Petrole Stella

Henri Boulanger (French, 1858–1924)

Courmont Frères (Paris, France)

1897

Medium/TechniquePoster, color lithograph

DimensionsSheet: 129.5 x 100.3 cm (51 x 39 7/16 in.)

Credit LineMuseum purchase with funds donated by Leonard A. Lauder

Accession number2014.100

On View

Not on view

ClassificationsPrints

Collections

InscriptionsPetrole Stella / Livraisons / en bidons plombés de 5 & 2 litresProvenanceBy 1938, Julius Paul (b. 1895 – d. 1938), Vienna; 1938, to his nephew, Gaston Albert Belf (b. 1908 – d. 2002), Vienna [see note 1]; 1938 sold or consigned to Antiquariat V. A. Heck, Vienna [see note 2]; 1939, sold by V. A. Heck to the Albertina, Vienna; 2008/2009, deaccessioned by the Albertina and restituted to the heirs of Gaston Albert Belf [see note 3]; December 18, 2013, Julius Paul poster collection sale, Swan Galleries, New York, lot [5], to the MFA. (Accession Date: January 29, 2014 )

NOTES:
[1] Julius Paul had formed a significant collection of posters by 1928, when he included them in his will. He passed away on January 5, 1938. By summer of 1938, this poster collection was evidently in the possession of his nephew, Gaston Belf. After the Anschluss of March 1938, Austrian Jews had to register their assets with the Nazi authorities, and Belf and his wife included a poster collection on their declaration of July 26, 1938. They fled Austria in October of that year.

[2] On March 16, 1939, Christian Nebehay wrote on behalf of the dealer V. A. Heck to the Albertina that he had been in charge of selling the Julius Paul poster collection for “a long time." The Albertina purchased the collection, which was transferred to the museum on September 15, 1939.

[3] In 2008, the Austrian Commission for Provenance Research recommended the return of the Julius Paul poster collection from the Albertina to the heirs of Gaston Belf. The Commission found that the couple needed to sell the collection to finance their flight abroad, the sale was the result of Nazi persecution and, therefore, invalid. The recommendation is accessible at http://www.bmukk.gv.at/medienpool/16738/beschluss_gaston_belf.pdf