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With more than 500.000 inhabitants Hannover is the capital and largest city of the German state of Lower Saxony.
Hannover was founded in medieval times on the east bank of the River Leine. It was a small village of ferrymen and fishermen. It became a comparatively large town in the 13th century, receiving town privileges in 1241, owing to its position at natural crossroads It was connected to the Hanseatic city of Bremen by the Leine and was situated north-west of the Harz mountains so that east-west traffic passed through it.
Between 1714 and 1837 three kings of Great Britain were concurrently also Electoral Princes of Hanover.
As an important railway and road junction and production centre, Hannover was a major target for strategic bombing during WW II. More than 90% of the city centre was destroyed in a total of 88 bombing raids. So today Hannover lacks it´s medieval heart.
Originally the Museum of "Kunst und Wissenschaft" (art and science) inaugurated in 1856 in the presence of George V of Hanover. After the annexation of Hanover by Prussia, the museum was integrated into the Provincial Museum, as it was called from 1869. The museum ran out of space for its art collections, prompting the construction of the current building in 1902. Extensive renovations and modernisations were carried out in the interior from 1995 to 2000, reopening on 13 May 2000 as part of Expo 2000.
Today the museum comprises the state gallery (Landesgalerie), featuring paintings and sculptures from the Middle Ages to the 20th century, and departments of archaeology, natural history and ethnology.
Paula Modersohn-Becker (1876 - 1907)
was a German painter and one of the most important representatives of early Expressionism. Her works unite characteristic aspects of early 20th century art.
Becker became known in the Worpswede artists' colony, where she was a pupil of Fritz Mackensen. Two paintings that she exhibited at the Bremen Kunsthalle in 1899 were sharply criticised and had to be removed during the exhibition. In 1900, she studied at the Académie Colarossi in Paris and married the painter Paul Modersohn after her return to Worpswede in 1901.
Paula Modersohn-Becker´s immense oeuvre only came to light posthumously. She created 750 paintings and around 1000 drawings.
Halbfigur eines Mädchens mit einem gelben Kranz im Haar - Half-figure of a girl with a yellow wreath in her hair / 1902
Paula Modersohn-Becker, Dresden 1876 - Worpswede 1907
Mädchenbildnis / Portrait of a Girl (1901)
Die Künstlerin, die zu den bedeutendsten Vertreterinnen des frühen Expressionismus gehört, war zwischen der naturverbundenen Worpsweder Künstlerkolonie und der urbanen Avantgarde in Paris hin- und hergerissen. Tief beeindruckt von den Gemälden von Paul Gauguin und Paul Cézanne, hat sie den Bildraum flächig reduziert. In ihren Kinderbildnissen zeigt die Malerin eine ernsthafte und ungeschönte Wahrnehmung kindlicher Physiognomik, meist mit vereinfachter, groß gesehenen Formen.
With more than 500.000 inhabitants Hannover is the capital and largest city of the German state of Lower Saxony.
Hannover was founded in medieval times on the east bank of the River Leine. It was a small village of ferrymen and fishermen. It became a comparatively large town in the 13th century, receiving town privileges in 1241, owing to its position at natural crossroads It was connected to the Hanseatic city of Bremen by the Leine and was situated north-west of the Harz mountains so that east-west traffic passed through it.
Between 1714 and 1837 three kings of Great Britain were concurrently also Electoral Princes of Hanover.
As an important railway and road junction and production centre, Hannover was a major target for strategic bombing during WW II. More than 90% of the city centre was destroyed in a total of 88 bombing raids. So today Hannover lacks it´s medieval heart.
Originally the Museum of "Kunst und Wissenschaft" (art and science) inaugurated in 1856 in the presence of George V of Hanover. After the annexation of Hanover by Prussia, the museum was integrated into the Provincial Museum, as it was called from 1869. The museum ran out of space for its art collections, prompting the construction of the current building in 1902. Extensive renovations and modernisations were carried out in the interior from 1995 to 2000, reopening on 13 May 2000 as part of Expo 2000.
Today the museum comprises the state gallery (Landesgalerie), featuring paintings and sculptures from the Middle Ages to the 20th century, and departments of archaeology, natural history and ethnology.
Paula Modersohn-Becker (1876 - 1907)
was a German painter and one of the most important representatives of early Expressionism. Her works unite characteristic aspects of early 20th century art.
Becker became known in the Worpswede artists' colony, where she was a pupil of Fritz Mackensen. Two paintings that she exhibited at the Bremen Kunsthalle in 1899 were sharply criticised and had to be removed during the exhibition. In 1900, she studied at the Académie Colarossi in Paris and married the painter Paul Modersohn after her return to Worpswede in 1901.
