The saved gods from the palace of Tell Halaf
The saved gods from the palace of Tell Halaf was a special exhibition of the Vorderasiatisches Museum Berlin in the Pergamonmuseum . The exhibition of ancient works of art from Tell Halaf took place between January 28 and August 14, 2011 and reached around 780,000 spectators.
From 1911 to 1913 and again in 1929, excavations at Tell Halaf in Syria were carried out under the direction of Max von Oppenheim . Unique finds from the early Iron Age (10th / 9th centuries BC) were made, including representative palace buildings on the citadel , a temple and several tombs. The architectural decoration of the so-called West Palace is unique in its monumentality and shows in the reconstruction of the main entrance, the three highest gods of the Syro- Hittite pantheon of mighty animal bases to carry the lintel. Huge sphinxes and griffins guarded the passageways, almost 200 large and small relief panels lined the outer walls.
With the finds brought to Germany in 1927, Oppenheim founded the private Tell Halaf Museum in Berlin , housed in a converted machine hall, in 1930 , which, however, was hit in 1943 during bombing during the Second World War and, like the specialist library founded by Oppenheim, was badly affected has been. The museum burned down to the outer walls, the finds were almost completely destroyed by the extinguishing work when the cold water hit the hot stones and caused them to burst, as well as the subsequent winter cold. Limestone, wood or plaster exhibits burned completely. The remains of the exhibits were taken to the cellar vaults of the Pergamon Museum on Oppenheim's initiative and with the support of the then director of the Vorderasiatisches Museum, Walter Andrae , and more or less forgotten there after Oppenheim's death in 1946. Assembling the many thousands of fragments seemed difficult, if at all possible. Only after reunification , in the course of which the collections on Museum Island were restructured, merged and, in many cases, re-inventoried, did the boxes with the remains of the Tell Halaf finds come back into the minds of the researchers.
In October 2001 the Tell Halaf project of the Vorderasiatisches Museum began its work. More than 27,000 fragments, which were packed on lattice boxes and on pallets, had to be sorted, identified and restored in meticulous work under the direction of Nadja Cholidis and Lutz Martin . It took more than nine years until 30 sculptures and a collection of architectural and work stones could be extracted from the fragments. After the Antikensammlung Berlin had moved from the north wing of the Pergamon Museum to the Altes Museum , space for special exhibitions became available there. 500 exhibits were shown on 1,400 square meters of exhibition space. In addition to the works of art, Oppenheim's life and work were the focus of the exhibition. After the successful exhibition, some of the exhibits were to be presented in other museums. Inquiries were received from the Louvre in Paris , the British Museum in London and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City . From April to August 2014 the Bundeskunsthalle Bonn showed the sculptures in connection with an exhibition on von Oppenheim. It was curated by Ulrike Dubiel and supplemented with a number of larger exhibits and loans from the Louvre and the British Museum that could not be shown in Berlin. In the mid-2010s, a complete renovation of the Pergamon Museum began, which is to be completed in the mid-2020s and within the framework of which the Museum Island master plan is to be implemented. The reconstruction of the palace facade of Tell Halaf with the monumental sculptures is to become the entrance to the Museum of the Near East. The artifacts now belong to the Max Freiherr von Oppenheim Foundation and are to be given to the Vorderasiatisches Museum on permanent loan.
Restoration work such as the exhibition was supported by the Sal. Oppenheim Foundation , the Alfred Freiherr von Oppenheim Foundation and the German Research Foundation. The corresponding catalog was published by Schnell und Steiner .
literature
- Nadja Cholidis and Lutz Martin (eds.): The saved gods from the palace of Tell Halaf. Accompanying book to the special exhibition of the Vorderasiatisches Museum “The saved gods from the palace of Tell Halaf”, from 28.1. - 14.8.2011 in the Pergamon Museum. Schnell + Steiner and Vorderasiatisches Museum, Regensburg and Berlin 2011, ISBN 978-3-7954-2450-3 and ISBN 978-3-7954-2449-7 .
