The Stolen Degas

 

Dancer Making Points
by Edgar Degas
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art

The Stolen Degas

Historical commentary by Gregory E. Larson

          Over the years, I have enjoyed looking at the pastel by Edgar Degas in the Impressionist collection at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. The fairy-like pose of the ballerina, with her tutu and body shimmering in the stage lights, gives no hint to the strange provenance and journey this piece of art has taken over the past few decades. Even the official information on the Nelson-Atkins website gives us no clue to its curious past that includes a time when the whereabouts of the art was unknown. . . no clue to who stole the art (estimated value of $10 million) or who owned it before it was stolen:

Artist: Edgar Degas, French, 1834-1917

Title: Dancer Making Points

Object Date: ca. 1874-1876

Medium: Pastel and gouache on paper mounted on board

Dimensions (Unframed): 19 ¼” x 14 ½” (48.9 cm x 36.8 cm)

Signature: Signed lower left: Degas

Credit Line: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. Gift of Henry W. and Marion H. Bloch, 2008.53

          The vast majority of the public is unaware the credit line is technically incorrect. It was not gifted by the Bloch’s, but by a woman named Huguette Clark. Henry Bloch, the “H” of H&R Block tax preparation firm, and a major benefactor to the Nelson-Atkins, purchased the pastel in 2005, not knowing that it had been stolen and had been missing for thirteen years.

          Confused? Curious? You should know the rest of the story. Grab another cup of coffee and read on.

          To understand the full story, one has to know more about Huguette (French pronunciation: ou-get) Clark (1906-2011). She was a daughter of the second wife, Anna Eugenia Clark (1878-1963) and copper magnate William Andrews Clark (1839-1925). Huguette lived a storybook childhood, spending summers in France, and winters in the largest single-family house ever constructed in Manhattan, New York. Her father, William, was one of the wealthiest Americans at the time, living a rags-to-riches story of a hardscrabble miner in the Western U.S. who finally struck it rich and parlayed his wealth from mining copper to a level that competed with the Carnegies and the Vanderbilts.

          The 121-room house on 5^th Avenue was completed in 1912 after 13 years of design and construction. Five of the largest rooms were designated as galleries for W.C. Clark’s extensive art collection. When he died in 1925, the majority of the art was given to the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. After her father’s death, Huguette and her mother moved out of the house (which was to be demolished) and into a large apartment on 5^th Avenue, overlooking Central Park. On November 11^th, 1929, just two weeks after the stock market crash, Huguette and her mother purchased three pieces of art:

          Chrysanthemums by Pierre-Auguste Renoir

          Landscape by Camille Pissarro

          Dancer Making Points by Edgar Degas

          Huguette had a brief marriage in 1928, but then moved back to her mother’s apartment where she remained for decades. Her mother died in 1963, and Huguette continued to live alone in the same expansive apartment which included space on several floors.

          Huguette lived a very private life. She had taken private art and violin lessons in her young adult years and was well-versed in art and music. She owned several Stradivarius violins, jewelry and artwork worth millions. Her $50 million inheritance after her father’s death grew to $300 million by 1990. She inherited or purchased several houses from Connecticut to California, although she had not travelled out of New York since the 1950s. The last known public photo of Huguette was taken in 1931. Her attorneys rarely, if ever, saw her, and communicated with her by phone.

Huguette Clark - 1931

           She was relatively healthy, but by 1991, several skin cancers were eating away her right eyelid, cheek and lip, and she was dehydrated. The small circle of people she communicated with convinced her to go to Doctors Hospital, which eventually became part of the Beth-Israel Hospital System in New York. The doctors operated and removed the skin cancers. Self-conscious of her appearance and wanting her privacy, Huguette became more reclusive, and would not leave the hospital. Although the hospital tried to convince her to leave, they eventually decided to quietly allow her to stay after she agreed to donate some money. The directors of Beth-Israel were going to play the “long game,” and work with Huguette in hopes of getting a $100 million gift. The big-payoff never occurred. She continued to give relatively small amounts to the hospital, and a small amount upon her death.

