Ivan Mestrovic, sculptor, who has been chosen to work on the American Memorial to Six Million Jews murdered by the Nazis, has issued a statement denying any connection with the Nazis and stating that he had no hand in statements by Goering and Goebbels that his work was a fine example of Aryan art.
Mr. Mestrovic declared that he was in fact anti-Nazi and refused to attend the opening in 1935 of an exhibit of his works in Berlin–organized without his assistance–because Hitler was scheduled to attend the ceremony. He also refused to sell a bust of Goethe which he created to the Yugoslav Government when learned that it was intended as a gift to Hitler, the sculptor said. As a consequence, he added, he was imprisoned for four and one-half months as an enemy of the Nazis when Yugoslavia fell.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
