Musée d'Orsay Opens Permanent 'Who Owns These Works?' Gallery for Nazi-Looted Art

France's Musée d'Orsay in Paris inaugurated a permanent gallery titled 'Who Owns These Works?' (À qui appartiennent ces œuvres?) on or around May 5, 2026, displaying 225 MNR (Musées Nationaux Récupération) artworks — pieces recovered from Nazi Germany after World War II but never successfully restituted to their original Jewish owners or heirs. The gallery currently shows 12 paintings and one sculpture drawn from the MNR collection, including Edgar Degas' 'Souper au bal' — once owned by Fernand Ochsé, a French Jewish collector deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau and murdered — and a Renoir canvas acquired at a 1942 Paris auction for Adolf Hitler's planned 'Führermuseum' in Linz, Austria. The gallery's creation reflects France's ongoing reckoning with its role in Nazi art looting: German authorities methodically plundered an estimated 100,000 artworks from French Jewish collectors, art dealers, and private individuals between 1940 and 1944, often with direct cooperation from French institutions. After liberation, 61,000 works were returned to France; approximately 2,000 remain unidentified or unclaimable as MNR works. The gallery invites visitors and potential heirs to come forward with claims. AP reported the opening as part of broader European efforts to identify and return Holocaust-looted cultural property, which accelerated after the 1998 Washington Principles on Nazi-Confiscated Art. CNN reported on the gallery on May 8, 2026, as part of VE Day anniversary coverage. The Musée d'Orsay holds MNR works alongside its regular collection and has accelerated provenance research in collaboration with French and international bodies.