Art between two fires. The Nazi art plunder in the occupied Slovenian territories 1941–1945 in the context of cultural genocide

Art between two fires. The Nazi art plunder in the occupied Slovenian territories 1941–1945 in the context of cultural genocide is a postdoctoral research project that addresses a topic that is as old as humanity itself and whose characteristics can also be observed in modern political and military conflicts. The postdoctoral research project investigates the German art looting in the occupied territories of present-day Slovenia (Lower Styria, the Occupied Areas of Carinthia and Carniola, The Province of Ljubljana/Operational Zone of the Adriatic Littoral). In relation to the objectives set, mechanisms of the confiscations, the legal basis of the confiscations, the institutional and personnel aspects of the looting, and the fate of the confiscated artworks in the areas under consideration will be analysed. The phenomenon of German looting of cultural assets in the territory of present-day Slovenia will be placed in a broader European context and, at the same time, analysed in connection with the political appropriation of cultural heritage by German National Socialist policy, which constituted cultural genocide.

The project will pursue three main objectives:
1)    Systematic study of the German confiscation of works of art in Slovenia in the years 1941–1945 based on preserved primary sources in Slovenian and foreign archives.
2)    To understand and present the German confiscation of works of art in Slovenia in the years 1941–1945 in the broader context of the National Socialist looting of works of art on the territory of the Third Reich and other German-occupied territories.
3)    Analyse and interpret the Nazi looting of works of art in the context of cultural genocide.