Werner Haftmann

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Werner Haftmann (born April 28, 1912 in Glowno , Weichselland , Russian Empire ; † July 28, 1999 in Gmund am Tegernsee ) was a German art historian .

Life

After studying in Berlin and Göttingen , where he received his doctorate in 1936 from the Italian Columns Monument, he was an assistant at the Art History Institute in Florence , where he had next to his employment with the Italian art of the Renaissance and the opportunity to be in contact with the art of classical modernism to stay. Haftmann joined the NSDAP in 1937, as evidenced by his membership card in the Federal Archives ; their discovery was announced in October 2019 at a conference of the German Historical Museum . When he was considering getting an assistant position in Vienna with Hans Sedlmayr , Friedrich Kriegbaum , the director of the Florentine Institute, advertised him in 1939 as a national socialist loyal to the line , SA man and party candidate. Haftmann then did not take up the position, preferring to work as a freelancer.

He was a soldier in World War II . From July 1940 to January 1941 he acted as secretary and interpreter in the German delegation to the Italian Armistice Commission with France in Turin , then as a liaison officer until 1944 . Captured as a prisoner of war in May 1945 , he was released in 1946 and moved to Bremen .

From 1950 he was a lecturer at the University of Fine Arts in Hamburg and in 1954 published a standard work on painting in the 20th century . In 1955, 1959 and 1964 he was under the organizational direction of Club 53 Arnold Bodes responsible for the art-historical direction and theses for documenta I , documenta II and documenta III . This is the first time an overview of Classical Modernism and the emerging Pop Art (1964) was given. Violent controversies during the preparations for the 4th documenta led to Haftmann's resignation. In 1967 he became the first director of the Neue Nationalgalerie in Berlin, which moved into Mies van der Rohe's new building a year later . Haftmann set about turning the two trunk collections of the National Gallery and the Gallery of the 20th Century into a single collection. This was to tie in with the famous New Department in the Kronprinzenpalais , which was built by Ludwig Justi from 1919 and destroyed in 1937 by the Degenerate Art campaign . Initially, all of the works in the National Gallery (West) and the municipal gallery of the 20th century moved into the building . The purchase budget of the Neue Nationalgalerie was rather small from the start. At the end of the 1960s it was around 200,000  DM . However, many pictures could be acquired with the help of the Deutsche Klassenlotterie Foundation and, from 1977 onwards, with the support of the Friends of the National Gallery. The museum concept and purchase policy were often marked by intense public sympathy. Haftmann succeeded in giving the still rudimentary collection a distinctive contour and placing it in an international context. Nevertheless, after 1968 there were serious disputes when Haftmann turned against cross-border happenings and installations . In the heated situation, the glass panes of the Mies building were partly smashed and even shot. Since 1970 Haftmann was also a member of the Academy of the Arts in Berlin. In October 1974, Haftmann resigned for health reasons, but continued to publish authoritative books and essays on the history of art in the 20th century.

Werner Haftmann was married to Roswitha Viollet from 1967 to 1970 . In 1987 he married the art historian Evelyn Gutbrod (* 1952).

Works (selection)

  • Paul Klee. Prestel Verlag, Munich 1950.
  • German abstract painter. Woldemar Klein publishing house, Baden-Baden 1953.
  • Painting in the Twentieth Century. Prestel Verlag, Munich 1954 (9th edition. 2000, ISBN 3-7913-0491-7 ).
  • Ostracized art. DuMont Buchverlag, Cologne 1986, ISBN 3-7701-1940-1 .
  • The sculptor Martin Mayer . Callwey, Munich 1988, ISBN 3-7667-0900-3 .

literature

  • Hanno Rauterberg : Werner Haftmann: Guardian of the false peace. The progressive art world, of all things, has a hard time remembering when it comes to their own involvement in the Nazi era. The case of the Documenta father, Werner Haftmann, shows why this may be. In: The time . No. 7/2020, February 6, 2020 ( zeit.de [accessed February 5, 2020; limited preview]).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ingo Arend: Brown shadows over the documenta in Kassel. In: dw.com . February 23, 2020, accessed March 1, 2020 .
  2. ^ Hans H. Aurenhammer: Hans Sedlmayr and the history of art at the University of Vienna 1938–1945. In: Art and Politics. Yearbook of the Guernica Society. Volume 5: Art History at Universities during National Socialism. Edited by Jutta Held and Martin Papenbrock . Göttingen 2003, p. 167.
  3. ↑ CV. 1940–1946: Military service and imprisonment. In: werner-haftmann.de, accessed on March 1, 2020.
  4. ↑ See GND 172119847 .
personal data
SURNAME Haftmann, Werner
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German art historian
DATE OF BIRTH April 28, 1912
PLACE OF BIRTH Glowno , Weichselland , Russian Empire
DATE OF DEATH July 28, 1999
Place of death Gmund am Tegernsee