One and a half years before the begin of the Second World War during the annexation of Austria in March of 1938, Hitler conceived the megalomaniac idea of creating the largest European art center in his home town of Linz. At the beginning of the war on the 1st of September 1939, not only did his armies advance but also his art thieves began to fan out in their great foray of art plundering; an expedition on a previously unheard of scale began. Not only did the task forces of diverse National Socialist organizations pillage the occupied countries; Nazi bigwigs like Goering also took whatever they felt was valuable. This documentary includes the long and eventful journey of an exceptional masterpiece of European art: the Ghent Altar, created by van Eyck.

Follow the remarkable journey of Belgium's most prized artistic treasure -- van Eyck's Ghent Altar -- as it passes through the hands of many art pillagers over the course of the Second World War. But behind the circuitous story lies Adolf Hitler's grand scheme to assemble Europe's largest art museum in his Austrian hometown of Linz. The absorbing documentary also covers Stalin's efforts to hoard numerous masterpieces from German art collections.