Gotthold Schneider

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Gotthold Schneider (* 29.06.1899 in Chemnitz , † 06.13.1975 in Hochenschwand (Black Forest)) was a German bookseller , art expert, co-founder and Director of the Art Service of the Protestant Church , Art Speaker of the Nazi government, as a confidant of the Reich Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels involved in Sale of Nazi-looted art . 1952 until his death in 1975 head of the “Institute for New Technical Form” established by Prince Ludwig of Hesse and near Rhein in Darmstadt . Founding member of the Bauhaus Archive.

Live and act

Schneider was born in Chemnitz into an evangelical- church family. After attending elementary school and high school in Chemnitz, he learned the trade of bookseller from H. Steinkopf in Stuttgart. He then worked at Furche-Verlag in Berlin. In Berlin and Dresden he came into contact with artists and architects such as Ernst Barlach , Otto Bartning , Emil Nolde, Otto Dix and Walter Gropius . He was also in contact with the art historian Will Grohmann , the gallery owner Rudolf Probst and the publisher Jacob Hegner . In 1928 he and Arndt von Kirchbach , Oskar Beyer and Heinrich König , who joined the company later, were among the founders of the “ Art Service ”, a working group for church design. Kirchbach valued Schneider's astonishing gift of “winning people over to new ideas”. In 1931 Schneider became chairman of the art service in Dresden.

After the Nazi takeover of power, the private, church-related art service took on official functions in the Nazi state under the direction of Schneider and moved to Berlin in 1933. This includes the "Reich Office for Church Art in the Evangelical Church". It began in 1933 with a German contribution to the exhibition of church art during the world exhibition in Chicago, which Gotthold Schneider was responsible for.

Although not a member of the NSDAP , he soon rose to head of the office of the "Reich Office for Church Art in the German Evangelical Church". After being renamed the “Evangelical Imperial Community of Christian Art”, it was incorporated into the Imperial Chamber of Fine Arts. From August 1934 Gotthold Schneider was an art consultant, later a department head at the Reich government . One of his tasks was to arrange internationally significant church art exhibitions.

Between 1937 and 1943, the art service published 14 “workshop reports” on artists and artisans .

After the art service was integrated into the visual arts department of the Propaganda Ministry in 1938 , the art service took over the presentation, temporary storage and removal of the works of art confiscated and stolen in the course of the “Degenerate Art” campaign in Schönhausen Palace and other of its properties. The works are sold to foreign buyers together with art dealers.

On December 10, 1952, on his initiative, the “Institute for New Technical Form” was founded in Darmstadt, for which he won the Federal President Theodor Heuss as patron . With his first major post-war exhibition “Man and Technology” as part of the Darmstadt Talks in 1952, Schneider became known far beyond Darmstadt.

For the spring and autumn trade fairs in Frankfurt, Schneider organized the special shows “ Gute Form ”. In 1958 he was one of the jurors of the German selection committee for the design of the German pavilion at the world exhibition in Brussels . Gotthold Schneider maintained close personal contacts with the German Design Council , which was then housed in the same building in Darmstadt, as well as with a number of well-known companies such as Braun , whose design strategy was significantly influenced by Schneider's exhibitions and activities.

Schneider was married to Ingeborg Schneider (1925-2019) and had two children, Michael (1946-2016) and Barbara.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Hans Wichmann: Courage to set out. Erwin Braun 1921–1992 . Prestel, Munich; New York 1998, ISBN 3-7913-2023-8 , pp. 265 f .
  2. ↑ a b Dieter Kusske: Between art, cult and collaboration - the church-related "art service" 1928 to 1945 in context . Bremen August 13, 2012, p. 228 .
  3. ^ Hans Prolingheuer: Hitler's pious iconoclasts. Church & art under the swastika . Dittrich Verlag, Cologne 2001, ISBN 3-920862-33-3 , p. 35 .
  4. ↑ Arndt von Kirchbach: Pietate et armis - memories from the life of Arndt von Kirbach . tape III . Self-published, Göppingen-Jebenhausen 1987.
  5. ↑ Intef, overview Auststellungen. In: Institute for New Technical Form INTeF. Retrieved May 19, 2019 .
personal data
SURNAME Schneider, Gotthold
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German bookseller, Nazi functionary and designer
DATE OF BIRTH 1899
PLACE OF BIRTH Chemnitz
DATE OF DEATH 1975
Place of death Höchenschwand (Black Forest)