Mendelssohn Monument (Leipzig)

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Mendelssohn Memorial, 2011

The Mendelssohn monument near the west portal of the Thomaskirche in Leipzig , known as the Mendelssohn Portal, honors the composer and former Leipzig Gewandhaus Kapellmeister and founder of the Conservatory of Music Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy . It was erected in 2008 as a detailed replica of the monument that stood in front of the second Gewandhaus, known as the New Concerthaus, in the music district from 1892 to 1936 .

The monument

Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy stands as a 2.8 meter high bronze “Wilhelminian style figure with toga” on a stepped granite base . The upper part of the base was made of red Meißner granite , the two lower steps are made of gray granite. The total height of the monument is 6.8 meters. Mendelssohn holds a piano roll in his left hand and a baton in his right, standing in front of a music stand , an indication that he was the first conductor in the modern sense.

Right base side, 2013

Euterpe , the muse of music, sits on the steps at Mendelssohn's feet, leaning on a lyre . Two angels making music are grouped on each side , the left singing, the right playing the flute and violin . The base bears the name of the sound poet on the front and the inscription "Noble only tells the language of sounds" on the back. On the left side of the base symbolizes an organ in a bronze medallion the sacred music ; on the right are masks, a vase with a dance scene, flutes and sword for secular music.

The location of the monument in the green areas of the Dittrichring has spatial reference to the St. Thomas Church, in which Mendelssohn gave organ concerts and conducted his own choral compositions, to the old Bach monument , which he donated, and to two of his Leipzig apartments in Reichel's front building and Lurgenstein's garden .

history

First Mendelssohn monument from 1892 based on a design by Werner Stein, 1900

  • Second Gewandhaus with the first Mendelssohn monument, around 1910

  • Ruin of the second Gewandhaus, in front of it Mendelssohn's portrait stele by Walter Arnold, 1947

21 years after Mendelssohn's death, an association for the erection of a monument was founded. But it took another 24 years until the memorial committee had collected the necessary funds and the memorial was inaugurated on May 26, 1892 in front of the (then) New Gewandhaus in the music district. The design came from the sculptor Werner Stein . The work was made in the art foundry of Hermann Heinrich Howaldt in Braunschweig .

Despite his Christian baptism , Mendelssohn was ostracized during the Nazi era because of his Jewish descent . During a trip abroad by the Mayor of Leipzig, Carl Goerdeler , his deputy Rudolf Haake had the memorial torn down on November 9, 1936 - exactly two years to the day before the Reichspogromnacht . Since Goerdeler could not enforce the reorganization, he submitted his resignation that same month. The granite base was sold to a stonemason in 1942 . The whereabouts of the bronze parts is not known; their later meltdown in the course of the metal donation by the German people to the Führer for war purposes is likely.

After the Second World War , on October 2, 1946, a simple natural stone with Mendelssohn's life data was erected on the site of the monument in front of the ruins of the Gewandhaus . A bust of Mendelssohn on a limestone stele created by Walter Arnold replaced this interim on November 4, 1947 on the 100th anniversary of Mendelssohn's death. In preparation for the demolition of the Gewandhaus ruins, it was moved to the Fritz von Harck facility near the former Reichsgericht in 1967, where it remained until 1999. Then she came to the garden of the Mendelssohn house ; it has been on the Mendelssohn-Ufer since 2008 .

Based on an agreement from 2003 between the then Lord Mayor Wolfgang Tiefensee and the honorary conductor of the Gewandhaus Orchestra Kurt Masur , it was decided to rebuild the Mendelssohn monument. With a donation of 50,000  euros from the patron Wolfgang Jentzsch, the foundation stone for the realization of the rebuilding could be laid. The difference to the total costs of 355,000 euros was borne by the Leipzig Regional Council , the Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy Foundation and the City of Leipzig.

The Dresden sculptor Christian Schulze was responsible for the realization and reconstructed the monument using photogrammetrically measured old images. The casting took place in the Lauchhammer art foundry . The new Mendelssohn Memorial was inaugurated on October 18, 2008.

Further Mendelssohn memorials in Leipzig

  • Mendelssohn bust by Walter Arnold, 2010

  • Statue in the Gewandhaus by Jo Jastram, 2016

  • In 2007, a part of the Pleißemühlgraben near the former Gewandhaus was reopened and its surroundings were named Mendelssohn-Ufer . The Mendelssohn bust created by Walter Arnold in 1947 was placed here.
  • The Mendelssohn statue by Jo Jastram is in the Mendelssohn foyer of the Gewandhaus . It received this place in 2003 after it was first placed in front of the main facade in 1993.
  • Since 1997 there has been a Mendelssohn bust on a brick plinth in the garden of the Mendelssohn House, made by Felix Ludwig, a former double bass player of the Gewandhaus Orchestra.
  • In 1997, a colored church window by Hans Gottfried von Stockhausen with Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy as the central motif was installed on the south side of St. Thomas Church.

literature

  • Markus Cottin, Gina Klank, Karl-Heinz Kretzschmar, Dieter Kürschner, Ilona Petzold: Leipzig monuments . tape 2 . Sax-Verlag, Beucha 2009, ISBN 3-930076-71-3 , p. 24-26 .
  • Thomas Schinköth: The demolition of the Mendelssohn monument. In: The Leipzig Music Quarter. Verlag im Wissenschaftszentrum Leipzig, 1997, ISBN 3-930433-18-4 , pp. 27-29.

Web links

Commons : Mendelssohn Monument  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Thomas Lackmann: Ehren in Erz. Jüdische Allgemeine, October 15, 2008, accessed on July 14, 2016 .
  2. ^ Gewandhaus in Leipzig. (No longer available online.) Leipzig Mendelssohn Prize, archived from the original on July 7, 2016 ; accessed on July 14, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.mendelssohn-preis.de
  3. ↑ The first Mendelssohn bust. In: Leipzig Lexicon. Retrieved July 14, 2016 .
  4. ↑ Mendelssoh monument is to be rebuilt. In: Info TV Leipzig. Retrieved July 14, 2016 .
  5. ↑ Mendelssohn foyer. Retrieved July 14, 2016 .
  6. ↑ Leipzig monuments. Volume 1, p. 46.
  7. ↑ Leipzig Lexicon. Retrieved July 14, 2016 .

Coordinates: 51 ° 20 ′ 22.2 ″  N , 12 ° 22 ′ 17.5 ″  E