Elizabeth Taylor tries to block tussle over Van Gogh

Elizabeth Taylor has asked for a declaration that she is the rightful owner of a Van Gogh painting that heirs of a woman who fled the Nazis claim should be theirs.

The suit, filed Tuesday in Los Angeles, says Taylor bought the 1889 work, “View of the Asylum and Chapel at Saint-Remy,” for $257,600 at a Sotheby’s auction in London in 1963. She now keeps it in her home in Los Angeles, according to the suit.

Taylor says four people, including Canadians Sarah-Rose Josepha Adler and Andrew Orkin and South African Mark Orkin, have contacted her business manager, claiming to be heirs to a former owner of the painting, Margarete Mauthner.

The four claim Mauthner lost the painting to the Nazis, and have asked for its return or a share of the proceeds from its sale, the suit states.

According to Taylor, the catalog from the 1963 auction stated that the painting had once belonged to Mauthner, but that it passed to two reputable galleries before it was sold to a German Jew, Alfred Wolf, who himself fled the Nazis in 1933 for Buenos Aires.

When Taylor bought the painting, it was part of Wolf’s collection, according to her suit.

Taylor maintains that the alleged heirs, who she names as defendants in the suit, have not presented evidence to back up their claim.