          It was not long after she began her permanent stay at the hospital that the Degas pastel disappeared from the walls of her 5^th Avenue apartment. The building manager notified the FBI, and Huguette was told of the disappearance. She was distraught, but wanting her privacy, she asked the FBI to drop the search, although they kept the information about the pastel on their computer list of stolen art.

Henry Bloch - Kansas City Philanthropist

          Years passed. Henry Bloch was amassing many Impressionist paintings, with the intent of bequeathing them to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, and the art would pass to the museum once Henry and his wife had died. In 2005 he purchased the Degas pastel Dancer Making Points from an art dealer in Manhattan. The information became public and that is when the FBI became aware of the pastel again. The FBI notified Huguette and her attorney. Huguette wanted the artwork back, but the Bloch attorneys said the 13-year disappearance of the pastel made it unclaimed property.

          The dealer told the FBI he had purchased it in the early 1990s from a well-dressed man with a European accent, who said the pastel had been in the family for a long time. The dealer no longer had any contact information regarding the seller (Author’s note: seems a bit strange for a piece of art worth $10 million).

          With no resolution on what to do with the Degas pastel, the attorneys (Huguette’s, the Bloch’s, and the Nelson-Atkins’) began discussions and deliberations. Huguette was convinced by her attorney that she would benefit from a large tax write-off if she gifted the painting to the Nelson-Atkins. The attorneys agreed that the Nelson-Atkins could “loan” the painting to Henry and Marion to display at their house until the entire Impressionist collection was passed on to the museum.

          A final agreement culminated in a bizarre scene outside the Bloch’s home in toney Mission Hills, Kansas. In 2008, attorneys for Huguette Clark, Henry Bloch, and the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art arrived in Henry’s driveway. The pastel was brought out of the Bloch’s home and handed to Huguette’s attorney, in essence, giving the Degas art back to Huguette. Huguette’s attorney then handed the pastel to the Nelson-Atkins director, Marc Wilson, thus gifting the pastel to the museum. Finally, the director carried Dancer Making Points into the Bloch residence, loaning it to the Bloch’s until it would be returned upon their deaths to the museum with all of the donated Impressionist paintings. There was a flurry of paperwork and signatures to finalize the legal settlement, including an official statement signed by Huguette’s doctor that she was of sound mind at 102 years old, and that she agreed to donate the piece of artwork to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.

          At her request, the Nelson-Atkins gave Huguette a full-size photo print of the pastel.

          That brings us back to the official description of the Degas artwork being a gift from the Bloch’s. Obviously, that is technically incorrect, but it is quite possible that in the fine print of legal agreement, Huguette agreed to having Bloch’s name associated with the gift since she fiercely protected her name from being shown in public.

The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art -Kansas City, Missouri
photo by Gregory E. Larson

          Huguette, at 104 years old, passed away peacefully in the Beth Israel Medical Center in New York in 2011. Her will was contested by distant relatives, The Corcoran Gallery, Beth Israel Hospital System, and numerous other entities, and was settled after several years by the courts.

          Henry Bloch, died in April of 2019 at the age of 96. His legacy is found throughout Kansas City from the fountain in front of Union Station to the Bloch School of Management at UMKC, and on galleries and a major wing at Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.  

(Author’s note: As of this blog posting, Dancer Making Points is not hanging in the small room in the Impressionist Gallery at the Nelson-Atkins. There is a display of miniature portraits in the room. A museum representative did not know when the Degas pastel would return to the Impressionist galleries. It is possible that the art is on temporary loan to another museum.)

Source Material: Book; Empty Mansions, by Bill Dedman and Paul Clark Newell, Jr. copyright 2013, Ballentine Books (subtitle: The Mysterious Life of Huguette Clark and the Spending of a Great American Fortune).

Gravestones in the Singaporean Jungle

Gravestones in the Singaporean Jungle

Travel memoir by Gregory E. Larson

          Truth be told, some of my best adventures are in out-of-the-way places where few people go. These are not tourist destinations, but are unusual lesser-known spots that sometimes are a bit quirky. A prime example of this is Bukit-Brown, an abandoned Chinese cemetery in the jungle on the Singapore island/city/state. The more information that surfaced, the more interesting and bizarre the destination seemed.

