kennedy Center for their contribution to culture.
Streep will join cellist Yo-Yo Ma, singer and songwriter Neil Diamond, Broadway singer and actress Barbara Cook and saxophonist Sonny Rollins as 2011 Kennedy Center honorees, the performing arts organization said on Wednesday.
President Barack Obama will salute the five, and other stars will perform in their honor at a ceremony to be broadcast on CBS television on December 27.
Kennedy Center chairman David M. Rubenstein said the five honorees were extraordinary people “whose collective artistry has contributed significantly to the cultural life of our nation and the world.”
Double Oscar-winner Streep, 62, is regarded as among the greatest living film actresses for performances in movies ranging from Sophie’s Choice to The Devil Wears Prada.
Rubenstein said “Sweet Caroline” singer Diamond has “created one of the most enduring catalogs of American popular music,” and he called Yo-Yo Ma “one of the most versatile and popular classical music performers in the world.”
Cook, 83, is best known for her 1950s Broadway performances in shows like Candide and The Music Man, while Grammy-winning Rollins, 81, is regarded as one of the most influential jazz musicians in the world over a 60-year career.
London Film Fest lineup announced LONDON (Reuters) - George Clooney, Ralph Fiennes and David Cronenberg will parade the red carpet of the British Film Institute's (BFI) 55th London Film Festival, which is set to showcase a varied line up of big titles and emerging talent, organizers said Wednesday.
The European premiere 360 directed by Fernando Meirelles with a glittering cast including Anthony Hopkins, Jude Law and Rachel Weisz, will launch the 16-day festival in October, and The Deep Blue Sea, also starring Weisz and directed by Terence Davies, will round off Britain's largest cinematic celebration.
Many big titles of the London Festival, such as George Clooney’s hotly anticipated work The Ides of March have already had a run in Venice, while the opening and closing films in London festival are set to make their world premiere at TIFF.
But organizers stressed the “variety and richness” of the London roster this year, which will showcase 13 world premieres, including Hut in the Woods – a new film from Germany’s Hans Weingartner, who also directed The Edukators.
The 55th London BFI Film Festival will run from Oct 12-27.