Reclusive German Cornelius Gurlitt, who hoarded Nazi-looted art, has died

The elderly recluse whose Munich apartment contained a secret art hoard, including masterpieces looted by the Nazis from their Jewish owners in the second World War, has died after a heart operation, his spokesman said yesterday.

Authorities stumbled upon Cornelius Gurlitt’s trove of paintings and drawings by the likes of Chagall, Picasso and Toulouse-Lautrec after a 2012 routine check on a train from Switzerland turned up wads of cash, triggering a tax probe.

Spokesman Stephan Holzinger said Gurlitt (81) had decided to return home after a complicated heart operation and spend his final days in the Munich flat that once housed part of his beloved collection.

Gurlitt’s collection was assembled by his father, an art dealer put in charge of selling what Adolf Hitler called “degenerate” art to help fund the Nazis’ war effort.

Now worth about €1 billion ($1.4bn), the hoard remained undetected for decades in the flat and a house in Salzburg, Austria. Gurlitt sold some pieces to finance his quiet lifestyle and his healthcare.

“I haven’t loved anything more than my pictures in my life. But hopefully it will all be cleared up soon and I will finally get my pictures back,” he told Der Spiegel magazine last November. – (Reuters)