Julius Konietzko

Julius August Konietzko (born August 6, 1886 in Insterburg ; † April 27, 1952 ) was a German explorer and trader with a focus on ethnology and folklore .

Life

Julius Konietzko spent his childhood with his uncle in Stolp , Pomerania, until he reached secondary school . During this time he made the acquaintance of the ethnologist Felix von Luschan , who aroused his interest in ethnographic and folklore collecting. After moving to Neustrelitz he was tutored by the son of the Troy discoverer Heinrich Schliemann , whose keen interest in ethnology led to a lively exchange with Konietzko. After completing his military service, he began commercial training in 1908 at the de Freytas import and export company in Hamburg. During this time he maintained contacts with the companies IFG Umlauff, Hoppe and Käptn Haase, which were the first in Hamburg to deal with ethnological objects. His first commercial activity fell in 1910 when he began to sell non-European art objects to German museums. From 1911 he had his own business premises in Hamburg-Eilbek.

1911–1914 Konietzko undertook several ethnological collecting trips to Lapland, Spain, Portugal, Ireland ( Aran Islands ) and the upper Nile region in South Sudan , to the tribes of the Schilluk and Dinka, on behalf of various museums .

During the First World War he worked as a scientific army employee in the Balkans as an army ethnographer.

Further trips to India (Pandanus and Khol area), Kashmir, Tibet and Sardinia followed by 1931.

With the beginning of the Third Reich, the funds for research trips were greatly reduced, so that from then on Konietzko devoted himself to the international trade in ethnographics and antiques. This led to his having an indirect influence on the visual arts: The expressionism of the Brücke artists was strongly influenced and guided by objects from African art . To Konietzkos customers contemporary artists such as the included Berlin Bridge counting Emil Nolde , Karl Schmidt-Rottluff and Max Pechstein as well as the painter Karl Hofer and Rolf Nesch ( Hamburg secession ), the Hamburg sculptor Friedrich Wield and a native of Vienna Art Nouveau artist Carl Otto Czeschka . Czeschka, who was a teacher at today's Hamburg University of Fine Arts from 1907 to 1943 , had built up a large private collection with the help of objects that Julius Konietzko had brought with him from his own travels - especially from Africa - and had sold. Today 600 of these objects are in the Museum für Völkerkunde Hamburg . In addition, Czeschka was a very good friend of Julius Konietzko's family and became the godfather of both sons Wolf and Boris.

The fruits of Konietzko's years of collecting are still among the highlights of German and foreign museums. It is thanks to his foresight that before the critical phase of the Second World War began, extensive ethnographic collections were relocated with the help of the Museum für Völkerkunde Hamburg and thus saved from the bombing war.

Julius Konietzko was married three times and had two sons: Dr. Wolf Konietzko, specialist in anesthesia, and Boris Kegel-Konietzko , qualified biologist and since 1957 also active as an international dealer for ethnographic objects and African art .

Julius Konietzko is the grandfather of Sascha Konietzko , the founder and frontman of the industrial rock band KMFDM .

Publications

• 1929/32 - The Konietzko'sche India expedition 1927 (Ethnologischer Anzeiger, Stuttgart)
• 1930/31 - The folk culture of the Hallig inhabitants (Low German magazine for ethnology, Bremen)
• 1943/43 - The development of lighting in Schleswig-Holstein (Schleswig-Holstein Yearbook)
• 1986 - Julius Konietzko - A collective traveler and dealer (messages from the Völkerkundemuseum Hamburg, NF, Volume 16, author: Jürgen Zwernemann )

Web links

• Julius Konietzko at LiTo