An 18th-century Italian painting looted by Nazis from Dutch-Jewish art collector Jacques Goudstikker will be returned to his sole surviving heir following a Friday court ruling in Argentina. The artwork, missing for eight decades, was discovered after appearing in an online real estate listing for a home in Mar del Plata.
A federal judge in Argentina approved a legal agreement on Friday that paves the way for the repatriation of a long-lost European masterpiece.
The Real Estate Listing That Exposed a Hidden Nazi Legacy
The discovery of the portrait happened by chance in August 2025. Reporters with the Rotterdam-based newspaper Algemeen Dagblad were investigating the background of Friedrich Kadgien, a high-ranking Nazi financier and SS paramilitary official who fled Europe after World War II and died in South America in 1978 without facing war crimes charges.
The home belonged to Patricia Kadgien, the fugitive official’s daughter. Within hours of the newspaper publishing its findings, the real estate listing vanished from the internet. Although initial police raids failed to locate the canvas immediately, Kadgien’s legal counsel surrendered the artwork to authorities more than a week later.
Legal Deal Secures Return Without Trial
Under the court-approved agreement signed on Friday by Federal Judge Santiago Inchausti, Patricia Kadgien and her husband, Juan Carlos Cortegoso, agreed to renounce all claims to the portrait.
In exchange for surrendering the artwork and avoiding a criminal trial, the couple will spend two years under court supervision, keep authorities informed of their whereabouts, and make financial payments to local medical facilities in Mar del Plata. Federal prosecutor Carlos Martinez outlined the terms of the settlement during the proceedings.
From Amsterdam Collections to Wartime Duress
The painting’s journey traces back to the devastating losses suffered by Jacques Goudstikker, one of pre-war Europe’s most prominent art dealers. Goudstikker maintained a celebrated collection of roughly 1,100 paintings, including masterpieces by Rembrandt and Vermeer. When Adolf Hitler’s forces invaded the Netherlands in May 1940, Goudstikker and his family attempted to flee by sea. Goudstikker died in a tragic shipwreck during the escape.
In the wake of his death, his massive inventory was sold under duress to high-ranking Nazi officials, including Hermann Göring, Hitler’s right-hand man who amassed a colossal illicit art cache during the conflict. Friedrich Kadgien, acting as Göring’s financial adviser, managed foreign currency, precious metals, and confiscated properties for the regime. While the Dutch state managed to recover approximately 300 works after the war and returned most to Goudstikker’s family, countless other pieces remained scattered across the globe.
For decades, the recovered portrait was cataloged in Goudstikker’s records and exhibited in Amsterdam as a creation of Italian Baroque painter Giuseppe Vittore Ghislandi. However, a court-ordered examination conducted by Argentina’s National Academy of Fine Arts during the current legal proceedings determined a different attribution, identifying the creator as Italian artist Giacomo Antonio Melchiorre Ceruti.
Next Steps and Exhibition Plans in Argentina
The artwork is currently in the custody of Argentina’s Supreme Court. Marei von Saher, Goudstikker’s daughter-in-law and sole surviving heir who now resides in Greenwich, Connecticut, has spent decades pursuing her family’s scattered collection.
