Fritz Fuglsang

Fritz Sophus Clausen Fuglsang (born February 15, 1897 in Hadersleben , † May 16, 1961 in Bethel , buried in Hadersleben) was a German-Danish art historian and museum director.

Live and act

As a member of the Fuglsang family, Fritz Fuglsang was a son of the Hadersleben brewer Christian Fuglsang and his wife Maria, née Stoecker. His brother Hans Fuglsang was a well-known painter and etcher.

In early childhood, Fuglsang suffered from rheumatoid arthritis, which led to a serious heart disease that caused problems for life. He attended the Johanneum grammar school in Hadersleben and graduated from high school in February 1917. He then served as a soldier in the field artillery regiment in Itzehoe. Because of his illnesses, he did not have to fight in war. After serving as a soldier, he worked briefly in his father's office. In 1919 he began studying art history, classical archeology and the history of literature in Freiburg im Breisgau. In 1921/22 he moved to Munich for two semesters. So he heard from Ludwig Curtius , Karl Künstle and Heinrich Wölfflin . In 1925 Fuglsang received his doctorate under Hans Jantzen with "Studies on the works of wood sculpture of the 13th century in North Schleswig". From 1925 to 1927 he worked as a museum assistant in the Thaulow Museum in Kiel under the direction of Ernst Sauermann . On April 1, 1927, he succeeded Sauermann and Walter Heinrich Dammann as director of the Flensburg Museum of Applied Arts . On May 5, 1928, Fuglsang married Dorothea ("Thea") Anna Maria König (born October 10, 1907 in Lüdenscheid ) in Mülheim an der Ruhr , with whom he had two sons.

The Flensburg Museum started out purely as a museum for arts and crafts. Sauermann and Damman had started to transform it into a museum for art and cultural history. Fuglsang completed this project. He expanded the focus of the collection to include paintings and graphics by artists of the 19th and 20th centuries who came from Schleswig-Holstein, especially Schleswig. In 1929 he founded the Flensburger Kunstverein, with which he reached new interested parties.

Fuglsang endeavored to use the existing collection of models for regional handicrafts to create a national museum for a wide audience. He offered many tours, exhibition openings, and lectures with which he tried to create more art connoisseurs. He was considered a very good speaker who was able to respond wittily and ironically to completely different audiences. He also tried to expand the museum space, but failed. During the time of National Socialism , he was able to save the museum from major interventions by the state.

Fuglsang was rather conservative towards modern art. Therefore, his purchases and exhibitions did not cause any conflicts with the cultural policy of the rulers. However, he only approximated the official taste in art of the National Socialists to the extent absolutely necessary.

As an art historian, Fuglsang continued to work on the subject of his dissertation throughout his life. He wanted to create an overall representation of medieval sculpture in the Duchy of Schleswig, but he did not realize it. Instead, he published many individual reports. In 1953 he organized an extensive special exhibition on the museum's 50th anniversary. For more than thirty years he wrote a comprehensive monograph on Melchior Lorck , which he did not complete.

From 1928 to 1937 Fuglsang was the secretary of the "Society for Flensburg City History", which he initiated. In the area of ​​monumental buildings, he was able to decisively influence building measures. He did this at first in the so-called “Art Commission”, from 1933 in direct cooperation with the Lord Mayor. In 1959 he published the book “Flensburg. Art and History ”, which was still the standard work in the 1990s.

Fuglsang maintained contacts with many artists, with whom he was often friends and for whom he organized memorial exhibitions. These included Hans Peter Feddersen in 1943 , Ludwig Dettmann in 1949 , Otto Heinrich Engel in 1950 , Alexander Eckener in 1951 and Käte Lassen in 1957 . Fuglsang always endeavored to link the contemporary development in art and culture of Schleswig-Holstein with supra-regional currents and goals, so that it no longer appeared provincial. Due to the lack of financial resources, he was often limited. He could at least establish an exchange with the cultural life of Hamburg. He cultivated friendships with the local artists Otto Thämer , Alexander Friedrich and Tom Hops .

Fuglsang was one of the most important cultural figures in the border area with Denmark. As a native of Hadersleben, he mastered the German and Low Danish language and had known Danish culture, German-Danish coexistence and conflicts since childhood. After Nordschleswig went to Denmark in 1920, he chose Danish citizenship in accordance with the political intentions of the German residents of Nordschleswig. His life's work can only be fully understood with the knowledge that he always considered the centuries-old interactions between Germans and Danes. In 1931 he was advised to take German citizenship. He did not take this step because of personal, political and official considerations. He also wanted to maintain close relationships with his family in North Schleswig and to continue collecting north of the border without any problems.

Fuglsang had a lasting influence on the museum in Flensburg. His successors had to adopt the exhibition concept that he had created. The compilation created by him after being outsourced during the Second World War remained almost unchanged for decades.

literature

• Ulrich Schulte-Wülwer: Fuglsang, Fritz . in: Biographical Lexicon for Schleswig-Holstein and Lübeck . Wachholtz, Neumünster 1982–2011. Vol. 9 - 1991. ISBN 3-529-02649-2 , pages 118-120.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} Ulrich Schulte-Wülwer: Fuglsang, Fritz . in: Biographical Lexicon for Schleswig-Holstein and Lübeck . Wachholtz, Neumünster 1982–2011. Vol. 9 - 1991. ISBN 3-529-02649-2 , page 118.
2. ^ Ulrich Schulte-Wülwer: Fuglsang, Fritz . in: Biographical Lexicon for Schleswig-Holstein and Lübeck . Wachholtz, Neumünster 1982–2011. Vol. 9 - 1991. ISBN 3-529-02649-2 , pages 118-119.
3. ↑ ^{a b c d} Ulrich Schulte-Wülwer: Fuglsang, Fritz . in: Biographical Lexicon for Schleswig-Holstein and Lübeck . Wachholtz, Neumünster 1982–2011. Vol. 9 - 1991. ISBN 3-529-02649-2 , page 119.
4. ^ Ulrich Schulte-Wülwer: Fuglsang, Fritz . in: Biographical Lexicon for Schleswig-Holstein and Lübeck . Wachholtz, Neumünster 1982–2011. Vol. 9 - 1991. ISBN 3-529-02649-2 , pages 119-120.
5. ^ Ulrich Schulte-Wülwer: Fuglsang, Fritz . in: Biographical Lexicon for Schleswig-Holstein and Lübeck . Wachholtz, Neumünster 1982–2011. Vol. 9 - 1991. ISBN 3-529-02649-2 , page 120.