Woman in Gold with Randy Schoenberg

In partnership with Case Western Reserve University Siegal Lifelong Learning

Date & Time:  Wednesday, Nov 6, 2024 at 7:00 - 8:30 PM ET

Location:  Zoom

Program:  The remarkable true story of one woman’s journey to reclaim her heritage and seek justice for what happened to her family. Sixty years after she fled Vienna during World War II, an elderly Jewish woman, Maria Altmann, starts her journey to retrieve family possessions seized by the Nazis, among them Klimt’s famous painting Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer. Together with her inexperienced but plucky young lawyer Randy Schoenberg, she embarks upon a major battle which takes them all the way to the heart of the Austrian establishment and the U.S. Supreme Court and forces her to confront difficult truths about the past along the way. 

Speaker:  E. Randol Schoenberg is an American lawyer specializing in complex litigation matters, and notably in cases involving looted art and the recovery of property stolen by the Nazi authorities during the Holocaust. He won the return of five famous Klimt paintings for his client, Maria Altmann. In 2007, Mr. Schoenberg received the California Lawyer Attorney of the Year award for outstanding achievement in the field of litigation. He also received the 2006 Jurisprudence Award from the Anti-Defamation League and the Justice Louis D. Brandeis Award from the American Jewish Congress.
 
Mr. Schoenberg served as President of the Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust from 2005-2015, during which time the museum constructed its new building in Pan Pacific Park. Mr. Schoenberg led the redesign of the permanent exhibit for the new museum. In 2013, he served as acting executive director while the Museum conducted a search for its new executive director.
 
He serves on the board of JewishGen, and the L.A. Jewish Symphony. He has been an avid genealogist since he was 8 years old, maintains a huge family tree both on JewishGen and Geni, and is the Co-Founder, Coordinator and Moderator for the JewishGen Austria-Czech Special Interest Group. He is the author of the Beginner's Guide to Austrian-Jewish Genealogy and the co-author of Getting Started with Czech-Jewish Genealogy.

Mr. Schoenberg’s recent documentary film FIORETTA, a five-century genealogical journey taken with his teenage son Joey, premiered last year and after a successful festival run is now available on demand for streaming at  https://www.rubberringfilms.com/fiorettastreaming.

Registration:  Required through CWRU Siegal Lifelong Learning.  Sign up HERE.  Free and open to the community.