Paula Modersohn-Becker´s immense oeuvre only came to light posthumously. She created 750 paintings and around 1000 drawings.
Stillende Mutter - Breastfeeding mother / 1903
Three stamps portraying three different famous women in Germany:
Paula Modersohn-Becker (BRD1359)
Therese Giehse (BRD1390)
Emma Ihrer (BRD1405)
These stamps are made up of 33 similar stamps in the Famous Women series.
Under the Swastika
In the history of the Friends of the Kunsthalle too the seizure of power by the Nazis is a deep cut. The Nazi regime developed a practice of arts funding which was marked by the mandatory relationship of art and state.
The enforced conformity of friends meant the loss of independence and the orientation of the association's activities to the objectives of the National Socialist government. Decisive for this change of course, was the board meeting on 10 June 1933. The poet and art historian Wilhelm Niemeyer played the key role as the representative of the Militant League for German Culture (Kampfbund). The Kampfbund was a Nazi-oriented organization which represented a nationalist-racist concept of art. Although Niemeyer since 1927 no longer belonged to the board of the association, he participated against the resistance of Gustav Pauli and the other board members at the meeting to introduce a list of the Executive Board drawn up by the Kampfbund.
As a result of the meeting Pauli on the same day sent a list of candidates for the election of the new board of the Friends to the Kampfbund. This was his last official act for the Friends of the Kunsthalle. The new board then was no longer elected but appointed by the First Mayor Carl Vincent Krogmann and was completely re-assembled, with two exceptions.
New chairman became Hermann Maetzig who also headed the official business at the Kunsthalle from the beginning of October, Pauli in late September 1933 as director of the Kunsthalle was sent into retirement. On the part of the club members, there was no opposition against the replacement of the Board, they confirmed this one after a short debate on their general meeting on 31 October 1933.
The era Maetzig did not last long. Already in April 1934, he had to give up all offices for belonging to the Freemasons. His successor Wilhelm Freiherr Kleinschmit of Lengefeld remained until August 1937 executive director of the Kunsthalle and Chairman of Friends. In the action "degenerate art" to which the set up by Pauli collection of modern art in the summer of 1937 fell victim he did not participate. However, in the tenure of Kleinschmit fell the exclusion of Jewish club members. This marks the blackest chapters in the history of the club.
At the beginning of 1936, the Statute of friends was officially completed by an "Aryan paragraph". But already at the end of the fiscal year 1935, the Jewish members had been forced to leave the club. In September 1935, the new program of events was sent with a message of Kleinschmit. It was said there, the membership card will be issued only to those persons who signed a statement that they were "Aryans".
Alone in September and October 1935, 29 Jewish donors, so financially particularly committed members, had to leave the club. Among them are such famous names as Bleichröder, Budge or Warburg. In addition, there were also about 100 regular members who had been excluded. Against this background is hardly surprising that the number of members of the Friends in 1936 with 1,124 members reached a historic low.
The lecture program of friends during the Nazi period designed primarily Wilhelm Niemeyer, who was secretary of the association since August 1933. As already Pauli, he also succeeded to win a number of known German art historians. Speeches were held by university professors as Hans Jantzen, Hans Kauffmann or the befriended with Niemeyer, Wilhelm Pinder. Although the Kunsthalle was closed at the beginning of World War II to the public, the friends continued to offer lectures. Those ones, however, unlike as in the days of the Weimar Republic, as regards contents offered only little direct references to the collection fund of the Kunsthalle.
Unter dem Hakenkreuz
Auch in der Geschichte der Freunde der Kunsthalle stellt die Machtergreifung der Nationalsozialisten einen tiefen Einschnitt dar. Das NS-Regime entwickelte eine Praxis der Kunstförderung, die durch die zwangsweise Verbindung von Kunst und Staat gekennzeichnet war.
Die Gleichschaltung der Freunde bedeutete den Verlust der Selbstständigkeit und die Ausrichtung der Vereinsaktivitäten auf die Ziele der nationalsozialistischen Regierung. Entscheidend für diesen Kurswechsel wurde die Vorstandssitzung am 10. Juni 1933. Der Dichter und Kunsthistoriker Wilhelm Niemeyer spielte als Repräsentant des Kampfbundes für deutsche Kultur die maßgebliche Rolle. Der Kampfbund war eine NSDAP-nahe Organisation, die einen völkisch-rassistischen Kunstbegriff vertrat. Obwohl Niemeyer seit 1927 nicht mehr dem Vorstand des Vereins angehörte, nahm er gegen den Widerstand Gustav Paulis und der übrigen Vorstandsmitglieder an der Sitzung teil, um eine vom Kampfbund erstellte Vorstandsliste einzubringen.
