Silesian Museum of Fine Arts
The Silesian Museum of Fine Arts in Breslau existed from 1880 to 1945. It was one of the most important art collections in Germany.
development
The story goes back to the picture gallery of the Wroclaw “Royal Museum of Art and Antiquities”, which was opened in 1815 in the building of the former Augustinian monastery on the Sand Island (today the university library ). The first "Directory of the painting collection in the university building in Breslau" was made by Johann Gustav Gottlieb Büsching in 1821.
In the middle of the 19th century, the plan arose to give the collections their own new building. The Comités for the establishment of the Silesian Provincial Museum of Fine Arts with 33 members was founded as early as 1869 . The design for the new building on the then Kürassierplatz in the Schweidnitz suburb came from the Berlin architect Otto Rathey . The Berlin sculptor Otto Lessing was commissioned to carry out the sgraffito decoration on the back wall of the entrance portico. The cycle of paintings in the stairwell was executed by Hermann Prell . In 1880 the new building was inaugurated in the presence of Kaiser Wilhelm I. The equestrian statue of Kaiser Friedrich III. by Adolf Brütt was placed in front of the main entrance on October 26, 1901.
The city of Wroclaw made money available to purchase additional works of art, and Berlin was given a number of pictures from the famous Suermondt collection to the museum .
Two master studios were set up in the museum:
- Atelier for landscape painting (dissolved in 1889), directors were
- from 1879 Adolf Dressler
- from 1883 Carl Coven umbrella
- Atelier for sculpture (dissolved in 1905), head were
- from 1879 Robert Toberentz
- from 1884 Christian Behrens
Directors were
- 1878–1884: Albert Berg
- ? –1892–1906– ?: Julius Janitsch
- 1919–1928: Heinz Braune
- 1929–1933: Erich Wiese
- 1936–1943: Cornelius Müller Hofstede
- 1943–1945: Hubertus Lossow (acting)
Shortly before the end of the Second World War , the exhibits in the Wroclaw museums were relocated to 80 different locations in Silesia. The museum's stock books are now in the Marburg Herder Institute .
The museum building was damaged during the Battle of Wroclaw in January 1945 and completely demolished in 1964. Today there is a school on the site ( Plac Muzealny ).
Part of the museum's collections fell victim to the effects of the war and looting after the war; a small part went to the National Museum in Wroclaw . The most valuable exhibits in the Wroclaw Collection were moved to the National Museum in Warsaw in 1946 .
Special exhibitions (selection)
- Memorial exhibition for Adolf Dressler . 1933
- Exhibition of paintings by the Silesian artists Erich Kubierschky , Adolf Schlabitz in honor of their 80th birthday . 1934
- Raphael Schall 1814-1859. Paintings and drawings by a Silesian romantic . 1935
- The Giant Mountains in 19th century art . 1937
- Silesian landscape art 30 years ago. Gertrud State Memorial Exhibition, Eugen Burkert, Robert Sliwinski . 1939
- Memorial exhibition Caspar David Friedrich 1774–1840, Karl Blechen 1798–1840 . 1940
- Japanese painting and woodblock prints . 1941
- Exhibition Friedrich the Great - Maria Theresa and her circle in portraits of time . 1942
Paintings (selection)
Botticelli :
Madonna and Child .
1939 loan from the Ingenheim collection
Lucas Cranach the Elder Ä. :
Adam and Eve .
Acquired in 1925
Johann Georg Platzer :
The concert .
Adolph Menzel :
Meeting of Friedrich II. With Emperor Joseph II. In 1769 at Neisse .
Anton von Werner :
Wilhelm I on the sarcophagus of his mother Queen Luise (1870).
Donation from Heinrich von Korn to the museum
Lovis Corinth :
Anna Schaumberg with a Doll (1886).
Lovis Corinth :
Am Starnberger See (1896).
Acquired in 1920
literature
- Berg: Silesian Museum of Fine Arts . In: Official reports from the Royal Art Collections, Volume 2, No. 2, 1881, pp. 13–15.
- Erich Wiese , Heinz Braune : Silesian Museum of Fine Arts Breslau. Catalog of paintings and sculptures . Wroclaw 1929.
- Zofia Bandurska: Archives of the former Wroclaw art museums . In: Reports and Research. Yearbook of the Federal Institute for Culture and History of Germans in Eastern Europe Volume 12, 2004, pp. 73–79.
- Diana Codogni-Łańcucka: The Silesian Museum of Fine Arts in Wroclaw during the Nazi era . In: Tanja Baensch, Kristina Kratz-Kessemeier, Dorothee Wimmer (eds.): Museums in National Socialism. Actors - Places - Politics , Böhlau, Cologne a. a. 2016, ISBN 978-3-412-22408-0 , pp. 245-262.
Web links
- Plans by Otto Rathey for the museum in the Architekturmuseum der TU Berlin
Coordinates: 51 ° 6 ′ 15 ″ N , 17 ° 1 ′ 32 ″ E