Late last week, a French judge ruled that a judicial court in Rouen, Normandy, can proceed with handling a legal complaint filed by the heirs of Claude Monet, against the New York gallery dynasty Wildenstein & Co., according to French reports.
The complex case revolves around a 2004 transaction, in which Monet’s great-nephew agreed to relinquish a rare Monet painting depicting the artist’s father, Adolphe, to the internationally renowned Wildenstein gallery, in exchange for several paintings of lesser value. The unnamed heir, a descendant of Monet’s brother, Léon, agreed to the arrangement despite being “very attached” to the painting of Adolphe Monet, because he wished to fairly distribute his inheritance between his two children, said the family’s lawyer, Corinne Hershkovitch, speaking to ARTnews.
According to the complaint, in return for the coveted Adolphe Monet Reading in a Garden (1867), French-American dealer Guy Wildenstein gave the family five paintings by artists such as Pierre Bonnard, Alfred Sisley, and, importantly, another Monet landscape titled Marine, Amsterdam (1874). However, when the family tried to sell the latter Monet painting in 2019, they were surprised to learn it was seriously damaged. Experts ultimately determined the original wooden canvas support for Marine, Amsterdam, had been lost, and at some date prior to 2004, the canvas had been “transferred” to another stretcher and distorted in the process.
“The family is very humiliated to have been fooled this way,” Hershkovitch said. For some 20 years, Guy Wildenstein’s father, the late, influential dealer Daniel Wildenstein, “had tried to seduce the descendant of the artist [who passed away in 2008] to sell the magnificent portrait of the father,” she added. “Wildenstein & Co couldn’t have ignored the fact that the pictorial layer of the Monet painting, Marine Amsterdam, was very damaged,” she insisted.
Late last year, Guy Wildenstein stepped down from the office of president at the 1875-founded gallery specializing in Old Masters and Impressionism, after he was found guilty of tax fraud in 2024, and accused of hiding masterworks in his collection from authorities. He was succeeded by his son David.
Wildenstein & Co has not been accused of damaging any paintings, but the Monet family claims the gallery “was not honest in the transaction,” which resulted in its acquisition of the Monet painting depicting the impressionist’s father sitting in the shade of a sun-lit garden in full bloom. As a result, the Monet family wishes to annul the 2004 agreement and obtain, “at a minimum,” a reimbursement of the value of the damaged Marine, Amsterdam painting, estimated at $3 million.
If the original transaction is voided due to an error in the estimated value of one of the paintings involved in the contested 2004 transaction, according to French law, Wildenstein & Co could be forced to return the painting of Monet’s father, and the family would also have to give back the five paintings it was offered in exchange, argued Hershkovitch.
There is one problem with that last scenario: The gallery has since sold the Adolphe Monet portrait to billionaire Oracle founder Larry Ellison, according to the Art Newspaper.
Before the May 28 ruling confirming the litigation can move forward in the Rouen court, Wildenstein & Co. had contested the competence of the French judicial system in handling the case and argued the legal dispute should be judged in New York. Their request was denied because the plaintiffs are considered general public consumers of art, rather than professional art buyers, and are also based in Normandy. The gallery now has until October 13 to present its defense.
ARTnews reached out to Wildenstein & Co. for comment, but did not hear back at press time.