Als Ergebnis der Sitzung schickte Pauli noch am selben Tag eine Vorschlagliste für die Wahl des neuen Vorstandes der Freunde an den Kampfbund. Dies war seine letzte Amtshandlung für die Freunde der Kunsthalle. Der neue Vorstand wurde dann nicht mehr gewählt, sondern vom Ersten Bürgermeister Carl Vincent Krogmann bestimmt und war bis auf zwei Ausnahmen völlig neu zusammengesetzt.
Neuer Vorsitzender wurde Hermann Maetzig, der ab Anfang Oktober auch die Amtsgeschäfte in der Kunsthalle leitete; Pauli wurde Ende September 1933 als Direktor der Kunsthalle in den Ruhestand versetzt. Von Seiten der Vereinsmitglieder gab es keinerlei Widerstände gegen die Neubesetzung des Vorstandes, sie bestätigten diesen nach kurzer Aussprache auf ihrer Mitgliederversammlung am 31. Oktober 1933.
Die Ära Maetzig währte nicht lange. Bereits im April 1934 musste er wegen seiner Zugehörigkeit zu den Freimaurern alle Ämter aufgeben. Sein Nachfolger Wilhelm Freiherr Kleinschmit von Lengefeld blieb bis August 1937 verantwortlicher Leiter der Kunsthalle und Vorsitzender der Freunde. An der Aktion „entartete Kunst“, der im Sommer 1937 die von Pauli aufgebaute Sammlung der Moderne zum Opfer fiel, war er allerdings nicht beteiligt. In Kleinschmits Amtszeit kam es jedoch zum Ausschluss der jüdischen Vereinsmitglieder. Dies markiert das schwärzeste Kapitel in der Geschichte des Vereins.
Zu Beginn des Jahres 1936 wurde die Satzung der Freunde offiziell um einen „Arierparagraphen“ ergänzt. Doch bereits am Ende des Geschäftsjahres 1935 hatten die jüdischen Mitglieder den Verein verlassen müssen. Im September 1935 wurde das neue Veranstaltungsprogramm mit einer Mitteilung Kleinschmits versandt. Dort hieß es, die Mitgliedskarte werde nur an solche Personen ausgestellt, die eine Erklärung unterschrieben, dass sie „ arischer Abstammung“ seien.
Allein 29 jüdische Stifter, also finanziell besonders engagierte Mitglieder, mussten im September und Oktober 1935 den Verein verlassen. Unter ihnen finden sich so berühmte Namen wie Bleichröder, Budge oder Warburg. Hinzu kamen noch ungefähr 100 ordentliche Mitglieder, die ausgeschlossen wurden. Vor diesem Hintergrund verwundert wenig, dass die Mitgliederzahl der Freunde im Jahr 1936 mit 1.124 Mitgliedern einen historischen Tiefststand erreichte.
Das Vortragsprogramm der Freunde während der NS-Zeit gestaltete in erster Linie Wilhelm Niemeyer, der seit August 1933 Schriftführer des Vereins war. Wie bereits Pauli gelang es auch ihm, eine Reihe bekannter deutscher Kunsthistoriker zu gewinnen. Es sprachen Universitätsprofessoren wie Hans Jantzen, Hans Kauffmann oder der mit Niemeyer befreundete Wilhelm Pinder. Obwohl die Kunsthalle mit Beginn des Zweiten Weltkrieges für das Publikum geschlossen wurde, boten die Freunde weiterhin Vorträge an. Diese wiesen allerdings – anders als zu Zeiten der Weimarer Republik – inhaltlich nur wenig direkte Bezüge zum Sammlungsbestand der Kunsthalle auf
freunde-der-kunsthalle.de/meta/ueber-uns/geschichte/unter...
From the museum label: While training to be a painter in Munich, Kollwitz made a group of self-portraits in which she adopted different attitudes. Aged 22 in this work, her confident pose recalls Rembrandt. Raised by a socialist family and influenced by the writings of the artist Max Klinger, Kollwitz rejected painting from 1890 onwards, instead devoting her talents to the graphic arts, which could reach a wider public.
Painting by Paula Modersohn-Becker (1876-1907), one of the most important representatives of early expressionism (expressionist artists sought to express the meaning of emotional experience rather than physical reality). Expressionism was a modernist movement, originating in Germany at the beginning of the 20th century. Paula was married to the artist Otto Modersohn (1865-1943).
Worpswede just outside Bremen is the place of Germany's most famous artist colony. Since the end of the 19th century artists have been working there and nowadays, about 130 artists and craftsmen and women live there permanently.
The painting is a part of the exhibition "The Worpswede Artists' Colony" at Waldemarsudde Art Hall.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paula_Modersohn-Becker
www.waldemarsudde.se (website in English and Swedish)