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Treasure in the Attic

British man plum forgot where he stored stepfather’s art works

by
Sara Ivry
June 26, 2009

A trove of work by the late German Jewish artist Erich Wolfsfeld, who lost his teaching job in Berlin in 1935 and moved three years later to England, turned up this week in the Liverpool attic of his 83-year-old stepson. Max Block, a recent widower, had gone up to empty the room before readying the house for sale. He told the Daily Mail the Wolfsfeld cache, including oils, drawings, and etchings,“just completely went out of my mind” after he stored them upstairs following his mother’s death 20 years ago. (Wolfsfeld died in 1956). The works are now worth roughly $164,000; they’ll be auctioned off in Chesire, England next month.

Sara Ivry is the host of Vox Tablet, Tablet Magazine’s weekly podcast. Follow her on Twitter@saraivry.