Leinkauf, Hans

Hans Leinkauf

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20.10.1879 Wien – 6.2.1946 Los Angeles

After his father's death in 1922, Hans Leinkauf took over Speditionsgeschäft Josef J. Leinkauf in Helferstorferstraße in Vienna's 1st district. He lived from 1933 in an apartment at Beethovenplatz 2 and owned an art collection inherited from his parents and further supplemented by himself. Apart from paintings by the Hungarian painter László Mednyánszky, it consisted above all of works by well-known sixteenth- and seventeenth-century artists such as Hans Beham, Albrecht Dürer and Rembrandt van Rijn, as well as valuable carpets. He was persecuted by the Nazi regime as a Jew but managed to escape in 1940 to the USA, where he married Helene Ziegler (1869–1969), who had also emigrated from Vienna to the USA. Before departing, he had applied to the Zentralstelle für Denkmalschutz (Central Monument Protection Authority) for permission to export his artworks and various interior furnishings. Permission was granted for most items, but some works were withheld and transferred to the Albertina for appraisal. The Albertina purchased a print by the Dutch painter and etcher Wallerant Vaillant, and the rest of the items were released for export. The removal goods transported to Trieste for shipment to the USA were seized in 1944 and sent back to the German Reich. Leinkauf's attempts to establish the whereabouts of the crates were unsuccessful.

After Leinkauf's death in 1946, his widow managed to have the property in Helferstorferstraße restituted, but the removal goods have not been found, in spite of a detailed list of their contents. In 2013, restitution of the print acquired by Albertina was recommended.

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Publications about the person / institution

Beschluss des Kunstrückgabebeirats, Hans Leinkauf, 8.10.2013, URL: www.provenienzforschung.gv.at/beiratsbeschluesse/Leinkauf_Hans_2013-10-08.pdf (3.12.2020).

Archives

BDA-Ausfuhr, Zl. 2814/39 und 2816/39, Hans Leinkauf.
BDA-Archiv, Restitutionsmaterialien, K. 40/1, PM Helene Leinkauf, GZ. 5157/49.

OeStA/AdR, E-uReang, VVSt, VA 2121, Hans Leinkauf.
OeStA/AdR, E-uReang, Hilfsfonds, Abgeltungsfonds 2364, Helene Leinkauf.
OeStA/AdR, E-uReang, Hilfsfonds, ("Alter Hilfsfonds") 21381, Ziegler Helene.

WStLA, Historische Wiener Meldeunterlagen, Meldeauskunft Hans Leinkauf.
WStLA, M.Abt. 119, A 41, VEAV 1158, 1. Bez., Hans Leinkauf.
WStLA, Verlassenschaft, Josef Leinkauf, GZ. A  72/22.