The Amsterdam court on Wednesday the claims were rejected of the Canadian company Mondex and its founder NRC. Mondex demanded that NRC take the eight-part podcast series ‘Here hung a painting’ (2023) by Pieter van Os and Emmie Kollau offline and wanted a correction. The court ruled that there is no reason for this.
The podcast revolves around the restitution of the painting ‘Bild mit Häusern’ by the Russian artist Wassily Kandinsky. In 2022, the municipality of Amsterdam returned (or gave away) the painting to the heirs of the last private owner, after which they sold it to a collector for approximately 60 million euros. Mondex assisted the heirs with this restitution and received an estimated commission of 25 million euros. The podcast revolves around the questions of whether it is moral to profit from the Holocaust, even if you have not been a direct victim of the violence.
In the podcast, the makers mention, among other things, that the founder of Mondex, James Palmer, “ambulance chaser” and “bounty hunter”. Mondex stated that the podcast created an unlawful narrative and caused reputational damage. The court rejected that. The offending statements are based on facts or are quotes from others, according to the judge. The editorial choices made by NRC fall within the freedom of the press.
