Walter Borchers

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Walter Borchers (born 1906 in Osnabrück ; died January 16, 1980 in Bad Salzuflen ) was a German art historian , folklorist and museum director.

life and work

Borchers was born in Osnabrück. In 1912 the family moved to Stettin ; the parents separated the following year. Borchers stayed with his siblings with their mother. In 1924, he passed the school leaving examination at the city high school. After a six-month traineeship in the Szczecin City Library , he studied German studies, folklore, art history and prehistory in Greifswald and Vienna with scholarships; he also taught as a private tutor. With the dissertation Folk Art in Weizacker (the region around Pyritz ) he received his doctorate in 1930 at the University of Greifswald , supervisor was Lutz Mackensen .

From 1930 he worked at the Pomeranian State Museum in Stettin, initially as a volunteer , from 1936 as an assistant and from 1938 as a curator . In 1938 he became civil servant. He had previously had to justify himself to the provincial administration because of his celibacy. His homosexuality was unofficially known, but no one wanted to put any stones in the professional career of Borchers, who was well respected professionally and personally. He built up the folklore department of the state museum and looked after local museums in the area.

In January 1940 Borchers was called up for military service. From August 1942 he worked in Paris for the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg (ERR), the NSDAP robbery organization of cultural goods from the countries occupied during the Second World War . From around mid-1944 he belonged to the special staff for fine arts under the direction of Bruno Lohse . Borchers determined and inventoried confiscated cultural goods, probably also from the furniture campaign . While retreating from France, he suffered an injury to his spine from a low-flying attack, which permanently impaired him, but saved him from being a prisoner of war. He spent some time in hospitals in southern Germany; he never returned to Stettin.

After the end of the Second World War, Borchers settled in Osnabrück, where relatives lived. He was not subjected to a denazification process, but until the early 1960s he had to testify several times as a witness in connection with looted art activities.

In November 1946 he took over the management of the Osnabrück Cultural History Museum . Its official director, Hermann Poppe-Marquard, was still a prisoner of war; in his absence since 1939, the museum association chairman, Philipp Reinecke, had run the museum on a voluntary basis. Although Borchers was not officially appointed until January 1, 1947, he had been involved in securing the collections and the damaged museum building since November 1946.

He set about rebuilding the almost completely destroyed scientific library, which in 1960 again comprised 6,000 volumes. Recognizing the importance of photographic documentation, he built up the photo library. Borchers ensured the professionalization of craft workers in art history and stylistics and contributed to the resumption of cultural life in the city with his lectures at H. Th. Wenner (bookstore, antiquarian bookshop and publisher) on topics of art in the first post-war years.

The museum was reopened on September 12, 1948 with the department for sacred art and the Renaissance room, further departments followed. In July 1955 the museum was closed for a general renovation and a year later it was reopened to the public with the exhibition Artistic Creation - Industrial Design . The exhibition signified a move towards the modern and offered a forum for the artists from the Bramscher wallpaper factory Gebr. Rasch . The Federal President Theodor Heuss was one of the visitors .

During his tenure, the natural history collection was relocated to Villa Schlikker , which was opened as a natural history museum in July 1963. The outsourcing necessitated a redesign of the Museum of Cultural History. In 1964, the increased financial leeway enabled Borchers to purchase works by Dürer , Cranach , Rembrandt and Goya for the Graphisches Kabinett. The modern inventory was expanded to include works by Slevogt , Liebermann , Grosz and other artists.

As in his time in Stettin, Borchers worked in Osnabrück beyond the city limits. He was involved in the design of the museum in Bentheim , as well as the establishment of the local history museum in Melle , and he redesigned the collection of the Bersenbrücker local history museum. In 1969 the Emsland homeland association commissioned Borchers to set up the Emsland local history museum in the Clemenswerth hunting lodge and five of its pavilions in Sögel .

When Borchers retired in 1970, the art historian Manfred Meinz (1931–2007) succeeded him. Borchers died in 1980. In the Westphalian mirror, Josef Balzer paid tribute to Borchers' services to the museum system in Osnabrück. He did not go into his work for the ERR and the special staff for the fine arts .

