Renata Hornstein

Renata Witelson Hornstein, born in Lodz, Poland, was the wife of Michal Hornstein. She met her husband in Bratislava, while fleeing from Nazi persecution. Witelson, a Polish Jew, had spent much of the war in hiding — in the Warsaw Ghetto, in a convent, with a Polish family and in safe houses. It was in one of those safe houses that the couple met. In 1946, they were married in Rome. In 1951, the couple immigrated to Canada and founded the company, Federal Construction Ltd., a real estate company, where he made his fortune and remained president of the company until his final days. The Hornsteins’ became prominent patrons of major Montreal institutions and were associated with the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA) to which he donated 420 works of art; the largest ever private donation to a Quebec museum. Some of their works included Dutch painters such as Willem van Aelst, Ferdinand Bol, Bartholomeus Breenbergh, Jan Brueghel the Elder, Pieter Claesz, Adriaen Isenbrandt, Jacob van Ruisdael, Jan Steen, David Teniers the Younger, Willem van de Velde the Younger and Philips Wouwermans. For more information, please see: https://www.theartnewspaper.com/news/renata-and-michal-hornstein. Accessed 29 May 2021.