Maria Altmann
Austrian-American Jewish refugee (1916–2011)
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Key Takeaways
- Maria Altmann (née Maria Victoria Bloch , later Bloch-Bauer ; February 18, 1916 – February 7, 2011) was an Austrian-American Jewish refugee from Austria, who fled her home country after it was annexed to the Nazi’s Third Reich.
- Early life Maria Altmann was born Maria Victoria Bloch on February 18, 1916, in Vienna, Austria-Hungary, the daughter of Marie Therese (née Bauer 1874–1961) and Gustav Bloch (1862–1938).
- Maria was close friends in the 1930s with Viennese actor and Hollywood-transplant Walter Slezak.
Maria Altmann (née Maria Victoria Bloch, later Bloch-Bauer; February 18, 1916 – February 7, 2011) was an Austrian-American Jewish refugee from Austria, who fled her home country after it was annexed to the Nazi’s Third Reich. She is noted for her ultimately successful legal campaign to reclaim from the Government of Austria five family-owned paintings by the artist Gustav Klimt that were stolen by the Nazis during World War II.
Early life
Maria Altmann was born Maria Victoria Bloch on February 18, 1916, in Vienna, Austria-Hungary, the daughter of Marie Therese (née Bauer 1874–1961) and Gustav Bloch (1862–1938). The family name was changed to Bloch-Bauer the following year.
She was a niece of Adele Bloch-Bauer, a wealthy Jewish patron of the arts who served as the model for some of Klimt's best-known paintings and who hosted a Viennese salon that regularly attracted the most prominent artists of the day, including Gustav Mahler, Richard Strauss, Arthur Schnitzler, Johannes Brahms, Franz Werfel, Alma Mahler, Leo Slezak, Otto Wagner, George Minne, Karl Renner, Julius Tandler, and Klimt. Maria was close friends in the 1930s with Viennese actor and Hollywood-transplant Walter Slezak. Her nephew was Canadian businessman and arts patron Peter Bentley.
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