Soulages Painting Is The Subject Of A New Lawsuit By The Zeckendorf Family

By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy. We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. A painting by French artist Pierre Soulages known as Peinture 161 x 200 cm, 14 novembre 1958, is the subject of a new lawsuit where the plaintiffs allege that it was stolen from their family nearly fifty years ago, as first reported by Crain’s New York. The painting was sold at a Christie’s auction last fall for just under $5 million. As per the Real Deal, the lawsuit states that the Zeckendorfs seek the proceeds from the sale but not the artwork itself. The Christie’s sale was part of an auction of the estate of Patricia G. Ross Weis and Robert F. Weis, who founded the Weis Markets grocery chain. Their children Jennifer Weis, Colleen Ross Weis, and Jonathan Weis, are listed as defendants in the suit. The complaint lists William Lie Zeckendorf, Arthur W. Zeckendorf, James Nicholson, and Leslie Nicholson, as the plaintiffs, all of whom belong to the Zeckendorf family: a real estate dynasty responsible for buildings such as 15 Central Park West and One Union Square East (also known as the Zeckendorf Towers). Christie’s has listed Marion Zeckendorf, as having purchased the painting in 1959. Following her death in 1968, the painting reportedly passed into her estate, according to the lawsuit. The plaintiffs allege that the painting was stolen following the death of the family’s patriarch, William Zeckendorf Sr. in 1977. The provenance notes that it was then sold by Gimpel and Weitzenhoffer Gallery in New York to the Weis family in 1984. The lawsuit also contested a gray-colored invoice from Niveau Gallery—which once operated in New York— dated to 1984 that the Weis family presented as proof of their ownership, noting that it is the wrong color, since the gallery switched to issuing blue invoices in 1961. “If there was a consignment to Niveau Gallery, it was by a thief or the successor in interest to a thief,” reads the complaint. A Christie’s spokesperson told Artnews that the auction house “was aware of and resolved this issue ahead of the sale. Title of this artwork passed to the buyer, and any remaining financial dispute does not concern Christie’s or its sale.”