Curt Valentin (5 October 1902, Hamburg, Germany – 19 August 1954, Forte dei Marmi, Italy) was a German-Jewish art dealer known for handling modern art, particularly sculpture, and works classified as "degenerate", seized from public museums or looted from private collectors by the Nazi regime in Germany.
[1] In 1934, he worked at Karl Buchholz Gallery, Hamburg from 1934 to 1936 until anti-Semitic National Socialist laws preventing Jews from practicing their professions in Germany.
Dismissed from his job in Germany in late 1936 Valentin emigrated to America and opened the Buchholz Gallery in September 1937 in New York City.
This resulted from Buchholz's gallery being one of four dealers—together with Ferdinand Möller (Berlin), Hildebrand Gurlitt (Hamburg), and Bernhard A. Böhmer (Güstrow)—who worked closely with Hitler’s Propaganda Ministry with the disposal of such art for profit.
His gallery operated from 1951, until a year after his death in 1954, and handled works by many notable artists including Alexander Calder, Henry Moore, Marino Marini, Irving Kriesberg, and Jacques Lipchitz.