- Henry David Thoreau

There has been a quiet, uncomfortable afterlife for the contents of Jeffrey Epstein’s 71st Street townhouse in New York.  Reviewing photos released among the millions of documents and photos released by the U.S. Justice Department on 30 January 2026 related to the Jeffrey Epstein investigation and comparing them with recent sales events its fairly easy to match artworks and furnishings once found in his home to at least two “select” auctions run by Millea Bros.  While the world has demanded transparency regarding this monster, for the art world it is business as usual. 

Without catalog descriptions disclosing Epstein as the owner or Epstein's estate as the consignor, the New Jersey auction house's first three-day auction was held June 11-13, 2025 which we will discuss here.  A second, by the same firm, occurred in December.

Among the robust number of Epstein owned paintings depicting nudes, some postwar, some not, his tacky sculpture of Alice in Wonderland and Little Red Riding Hood in a brawl and a replica sculpture in the style of Amedeo Modigliani was his c. 1820, Austro-Hungarian map desk, with four front to back drawers to each side, moulded pilaster dividers, and brass escutcheons with rosette covers.  For this piece, auctioneers Michael and Mark Millea stated the provenance as; 

Purchased from J.P Molyneux Studio, Paris in 2006; House of Liechtenstein

Remaining unsold, it is depicted in a photo which shows the now-deceased billionaire speaking with Stephen K. Bannon in his abode from behind the same desk.  To the rear of Epstein we can also see a grouping of circular paintings depicting sculls, which sold in the auction for $900. 

A portrait visible in the same photo titled Girl With Vegetables, after Portrait of a Young Cook,  by Giuseppe Nogari's (Venezia, 1699 - 1763).  It sold for $500.

Epstein's Belgian carved walnut bookcase, seen in photos stacked with lotions and creams in the room where his employees testified at Ghislaine Maxwell's trial that Epstein received about three massages every day by the time he left his job in 2002. sold for $800 listing only Alain Helmroth in the provenance. 

A limited edition bronze by French sculpture Arnaud Kasper titled Regard sur le monde, (a look at the world) listed no provenance whatsoever.  It once adorned the mansion's staircase and was under a different name as Female Nude stripped of the Epstein-added bridal attire for $1500. 

The omission of this individual's name matters because Epstein’s “provenance” is not a neutral footnote. His New York was filled with works of art which underscored a  depraved lifestyle on of his visiting guests batted an eye at, including a large painting by Jorge Alvarez titled Coming of Age Ceremony (1995), which depicts a nude underage boy with explicit arousal. It was put up for sale by Collective Hudson, LLC in September 2025 with a provenance of purchased from the artist.

In addition to the object's mentioned in this article there are Olmec carvings, Precolumbian gold pieces, Chinese, Himalayan, Etruscan, Greco-Roman, Egyptian, and Leventine pieces, all of which are equally spartan on their previous origins and are worth following up on.  

Having said all that, and despite the fact that the sale proceeds of these dark, rotten trappings of wealth are said to benefit a victims’ compensation fund, knowing the origins and provenance of items remains essential for buyers and for the integrity of the market.  Disclosure allows would-be purchasers to make an informed ethical choice about whether they want to live with, display, or later resell objects tied to an individual associated with such horrific abuse.

When a prior owner is intentionally omitted, as has been the case with these auctions, the sales channels are complicit in reputation laundering for profit, scrubbing away, through absent or bland catalog language,  the objects' ownership chain and leaving future buyers oblivious to the material facts and circulation of their purchase, 

Provenance is not a trivial detail. It directly affects value, future resale, and institutional acceptance. Withholding it shifts reputational and financial risk from the seller to the unsuspecting buyer in much the same way Nazi tainted pieces deserve careful review. 

Compensating victims and informing the public are not mutually exclusive goals. A restitution-minded approach  should coexist with full and forthright disclosure of an object’s most recent ownership history, particularly when that history is precisely what many buyers would consider decisive.

By:  Lynda Albertson