          Singapore is an island at the tip of the Malaysian peninsula. It is fast becoming the new “Hong Kong.” There are tourist attractions (most of which I have visited) but it is mainly a business and shipping center. Six million people inhabit Singapore which has about 284 square miles. Property is at a premium, but there are still some undeveloped areas. My architectural description of Singapore is “urban nodes of tall buildings popping up in the jungle with interconnecting boulevards and highways.”

Urban nodes of tall buildings and interconnecting boulevards

          Prior to my visit there earlier this year, my daughter sent me some links to Bukit-Brown’s history. The cemetery was opened in 1922, and was filled with gravesites by World War II. Some additional burials were made available after the Japanese occupation, but the burials stopped by 1950. The cemetery closed in 1973. I was aghast when I read that the government is planning for development on the Bukit-Brown site. In fact, over 5,000 gravesites had already been eliminated to allow for a highway expansion. The bodies were exhumed and cremated. Attempts were made to connect with families so the ashes could be given to the descendants. Still, about 170 acres of land exists with close to 100,000 graves that have remained undisturbed. That will begin to change in 2030 when the process starts to remove all of the remaining graves and headstones.

One of the reservoirs on the island of Singapore

          On a recent day-hike in Singapore, I passed a reservoir (one of many) that is used for the island’s water supply. I walked through some urban nodes and past a golf course. When I got to the cemetery there was a sign that said it was closed, although there was no gate or fence to keep me out, and there was a road to walk on. The sign also said “Enter at your own risk.”  That caused me to pause. I decided to continue past the cemetery and discuss the issue of entering later with my daughter and son-in-law. I knew they would know the dangers.

Ominous sign along the entry to Bukit-Brown Cemetery

          My daughter said that she and her husband would go there with me on a Saturday morning hike, when they were not working. It worked out for the best, because they knew a lot of history and were able to share it with me. As we walked past the entry sign, the cemetery exuded an eerie feeling with burning incense and the high humidity creating a haze among the jungle shadows.

The burning incense and the humidity gave the cemetery an eerie feeling

          My daughter said that historians are etching the gravestones and taking pictures of them, because the stones are rich in information. My son-in-law shared with me that a symbol on the corner of the gravestone represents the Chinese village from which the person’s family came from. With the village symbol and research, a family can go back over 1,000 years of family records. 

Examples of the gravestones with the symbolic horseshoe-shaped mountainside

          He also told me that the horseshoe-shaped area behind the gravestone is a symbol of a mountainside, as the Chinese custom is to have the burials on a mountainside. There are significant symbols of nature and guardians, as well as a separate headstone to the right of the main headstone that represents an offering to the “earth god.”

Gravestone with a guardian

Largest gravestone that we saw in Bukit-Brown

          Although the last burials occurred many decades ago, we saw many families there visiting graves and burning incense. A history walking tour was happening as well. We also saw monkeys fighting over scraps of food offerings left by families at the graves. Some graves were well kept with the grass and weeds cut regularly. Other areas were succumbing to the jungle overgrowth which occurs at a rapid rate. Additional tombstones had tented areas or tarps so that families could come to visit the grave and stay out of the sun or rain.

Bukit-Brown Cemetery covers roughly 170 acres

          As we walked for a couple of hours, I sensed that a lot of history of the island and some of its Chinese heritage was going to disappear when the cemetery is removed. I had to remind myself that different nations require different customs. It is hard for me to imagine cemeteries in the U.S. being demolished. I know of many urban areas that have wrought-iron fences around small cemeteries in parking lots or busy corners of the city.

          I wondered what the area will look like in a hundred years from now. Progress marches on, and generation after generation learn to deal with the issues of their time. And, truth be told, those tall buidlings in the jungle will return to dust in some distant era.

The Singaporean Jungle will probably outlive the civilized era

THE END

New Zealand: A Best Kept Secret

 

The Southern Alps in New Zealand

New Zealand: A Best Kept Secret

travel memoir by Gregory E. Larson

          Have you ever been to a place that felt like you were on another planet? . . . a place with exotic flowers, plants and mountains? . . . a place with glaciers, rain forests and arid plains? Some of you may have traveled there, to New Zealand. On my recent adventure, I learned their agriculture economy and is gradually becoming a tourist economy. For so many decades the destination has been a best kept secret, but that is changing.

