On January 14, 2026, the Art Institute of Chicago presented oral argument in its appeal against a New York court order directing the return of Egon Schiele’s Russian Prisoner of War to the heirs of Fritz Grünbaum.

For the Grünbaum heirs, the appeal is not merely about ownership of a single drawing, but about accountability: whether decades of possession and market transactions can erase the reality of Nazi looting, and whether the law will continue to recognize the rights of families whose property was taken through persecution, coercion, and murder.