How Did Hitler Stolen Artwork

Stolen Artwork Hitler was known for hating Jews and trying to remove them from the world. However, he not only wanted to destroy the Jews, he wanted to erase their very existence. He wanted to make sure that in a couple a hundred years, no one would remember them. He wanted to make sure that even the smartest of people could not uncover anything about the Jews. To carry out this, Hitler stole thousands of pieces of artwork to try to destroy the cultures of the Jews.

The Nazis had multiple reasons on why they wanted to steal the artwork. Mostly because Hitler told them to. You see, Hitler had dreamed of being an artist and architect. When he did not make it into the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, he realized his purpose was not to

They wanted to show off their power by confiscating art that did not agree with the Nazis Party’s ideas and definition of art. They also wanted their own art collections. Since Hitler had an obsession with art, it helped define German society during that time. The bigger and better your art collection was, the higher your social rank was (Vermin). Hitler even had a book made on stealing art. ‘The Purging of the Temple of Art’ was the basis for destroying and stealing art. (How the Nazis Destroyed Diversity in Art)

Hitler had standards made so that the people in charge of the raids could decide what art pieces were worthy to be kept. Obviously, all the art made by or about Jews were thrown in the burn pile. Everything else had to be sorted through for Hitler’s museum, for he wanted the best artworks there. However, what did he do with the ones that were not deemed worthy of his museum?

Some non-Jewish art was burned because it was not supporting Hitler’s standards. He felt that he also needed to purge the world of ‘bad art’. He even burned entire buildings and blew up a Warsaw’s Royal Castle in Poland (Adams). Although he blew up the castle just because he could, not because it needed to be destroyed. “One of Vincent van Gogh’s most striking self-portraits of isolation, showing the painter alone with his art supplies on a road in Provence, was destroyed in a fire”