A violin 'revives' thanks to a searcher of instruments looted by the Nazis

BarcelonaAlmost nine decades after being confiscated during the German occupation of France, a violin made in 1905 by the Caressa & Français house will sound again this Wednesday in Paris at a restitution ceremony for the descendants of its owner, thanks to researcher Pascale Bernheim and her long search for instruments looted by the Nazis.

"And so, this Wednesday, it will be resurrected," explains Bernheim to the Efe agency, the expert who has followed its trail for years. For her, the restitution does not only mean recovering a stolen object, but also returning its past to it.

The violin, identified by serial number 152, would have been delivered with the Conservatory prize to the young violinist Eugène Choubry, who died at the front in 1917, at 21 years old.

Subsequently, it was kept by his sister, married to Eugène Gabriel Girondelot, a notary in Vitry-le-François and collector of instruments, who hid it to protect it from the Nazis. But when German troops occupied the town in 1940, they seized the violin. "They took everything," the researcher stresses.

The instrument reappeared decades later, when an antique dealer brought it to an auction house and the auctioneer verified that it appeared in a register of looted goods and stopped the operation. "He told me: 'What do I do with this instrument that is on my desk? I don't want to keep it for the rest of my life'," recalls Bernheim.

Then, the association Musique et Spoliations (Music and Spoils), which Bernheim founded in 2017, began to reconstruct the history of the violin. For two years, Bernheim delved into the Caressa & Français archives kept in the Music Museum of Paris and, in addition, turned to genealogists.

Decisive serial number

"All violins look alike –explains Bernheim– many times a violin only exists as such because an expert has authenticated it". In this case, she recalls, "the serial number was very valuable to us".

The investigation allowed for the identification of six descendants, some of whom did not even know each other, which is why "the discovery of this instrument and this common ancestor connected people", explains Bernheim.

The violin was restored thanks to the collaboration of the house of the famous Parisian luthier Vatelot. The violinist Sarah Dayan held it in her hands for the first time a few days before the restitution and Bernheim was present when she began to play it.

"It is exactly like when you open a bottle of very good wine and they tell you that it must be opened in advance so that the wine develops", she explains. "With the sound of an instrument –the expert also says– exactly the same thing happens: you have to make it sound, make it vibrate, and then it opens".

Daughter of an antique dealer and a sculptor, Bernheim began to investigate these instruments after working in the field of art and discovering, while studying collections of looted works, that alongside the paintings there were often musical instruments. "I knew nothing about it, it is extraordinary, and when I asked who was looking for the instruments, they replied that, in reality, they did not interest anyone", says Bernheim.

Since then, Musique et Spoliations has investigated pianos, violins, cellos, clarinets, and sheet music. The association works with archives of manufacturers, museums, auction houses, and genealogists. The resolution of the Caressa & Français case was especially fast thanks to the serial number and the archives that allowed it to be identified with total certainty. For this reason, Bernheim considers it "almost a textbook case".

The six heirs have decided to put the violin up for sale at an auction scheduled for December 3rd. The proceeds will be divided between them and the antique dealer who brought the instrument to the auction house, who, according to the research, was unaware of its provenance.

For Bernheim, the goal goes beyond finding lost instruments. Every time the association's work appears in the media, he receives new leads. One has just arrived this week and refers to a violin that a Jew handed over to another person before being arrested, asking them to keep it and return it if he returned. He never returned.

Decades later, the granddaughter of the man who kept the instrument has contacted Bernheim: "I would like this instrument to be played and for its story not to be forgotten," she told him.

"May the instrument, if it is to live again, live again with its history," concludes Bernheim, while leaving in the air an "enormous" line of research: instruments that may have traveled from the rest of Europe to Spain, Portugal, and Latin America through escape routes during and after the Second World War, both by Jews and Nazis. Some violin may have served, he says, to "pay for a passage".