Heirs relinquish art claims

Heirs of a German Jewish woman relinquished their claim to Van Gogh and Gauguin paintings in museums in Toledo, Ohio and Detroit. In 2004, descendants of Martha Nathan said that “Les Becheurs,” by Vincent van Gogh, and “Street Scene in Tahiti,” by Paul Gauguin, had been sold in 1938 under duress. The Toledo Museum of Art, which owns the Gauguin, and the Detroit Institute of the Arts, which owns the van Gogh, researched the claims and found that the paintings were sold voluntarily.Nathan’s family took the cases to court, but an Ohio judge dismissed one claim in December and a Michigan judge dismissed the other last month. The museums announced Thursday that the family chose not to take further action. The paintings will remain on display, with a note that Nathan owned them from 1922-1938.