Enteignetes Erbe: Eine venezianische Bildtafel

Enteignetes Erbe (Expropriated Heritage) is a medieval painted panel from Venice, which can be found in Bern’s History Museum today. It was confiscated during the Reformation and later reclassified as spoils of war.
The entirely invented connection to Charles the Bold, the Burgundian duke defeated by the Swiss in 1476, overwrote a long history of the panel being in the hands of women. This was apparently the only way this testimony to medieval piety could survive the era of sectarian division undamaged. The book follows the “biography” of the work of art, vividly bringing to life 750 years of history in the process.

This series in four volumes examines four museum exhibits as examples to show how and why objects that were violently looted or confiscated due to religious differences became “art” over the centuries and a part of Swiss cultural heritage.