Walter Ohle

Walter Ohle around 1970

Walter Ohle (born September 1, 1904 in Dessau , † February 17, 1971 in Schwerin ) was a German art historian and monument conservator .

Life

Walter Ohle was born in Dessau, the capital of Anhalt, and had a family history as a monument conservator. His uncle Max Ohle had worked there as a provincial curator and made a name for himself as an inventor of architectural and art monuments. After his apprenticeship as a glove maker, he decided to study architecture at the Technical University of Braunschweig , but then to study art history at the universities of Berlin and Leipzig . He began his academic career in 1932 with a dissertation on Protestant palace chapels of the 16th century, which was published in 1936.

Bad career opportunities forced him to work for a short time as a bookseller in Burg and then for the German Research Foundation in Dessau and Köthen . In 1934 he found a job with the provincial curator in Stettin . Ohle was drafted into military service in World War II and returned to Schwerin in 1947 from captivity. His last boss, who was already in retirement, had a retirement there. D. Paul Viering, set up a new State Office for the Preservation of Monuments on January 1, 1946. In May 1946 the official title of State Conservator was introduced.

Walter Ohle did an excellent job as an art historian in Mecklenburg to secure the monument inventory in the post-war years. In the years 1948/49 he inspected 21 valuable manor houses on some arduous bicycle tours and described the conditions there. What Ohle saw on site confirmed the worst suspicions of the preservation authorities. In 1950, Hohenzieritz Castle was still inhabited by 40 families, and Queen Louise's death room had become a storage area for firewood. The castle Burg Schlitz had been badly affected, because there lived since the autumn of 1945 evacuees Familen, a total of up to 200 people. During a visit in 1950, Walter Ohle discovered that the residents' laundry was being dried in the beautiful parlor with the wallpaper and the Schinkel oven.

With the administrative reform begun at the beginning of June 1952 and the dissolution of the federal states, the preservation of monuments was to be politically centralized in Berlin . The Schwerin office was dissolved on December 31, 1952 and incorporated into the North Office of the newly created Institute for Monument Preservation . By then the office in Schwerin had already changed its address six times. Walter Ohle took up his job in Berlin for four years. In 1952 he was appointed by the State Commission for Art Affairs to a commission for the preservation of monuments made up of representatives from all state offices, which was supposed to examine the current state of maintenance and what can be done to promote this outstanding cultural and historical monument.

When the preservation of monuments returned to Mecklenburg in 1956, the institute was housed as a branch of Berlin in Schwerin on Schlachtermarkt in what is now the lodge house. Ohle was appointed to the head of the workplace and had a number of proven employees, such as Gerd Baier , Serafim Polenz , the photographer Rudolf Schmidt, several technical staff and a large group of volunteers.

Walter Ohle loved the practical work on site and he was a humorous and cheerful person. The list of monument conservation work carried out under Ohle's direction by the Schwerin office of the Institute for Monument Preservation is long and concerns many well-known monuments. These include the restoration of Schlitz Castle , the Gothic gabled houses on Greifswalder Markt , the Rostock stone gate , the Stellwagen organ in Stralsund and the colored windows in the churches of Kenz and Neukloster . It was also possible to restore the palace gardens in Schwerin and Ludwigslust . After 1960 Ohle succeeded in enlarging the restoration studio, the research, documentation and inventory department and the practical monument preservation in the institute. This enabled him to begin the extensive restoration of Güstrow Castle . Ohle drove to Güstrow twice a week to talk to the site manager Rudolf Pilz and the Polish restorers about the execution of the restoration work in accordance with the monument. But Walter Ohle did not live to see the culmination of his monument preservation activities with the completion of the first construction phase at Güstrow Castle in 1972.

Until his death in 1971, Walter Ohle was an employee, conservator and from 1956 head of the Schwerin office of the GDR Institute for the Preservation of Monuments .

Publications

• The chapel of Hartenfels Castle in Torgau . Dissertation Leipzig 1936
• The Protestant castle chapels of the Renaissance in Germany . Szczecin 1936
• County of Kammin, Land . Stettin 1939 (= The Art and Cultural Monuments of the Province of Pomerania , Vol. 2)
• Former manor houses and mansions in Mecklenburg. In: Preservation of monuments in Mecklenburg. Sachsenverlag Dresden, yearbook 1951/52, pp. 90–113.
• The restoration of the medieval stained glass in Neukloster . In: Preservation of monuments in Mecklenburg. Sachsenverlag Dresden, yearbook 1951/52, pp. 173–189.
• The Marienkirche in Bergen / Rügen . Berlin 1959, 3rd edit. Berlin 1973 edition
• Schwerin-Ludwigslust ( city ​​books on art history ). Leipzig 1960
• The art monuments of the Rügen district . Leipzig 1963
• Rostock (art history city books). Leipzig 1970
• Schwerin (art history city books). Leipzig 1984

literature

• Horst Ende: Dr. Walter Ohle on his 100th birthday. In: Monument protection and preservation in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Issue 11, 2004, p. 61.

Web links

• Literature about Walter Ohle in the state bibliography MV

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Horst Ende: Dr. Walter Ohle on his 100th birthday. In: Monument protection and preservation in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Issue 11, 2004, p. 61.
2. ↑ ^{a b} Horst Ende: Finding ^a place for the preservation of monuments in the new era. On the history of the State Office for Monument Preservation 1946–1952. In: KulturERBE ​​in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. Volume 6, 2010, pp. 9-34.
3. ↑ LAKD / AD, file return of art objects, district Neustrelitz No. 2.
4. ↑ LAKD / AD object file Hohen Demzin, Schlitz Castle, Castle, folder 01.
5. ↑ LAKD / AD, Securing Works of Art in General 1952.
6. ↑ Horst Ende: Dr. Walter Ohle on his 100th birthday. In: Monument protection and preservation in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Issue 11, 2004, p. 62.
7. ^ Due to censorship because of the criticism of the urban planning situation of the rebuilt Neuer Markt , the remaining copies were removed from the book trade in 1971.