Paul Westheim


Paul Westheim was a German art historian and publisher of the magazine Das Kunstblatt.

Biography

Born into a Jewish family he studied art history at the Technische Universität Darmstadt and then, in 1906, at the Humboldt University of Berlin where he was taught by Heinrich Wölfflin and Wilhelm Worringer. Westheim published monographs on Oskar Kokoschka, Wilhelm Lehmbruck, and Mexican sculpture.
His German citizenship was stripped from him in 1935. He moved to Paris the same year. Despite his exile status, Westheim was considered an enemy alien in France at the beginning of the war and was interned. Shunted from camp to camp he later referred to this as his "Tour de France." As France fell to the Germans, he escaped his internment camp in 1941, fleeing France through the ERC. From Marseille he moved to Spain, Portugal and ultimately Mexico, where he married Mariana Frenk, who assisted him.

Paul Westheim's Art Collection

Before the rise of Hitler, Paul Westheim had gathered an important art collection of German Expressionists. In 2013 the heirs of Paul Westheim filed suit against the heirs of Charlotte Weidler for the return of paintings from the collection, which had been entrusted to Weidler for safekeeping during Westheim's flight. Weidler told Westheim the artworks had been destroyed; however she began selling them as her own after his death The matter was resolved in 2019 after the death of Weidler, with Yris Solomon, the executor of Charlotte Weidler’s estate, successfully defending the case. The court supported the claim that Marianna Frenk had relinquished all claims to the artworks in Westheim’s collection.