October 15, 2026 ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Kandinsky.jpg\")
Art handlers pose with an artwork entitled ‘Das Bunte Leben, 1907, (The Colourful Life)’ by Russian artist Wassily Kandinsky, during a photocall ahead of the 20th\/21st Century: London Evening Sale, at Christie’s auctioneers in London on October 8, 2026. Photo: Carlos Jasso\/AFP<\/p>\n
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Add as a favourite source on Google Add DutchNews as a favourite source on Google <\/a><\/p>\n A painting by Wassily Kandinsky looted from a Jewish family in Amsterdam has sold at Christie\u2019s in London for \u00a327 million, (\u20ac32 million), broadcaster NOS reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n Kandinsky painted Das bunte Leben (The colourful life) in Paris in 1907. Emanuel and Hedwig Lewenstein, who ran a sewing machine factory on the Dam, bought it in 1927. Their collection also included works by Jan Toorop, Jozef Isra\u00ebls, and Jean Metzinger.<\/p>\n The painting was auctioned shortly after the German occupation began and was bought by Jewish collector Sal Slijper. His family later sold it to the Bayerische Landesbank, which loaned it permanently to the Lenbachhaus museum in Munich, where it hung for decades.<\/p>\n Researchers found that in 1940 a museum employee, acting for an unknown person, had the work taken to the auction house by courier. They said there were many indications the Nazis had seized it.<\/p>\n In 2023, the German public prosecution department classified the painting as looted art and the bank returned it to the Lewensteins\u2019 heirs.<\/p>\n That same year, the heirs sold another Kandinsky, Bild mit H\u00e4usern, for more than \u20ac60 million. Amsterdam city council returned that work after a years-long dispute. It had hung in the Stedelijk Museum until February 2022.<\/p>\n