          After my arrival in Christchurch on the South Island, I spent two days acclimating to the summer and to the time change. Having spent more than three days travel to get there, I wandered out into the giant botanical garden full of sunshine, huge lawns and giant trees. I dropped the day pack onto the ground and lay down in the grass to stretch out. I thought, “I’m out of the plane and I made it all in one piece!”

The Christchurch Botanical Garden was the best antidote after the long trip.

Entrance Fountain at the Christchurch Botanical Garden

          Once acclimated, I began the Classic South Island Tour with Active Adventures, Inc., with fourteen people and two guides. It was a trip to places of unrivaled beauty and ruggedness. From 400 ft. waterfalls to rainforests and mountain valleys, every day was truly an adventure, including several days of rugged hikes, an additional day of biking and a day of kayaking. Complimenting the exercise were a bush-pilot flight to a remote valley, a wild and crazy jet boat ride, a gondola ride above Queenstown, and a cruise on Milford Sound. 

We hiked to a 400 ft. waterfall near Arthur's Pass

          On the kayaking day, we toured Okarito Lagoon and saw two White Herons, which are extremely rare. Only 170 remain in existence. 

Kayaking on a tributary to Okarito Lagoon

          Our “epic” day of the tour included a flight into a remote valley, a nine-mile hike out of the valley, and a jet boat ride back to our resort. The bush pilot flight was the most exciting twenty minutes I have experienced in a plane, which was a tiny Cessna 185 with balloon tires for landing on grass in the mountain valley. I felt as though I could reach out and touch the trees on the mountainsides, and was in awe of the beauty of the snow-capped peaks and the glacial ponds which are only visible from the air. Once back on the ground, we had to ford a tributary, then hike up the valley towards a beautiful peak in the clouds. Turning back down the valley, we hiked several miles to the Wilkin River where the jet boats took us back to our resort.

The Cessna 185 plane that took us to a remote valley.

Take-off was next to the Wilkin River Valley, then up into the mountains.

I felt like I could almost touch the trees on the mountainside.

The remote Siberian Valley in Mount Aspiring National Park

A day of memorable hiking

A wild and crazy boat ride was the exclamation point on an epic day.

          Two days were spent in Queenstown, which was crawling with tourists. It reminded me of an oversized Estes Park in Colorado. One of the days was spent hiking up Ben Lomond Peak. It began by taking a 1500 ft., mostly vertical gondola to a point above Queenstown, then a strenuous hike at twenty percent grade for three miles. I barely made it two miles, and then turned around to save my legs for the remainder of the week.

Overlooking Queenstown at the top of the gondola station.

View of Ben Lomond Peak from the twenty-percent grade on the trail.

          The last day of the tour began in the early morning darkness, with our guides brewing French-press coffee. We piled into the bus and drove to one of the top tourist destinations: Milford Sound in the Fiordland National Park.

Milford Sound - unrivaled beauty

          About every twenty minutes a huge cruise boat (with 150-200 people on board) departed for the two-hour cruise out to the Tasman Sea and back. During the cruise, the tour boat ahead of ours had stopped and turned at a waterfall. The photo had a good composition for a watercolor: reflections in the water, the boat and waterfall as the focus, with numerous textures and colors on the cliffs and mountain. Back home in the studio, it was a joy to paint, although it is one of the most difficult scenes I’ve painted, due to all of the detail.

Stirling Falls - Milford Sound, New Zealand
2025 watercolor by Gregory E. Larson

          Our last hike was one for the memories. We hiked two miles up through the forest to a summit pass. The beginning was in the mossy woods with ferns and trees surrounding the trail. As we ascended through the forest, we began to have glimpses of the granite peaks through the 800-year-old trees. Once at the pass, the vistas were in all directions. Our guide passed out boxes of pasta salad for our lunch, and we sat on benches that viewed the snow-capped peaks. It was one of those places that was hard for me to leave. When we began the trek down the mountain trail and back into the forest, I knew that I had fallen in love with New Zealand.

Glimpses of the granite peaks through the ancient forests.

A view at the mountain pass on the last hike - one to remember.

THE END