Alexandre Calame, 'Chalets at Rigi', 1861

Chalets at Rigi is one of four variants, which have been confused at times in the literature. In terms of composition and dimensions it is most closely related to the version in the Neue Galerie, Kassel, which was acquired in 1883 with the Bose Collection (oil on canvas, 41.5 × 63 cm, inv. AZ 21). According to Calame’s Catalogue de mes Ouvrages the Kassel painting was a replica commissioned by Graf von Bose in 1861, promised for the end of July but dispatched by Calame on 21 September of that year. On the back of the National Gallery painting there is an inscription in ink on a label, partly covered by brown paper, which reads: Largeur 62 cent/hauteur 40…./Genève 20 Sept 1861/A Calame. This perhaps suggests that it was this painting, presumably finished on 20 September, which was the replica intended for Bose, but that it was the first version that was actually sent.

Nothing is known of its provenance until it was with Galerie Maria Gillhausen in Munich in July 1943. According to the databases for the Special Commission Linz and the Central Collecting Point in Munich (both available online at the Deutsches Historisches Museum), it was sold that same month by Maria Gillhausen to Galerie Maria Almas-Dietrich for Hitler’s projected museum (Führermuseum) in Linz for 57,000 Reichsmark, probably together with Linz 2929 (Barend Cornelis Koekkoek, Brook in a Forest with Fisherman). The Linz numbers 2930/1120 are on the back. Maria Gillhausen (1889–1948) sourced many of her paintings in occupied countries, particularly France, buying from such dealers as Pierre Landry and Raphaël Gérard. She was also associated with Adolf Wüster, an art looter who worked out of the German Embassy in Paris during the war, at the end of which holding in her custody paintings belonging to him. Gillhausen is an extremely problematic figure, named by the Art Looting Investigation Unit as a dealer and mediator who acted on behalf of the German regime, and who is on the Red Flag List. While more research needs to be carried out into her activities as a dealer, it has to be acknowledged that her source for this painting is currently unknown, and that all records connected with her gallery, including ledgers and exhibition catalogues, are at present missing. However, there is currently no evidence to indicate that the work was acquired illegally or improperly.

Chalets at Rigi is number 36 in Album XXVI of the photographic albums assembled for Hitler, this one dispatched from Dresden to Hitler on 3 November 1943: Alexandre Calame, Blick von einer Alm auf den Pilatus. The painting was held at the Führerbau in Munich, and around 1944–5 it was stored in the salt mine at Altaussee in Austria. On 15 October 1945 it was brought to the Central Collecting Point, Munich, and assigned the number 9683, which is written in blue crayon on the stretcher at bottom right. On 31 August 1948 trusteeship was transferred to the State Premier of Bavaria. On 18 January 1952 it was transported from Munich to Salzburg and stored in a depot of the Austrian Federal Authority. On 22 July 1955 ownership of this and other objects was transferred to Austria for disposition. From 1966 it was stored in the former Carthusian monastery in Mauerbach.

After criticism over a failure to trace the former owners of the objects in the custody of the Federal Monuments Office stored at Mauerbach, the Art and Cultural Assets Settlement Act was passed on 27 January 1969, and the works were published in the annex to the Federal Law Gazette (Amtsblatt zur Wiener Zeitung) with the purpose of inviting people to make claims for the works; no. 294/1969, 2 September 1969, pp. 9–42 (where Chalets at Rigi was no. 63). In 1957 Austria had established two Sammelstellen (organisations for the collection of heirless property) and agreed to pay them in advance a lump sum for any items remaining after the deadline in 1972 for filing claims after this first act. Austria was thus the owner of the remaining items when, on 13 December 1985 the 2nd Art and Cultural Assets Settlement Act was passed, with the provision that any remaining objects would be auctioned off for the benefit of the victims of National Socialism, and the works were again published in the Federal Law Gazette, no. 2/1986, 1 February 1986, pp. 25–60 (where Chalets at Rigi was no. 61). From 1979 it was on deposit at the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna (inv. 9734). On 31 October 1995, along with the other Mauerbach works, it was transferred to the Federation of Jewish Communities of Austria. It was lot 317 in the sale Mauerbach. Items seized by the National Socialists to be sold for the benefit of the Victims of the Holocaust, Christie’s, Vienna, 29–30 October 1996, as follower of Calame, where it was purchased by Asbjørn Lunde (1927–2017). It has been on long-term loan to the National Gallery from 2011. Presented by Mr Asbjørn Lunde through the American Friends of the National Gallery in recognition of the directorship of Sir Nicholas Penny, 2020.