In a fresh legal complaint filed on Tuesday, the estate of a Paris art dealer is seeking the return of a precious Modigliani portrait said to have been seized by the Nazis and now, the court papers contend, in the possession of the Nahmad family, a dynasty of art dealers that wields enormous power in the international art market.

The action against the Helly Nahmad Gallery and others, filed in New York State Supreme Court, is the latest effort by the dealer’s grandson to secure the handover of the 1918 painting, “Seated Man With a Cane,” which is valued at more than $25 million. Earlier this year a judge in the same court ruled that the grandson, Philippe Maestracci, a French resident, lacked standing to press his claim in the United States.

In the refiling, Mr. Maestracci’s claim is now being pursued by the New York administrator for the estate of the gallery owner, Oscar Stettiner, a Jewish dealer of British nationality. Mr. Stettiner had sought to reclaim the Modigliani painting after the war before dying in France in 1948, according to documents submitted to the court.

In the years since, Mr. Maestracci, 71, and his lawyers have faced numerous obstacles in their own quest to recover the painting, including determining the origins of the International Art Center, the corporation that now owns the portrait.