Magdeburg City Hall

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Magdeburg City Hall from the southwest

The Magdeburg City Hall , located in Rotehorn Park on the Elbe island of Werder in the center of Magdeburg , was built between 1926 and 1927 according to plans by the architects Johannes Göderitz and Wilhelm Deffke . The hall is an example of German brick expressionism.

The occasion was the German Theater Exhibition planned for Magdeburg in 1927 . The foundation stone was laid on January 5, and the inauguration ceremony took place on May 29, 1927. This short construction period represented an outstanding structural achievement. With the 100 meter long, 50 meter wide and 22 meter high building, Göderitz created his most important work.

construction

City hall, observation tower and museum ship Württemberg
Clinker brick facade with ribbon windows made of glass blocks

Johannes Göderitz resorted to the architecture he had already used when building the Magdeburg gasworks in 1925, the characteristic of which are the recessed, wall-high windows between thin clinker bricks . A reinforced concrete basement was built on a pile foundation. Due to the weak subsoil in the Elbaue, Göderitz saw it as appropriate to erect a steel frame building on it. This has been clad with fused iron bricks with a brown-violet color. The outer walls are structured by black clinker strips and (during the day) black window strips made of glass blocks, so-called Luxfer prisms.

The large hall, with up to 3,100 standing or 2,000 seats today, was designed in such a way that it could be used in a variety of ways, thus representing a novelty in theater and festival hall construction. It is 50 m long, 30 m wide and 15 m high. The depth of the stage area is 18 m, another room, delimited by the rear gallery, is 13 m long, so that the total internal length of the hall is 81 m. Four corner stairs led to the galleries , and the side wall halls were accessed via five flights of stairs. The closed wood cladding guaranteed optimal acoustics. The podium room could be adapted to the different forms of use by means of a special mechanism.

In 1945 the hall was badly damaged by bombs and artillery fire and burned out completely. The roof collapsed.

organ

The Wilhelm Sauer company built a huge, four-manual organ with 131 registers in the large hall of the new hall. It was controlled by a retractable console located 18 m in front of the organ. Thus the organist sat close to the orchestra, which facilitated the interaction between the two. The electric play and stop action allowed a variety of playing aids. The organ system also included a remote mechanism , the sound of which emanated from the ceiling above the middle of the hall. Göderitz had a decisive influence on the design of the prospectus , which had to fit the space. This is how, among other things, the unusual, V-shaped arrangement of the full-length wooden beaker of the 32-foot reed voice in the middle of the prospectus, decorated with metal panels at the top, was created.

The organ was lost in the 1945 bombing.

reconstruction

The reconstruction intended to be used as a concert and congress hall; not as a pure concert hall, which is why the re-installation of an organ was omitted. The reconstruction was not completed until 1966. Since the roof zone had been greatly simplified, an essential feature of the hall was lost. With the reconstruction of the town hall, which was in the way of longer sections of the pioneer railway in Magdeburg , its track system was completely dismantled, as a relocation failed due to lack of funds.

Redevelopment

In 2017, the building and culture committees of Magdeburg's city council agreed to renovate the city hall from the ground up. The town hall is to provide space for concerts and congresses with up to 2000 participants with divisible halls. A mobile wall would protect the building against flooding in the future. Furthermore, additions made after 1945 are to be removed. The renovation of the monument is scheduled from 2019 to 2022. The Hamburg architecture firm gmp was commissioned as the building planner . Financing the construction costs of 65 million euros through subsidies from the state of Saxony-Anhalt is part of the financial planning. The renovation is part of a general improvement in the quality of the Rotehorn Park .

More detailed analyzes of the condition of the building and the properties of the material resulted in a higher financial requirement for the improvement of the pile foundation, the facade and fire protection. The current financial requirement thus adds up to 70.1 million euros (as of February 2018). On April 5, 2018, the Magdeburg city council approved the renovation of the city hall from spring 2019. In addition to the infrastructural construction work, the original facade is also to be restored. This also includes reactivating the light strips on the facade.

literature

  • Olaf Gisbertz: Bruno Taut and Johannes Göderitz in Magdeburg. Architecture and urban development in the Weimar Republic. With a foreword by Tilman Buddensieg. Gebr. Mann-Verlag, Berlin 2000, ISBN 978-3786123187 .
  • Hartmuth Schreiber and Ludwig Schumann: A major work of the new building will: The Magdeburg town hall, since 1927 the urban setting for events. Brochure of the Stadthallen Magdeburg, 2002, online file , (PDF; 35 p., 2.4 MB).

Movie

  • Between dance tournament and propaganda - the city hall in Magdeburg. Documentary, Germany, 2016, 29:33 min., Written and directed: Karin Roxer and Andreas Tempelhof, production: MDR , series: Der Osten - Discover, wo du Leben , first broadcast: January 17th, 2017 on MDR, synopsis by MDR, ( Memento from January 18, 2017 in the Internet Archive ).

Web links

Commons : Stadthalle Magdeburg  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Grit Warnat: Theater Exhibition. Glorious times. In: Volksstimme , May 12, 2017.
  2. ↑ Hartmuth Schreiber and Ludwig Schumann: A major work of the new building will: The Magdeburg city hall, since 1927 the urban framework for events. 2002, p. 11.
  3. ↑ a b c d DIE STADTHALLE MAGDEBURG - PDF free download. Retrieved December 24, 2019 .
  4. ^ Hartmuth Schreiber and Ludwig Schumann: The Magdeburg city hall. 2002, p. 9.
  5. ↑ Magdeburg City Hall / Great Hall. In: mvgm.de , accessed on June 10, 2017.
  6. ^ "The organ of the Magdeburg city hall built by the organ building company W. Sauer, Frankfurt ad Oder", author: Städt. Hochbauamt, 1929, found on Google books on December 24th, 2019, see: https://books.google.at/books/about/Die_Orgel_der_Stadthalle_Magdeburg_erbau.html?id=4lzjSAAACAAJ&redir_esc=y
  7. ↑ track info regional - Saxony-Anhalt. Retrieved December 24, 2019 .
  8. ↑ Martin Riess: City Hall. Signs point to renovation in Magdeburg. In: Volksstimme , June 3, 2017.
  9. ↑ Conrad Engelhardt: The town hall on Rotehorn is finally being renovated. June 26, 2017, accessed on December 24, 2019 (German).
  10. ^ Rainer Schweingel: Magdeburg City Hall. Renovation costing 65 million euros. In: Volksstimme , May 4, 2017.
  11. ^ Michaela Schröder: Urban redevelopment east. Beauty treatment for Magdeburg City Park. In: Volksstimme , May 2, 2017.
  12. ↑ Martin Rieß: Restoration. Plans for Magdeburg city hall deepened. In: Volksstimme , February 17, 2018, with picture gallery.
  13. ↑ Martin Rieß: Magdeburg city hall will be renovated from 2019. In: Volksstimme , April 5, 2018, with picture gallery.

Coordinates: 52 ° 7 ′ 6 ″  N , 11 ° 38 ′ 23 ″  E