Award

In 1973 Borchers received the Federal Cross of Merit, 1st class, “for his services in the cultural field” .

Publications (selection)

  • Folk art in the Weizacker. A contribution to the folklore structure of Central Pomerania. Eichblatt, Leipzig 1932 (also dissertation).
  • The Camminer cathedral treasure. Saunier, Stettin 1933.
  • The town hall of Osnabrück. Wenner, Osnabrück 1948.
  • Goldsmith work of the 17th and 18th centuries in Osnabrück churches. (= Association for History and Regional Studies of Osnabrück [Hrsg.]: Osnabrücker Geschichtsquellen und Forschungen . Volume 8) Wenner, Osnabrück 1966.
  • Fritz Szalinski. Wenner, Osnabrück 1970. ISBN 978-3-87898-006-3 .
  • Folk art in Westphalia. Aschendorff, Münster 1986. 4th edition, ISBN 978-3-402-05551-9 .

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kurt Dröge: On the biography of Walter Borchers with regard to his work in Stettin (1930–1940). In: Ders .: The historical material culture in Pomerania and Walter Borchers. 2018, pp. 37–52, here pp. 37–38.
  2. ^ Kurt Dröge: Borchers, Walter (1906–1980). Folklorist, art historian. In: Biographical Lexicon for Pomerania. 2019, pp. 84–85.
  3. ↑ Kurt Dröge: On the biography of Walter Borchers with regard to his work in Stettin (1930–1940). In: Ders .: The historical material culture in Pomerania and Walter Borchers. 2018, pp. 38–59.
  4. ↑ Thorsten Heese: "... an own local for art and antiquity". The institutionalization of collecting using the example of Osnabrück museum history. Kulturgeschichtliches Museum Osnabrück, Museums- und Kunstverein Osnabrück eV (Ed.) Rasch, Bramsche 2004, ISBN 978-3-89946-016-2 , p. 196.
  5. ↑ Kurt Dröge: On the biography of Walter Borchers with regard to his work in Stettin (1930–1940). In: Ders .: The historical material culture in Pomerania and Walter Borchers. 2018, p. 46, p. 48.
  6. ^ Kurt Dröge: Borchers, Walter (1906–1980). Folklorist, art historian. In: Biographical Lexicon for Pomerania. 2019, p. 87.
  7. ↑ Kurt Dröge: On the biography of Walter Borchers with regard to his work in Stettin (1930–1940). In: Ders .: The historical material culture in Pomerania and Walter Borchers. 2018, pp. 48–49.
  8. ^ Kurt Dröge: Borchers, Walter (1906–1980). Folklorist, art historian. In: Biographical Lexicon for Pomerania. 2019, p. 87.
  9. ↑ Thorsten Heese: Between home and racial madness. The museum as a parallel multiplier of Nazi ideology . In the S. (Ed.): Topographies of Terror. National Socialism in Osnabrück . 2nd corrected edition. tape 16 . Rasch, Bramsche 2015, ISBN 978-3-89946-240-1 , pp. 144 .
  10. ↑ Thorsten Heese: "... an own local for art and antiquity". The institutionalization of collecting using the example of Osnabrück museum history. Kulturgeschichtliches Museum Osnabrück, Museums- und Kunstverein Osnabrück eV (Ed.) Rasch, Bramsche 2004, p. 210.
  11. ↑ a b c d e Thorsten Heese: Osnabrück Museum History. “Reconstruction”: 1945–1971. In: Ders .: "... a separate local for art and antiquity". The institutionalization of collecting using the example of Osnabrück museum history. Kulturgeschichtliches Museum Osnabrück, Museum and Art Association Osnabrück eV (publisher). Rasch, Bramsche 2004, ISBN 3-89946-016-2 , pp. 205-238.
  12. ^ Thorsten Heese: Art in the National Socialist Osnabrück. In the S. (Ed.): Topographies of Terror. National Socialism in Osnabrück. Rasch, Bramsche 2015, p. 161.
personal data
SURNAME Borchers, Walter
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German folklorist, art historian and museum director
DATE OF BIRTH 1906
PLACE OF BIRTH Osnabrück
DATE OF DEATH January 16, 1980
Place of death Bad Salzuflen