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Five paintings by Austrian artist Gustav Klimt have left Vienna for the United States, following a court decision that they be returned to an American heiress, a spokeswoman at the Belvedere museum said.
The paintings were taken away Tuesday and will first be put on display at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) in California, spokeswoman Sigrid Sprung said.
Among the five paintings by turn-of-the-century Art Nouveau painter Klimt, are two famous portraits of Adele Bloch-Bauer.
They were taken down in early February, after the Austrian government said it would not buy back the paintings, deemed too expensive, and would return them to Maria Altmann, the niece of the former Jewish owner Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer, whose possessions were seized by the Nazis.
Austrian Culture Minister Elisabeth Gehrer at the time said the government did not see how it could afford to spend 300 million dollars (248 million euros) to buy back the paintings, albeit regarded as being among the highlights of Austrian public collections.
After years of legal wrangling, an arbitration court ruled in early January that the paintings should be returned to Altmann.
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AFP 151130 GMT 03 06
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