'It's a brawl' Film explores story of art dealer forced by Nazis to sell collection

From the Benin bronzes to the Parthenon marbles, debates over the restitution of cultural artefacts are now a fact of life in an international art world forced to reckon with the often controversial history of its treasures.

- Nadia Khomami

From the Benin bronzes to the Parthenon marbles, debates over the restitution of cultural artifacts are now a fact of life in an international art world forced to reckon with the often controversial history of its treasures.

Museums around the world are having to consider the implications of retaining items many argue were taken from their owners under persecution or duress.

While many of the rows over restitution pertain to centuries-old pieces, the recovery of which is complicated by the time that has passed since their removal, a documentary shows how the fight to recover more modern artwork can be just as problematic.

The Spoils follows the continuing attempts to restitute the assets of a German-Jewish art dealer, drawing attention to how loaded a political and cultural issue restitution has become.

The film, which premieres in Britain as part of the Jewish film festival, follows two fraught restitution cases and two botched exhibitions attempting to honor Max Stern, who liquidated his Dusseldorf gallery in a Nazi-forced auction in 1937.

"The issues in the film go beyond the Holocaust and resonate with larger questions facing the art world right now," the film's director, Jamie Kastner, said.

"In recent years restitution has become an endlessly loaded political and cultural issue - be it over antiquities, colonial plunder, the Benin bronzes, the Parthenon marbles, or last week a Monet from Austria.