Sopot Museum
The Museum of Sopot (also: Museum of Sopot , Polish: Muzeum Sopotu ) is located in the Villa Ernst Claaszen in Sopot near Gdansk in Poland, in the immediate vicinity of the beach and the city center.
museum
The Sopot Museum has existed since 2001. It was founded by the Soport City Council on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the city of Sopot.
The museum shows today in the historic rooms in the villa Ernst Claaszen (Year: 1903/1904) as civil life in the early stages of Sopot as a spa town looked like. The villa was completely renovated from 2001 to 2006 in order to restore the property to its original state and to make it usable as a museum. The original decorative elements were preserved and exhibits and furnishings were collected for the future museum. The original arrangement of the rooms was not changed. The renovation work also involved the spacious garden and the wrought iron fence of the villa. In addition, a lift for people with disabilities was installed. The Villa Ernst Claaszen is a typical example of town houses that were built in Sopot around 1900 - both in terms of the facade decoration as well as the interior , function and arrangement of the rooms: This is how the utility rooms of the villa in the basement ( kitchen , firewood storage, central heating stove) were furnished ). Today there is a restaurant with access to a garden terrace and the entrance area to the museum.
The former representative rooms of the villa are used for the permanent exhibition to present the historical interior.
The representative rooms were traditionally set up on the ground floor at the beginning of 1900: the dining room was then furnished with baroque Danzig furniture and Dutch faience objects from Delft . Oil paintings of family portraits hung over the alabaster fireplace in the drawing room . The ladies' room was connected to the salon via a Gdańsk rococo door . In addition to the then popular English graphics with their genre scenes and mythological content, there were also paintings by Dutch masters and Danzig artists . There is also a veranda on the ground floor , which was typical of the Sopot architecture of the time: it served as a kind of winter garden and was furnished with light wicker furniture at the beginning of 1900. The porch and terrace that can be accessed from the porch face the nearby beach .
This type of facility was common in Sopot's bourgeois villas at the time. It followed on from the tradition of Gdańsk town houses - also in the case of this villa, as many of the furnishings in Villa Ernst Claaszen come from the former town houses of the Claaszen family.
The permanent exhibition in the representative rooms of the Villa Ernst Claaszen was created on the basis of photos from the period around 1900, which were given to the museum from 2001 to 2003 by Ruth Koch, b. Claaszen, the daughter of the builder of the villa. These historical recordings helped to reconstruct the furnishing of the entrance hall with the stairs, the dining room with winter garden, the salon and the ladies' room according to a Sopot town house of that time. The estate of Ruth Koch, who died in Bad Pyrmont in August 2005, was also very valuable . Their heirs leaving the Museum of Sopot, the family archive and the elements of that equipment of the villa Ernst Claaszen still preserved original - a very important gift for the authenticity of the permanent exhibition, since precisely these furniture, exhibition elements and furnishings like porcelain , clothing - and jewelry the Permanent exhibition that can authentically bring to life the glamorous times of Sopot at the beginning of the 19th century. These are currently the only historical living spaces in Sopot that have been reconstructed as museums and are open to the public. The museum is constantly acquiring additional exhibits for its own collections, such as old furniture, pictures, handicrafts, etc. - mainly from the Sopot region.
The Claazsen family's four bedrooms were originally located on the first floor : three small bedrooms for the son and two daughters and a large bedroom for the parents. Temporary exhibitions are presented here today.
The house staff was housed in dark, small rooms in the attic in early 1900. These attic rooms are not accessible to visitors. Today the work and office rooms of the museum staff are located here.
Collections
The Sopot Museum has a collection of works of art from the fields of sculpture , graphics , painting and handicrafts , which depict or represent the history of the city and the region. The museum also has a specialized collection of valuable objects from the fields of painting, graphics, furniture and handicrafts that were acquired for the permanent exhibition - especially during the reconstruction of the villa.
In addition, the museum also houses an archive of arts and crafts collection with old postcards , photographs , maps , documents and publications dealing with Sopot and other cities (especially seaside resorts).
Museum education
The museum education is an important part of the Museum of Sopot with offers for students and young people in the form of history lessons in the museum, where you monuments of Sopot and the most important events and personalities can get to know from the history of the spa town.
The museum also organizes lectures that deal with the culture and history of Sopot and Pomerania. Last but not least, old customs are presented in the museum .
Professor Jerzy Stankiewicz Prize 2009
On October 1, 2009, the Sopot Museum received the Professor Jerzy Stankiewicz Prize , which the museum director Małgorzata Buchholz-Todoroska and her team for the creation of the exhibition and the catalog “ Paul Puchmüller . The architect who turned Sopot into a city ”.
This award is presented by the Gdańsk Monument Preservation Association and the Gdańsk Art Historians Association together with the Department of Art Restoration of the Polish Artists Association.
The decisive factor for the award was that the project not only addressed an important art and cultural-historical topic, but also involved scientists and exhibition organizers from all over the country (e.g. Konrad Nawrocki , Janusz Dargacz , Maciej Maria Putowski ). Alex Puchmüller, the architect's grandson, also helped in realizing the exhibition with family souvenirs that he made available and a contribution with his personal memories.
History of the Villa Ernst Claaszen
The villa was built from 1903 to 1904 by the Gdansk merchant Ernst Claaszen according to the designs of the architect Walther Schulz .
The Claaszen family was of Flemish origin , belonged to the upper middle class of Gdańsk and had owned Gdańsk town houses for generations. This family history, as well as the family's passion for Gdansk art and culture , shaped Ernst August Claaszen's interest in antiques - mostly (art) craft objects and works of art with which he adorned his Sopot villa.
The head of the family Ernst Claaszen founded for a good vocational training and internship in England an export company to sugar export from Gdansk to England. Little by little he owned various profitable companies and around 1900 became US consular agent in Gdansk.
At that time he also acquired the land for his villa in Sopot, which is very close to the beach, which turned out to be an excellent investment. After Ernst Claaszen's suicide in 1924, his wife Martha was forced to sell the family property piece by piece - ultimately including the villa, which was bought in 1928 by Oskar Meltzner from Danzig. Meltzner owned a machine factory and an iron casting company. When he died in 1932, the villa passed to his son Herbert, who lived in the house with his family until 1945. At the beginning of 1945 his wife and their two children left Sopot by sea, Herbert Meltzner was called to Danzig for civil defense. On March 23, 1945, Sopot was captured by Soviet troops . Fortunately, Sopot was hardly destroyed in the ensuing fighting.
After the end of the Second World War , the well-preserved villa was taken over by the chancellery of then Polish President Bolesław Bierut and Eugeniusz Kwiatkowski moved there in autumn 1945, who shortly afterwards became head of the government embassy for coastal affairs . The Stalin terror directed from 1947 to the pre-war intelligence, which began significantly in building the destroyed Poland. So Kwiatkowski and his family had to leave the villa again in the spring of 1948. Shortly thereafter, he was removed from his post as government envoy.
The villa, with its attractive location near the beach, became one of the most valuable parts of the local complex of government and military buildings until 1980 .
In 1981 the property became the property of Sopot. Until 2001, a psychological-pedagogical counseling center was housed in the villa.
In 2001 the Sopot City Council decided to set up the newly founded Sopot Museum here.
literature
- Handout of the Museum of Sopot, 2010
Web links
- Official website of the Museum of Sopot (English)
Coordinates: 54 ° 26 ′ 22.7 " N , 18 ° 34 ′ 36" E