The ‘Kunstgewerbe-Museum’s’ (Museum of Arts and Crafts) acquisitions at the second ‘Deutsche Architektur- und Kunsthandwerkausstellung’ (German Architecture and Arts and Crafts Exhibition) in Munich
Most of the acquisitions that entered the ‘Kunstgewerbe-Museum’s’ collection under director general Adolf Feulner (1938-1945) were objects from past eras. In the case of furniture and ceramics, for example, works from the 18th century were preferred. One exception is a group of purchases in the accounting year 1938 (April 1938-March 1939). In the acquisition documents of the Cologne Museum of Applied Arts (also known as MAKK) archive, a central source for provenance research, the summarizing designation ‘Modern Porcelain - Decorative Arts from the Munich Exhibition 1939’ is used for a large number of new acquisitions. However, on the basis of the accession lists and the museum's inventory books, which were only compiled after 1945, it was not possible to determine which 27 objects, recorded here with the accession numbers 1938.0089 to 1938.0115, were involved in detail. The research was therefore extended and led to the ‘Haus der Deutschen Kunst’ (House of German Art) in Munich.
The House of German Art was established as an early prestige project of the National Socialists. Adolf Hitler personally laid the foundation stone in 1933, and in July 1937 the exhibition building on Prinzregentenstraße, designed by architect Paul Ludwig Troost, was inaugurated with the first ‘Großen Deutschen Kunstausstellung’ (Great German Art Exhibition) and a ceremony. The following day, the propaganda exhibition ‘Entartete Kunst’ (Degenerate Art) opened in the gallery building, which defamed modernist art that did not correspond to the National Socialists’ understanding of art. In addition to the subsequent annual exhibitions of fine art, which were conceived as sales shows and attracted large crowds of visitors, presentations of architecture and applied arts were also held from 1938 onwards. Artists, workshops, manufactories and trade schools exhibited their products here and offered them for sale.
Various documents relating to the purchase transactions have been preserved in the House of German Art’s archive. Research into these sources has yielded completely new and extensive information on the acquisitions made by the ‘Kunstgewerbe-Museum’. For example, the accounts receivable ledger from 1939 shows purchases worth 2,631.82 Reichsmark by the Cologne museum on March 22 (Haus der Kunst, Historisches Archiv, HdDK 24). In addition to this proof of the origin of the acquisitions, a list of purchases from the second German Architecture and Arts and Crafts Exhibition for the period from February 25 to April 9, 1939 was found (HdDK 39). The list includes a compilation of the objects that Adolf Feulner personally purchased for the ‘Kunstgewerbe-Museum’ on March 21, 1939.
Further sources confirm this information. The purchase sum recorded in the Munich archive corresponds exactly to the details on one of the Cologne acquisition lists preserved in the museum archive. In addition, correspondence between Feulner and the Cologne ‘Kulturamt’ (Cultural Office) reveals that he had undertaken a business trip to Munich in March 1939 to select objects for the ‘Kunstgewerbe-Museum’ at the exhibition in the House of German Art that he considered exemplary (HAStK, Acc. 1746, A 49).
The Munich source was particularly productive with regard to the type of works purchased: the list contains the names of the artists who executed the objects as well as references to entries in the exhibition catalog. According to this, Feulner acquired ceramic works by Hans Eska, Wim Mühlendyck and Uhlemeyer & Hobein, an ivory box by Albin Schreiber, a lace work by Heinrich Franke, glass art from the state technical schools in Zwiesel and Steinschönau (Kamenický Šenov) and by Ilse Scharge-Nebel as well as silver objects by Elisabeth Wiens, Georg Czauderna and Karl Weishaupt.
Unfortunately, the search for these objects within the MAKK's holdings has so far been unsuccessful, despite the detailed information provided. The purchases made at the second German Architecture and Arts and Crafts Exhibition at the House of German Art in Munich were never recorded in the museum's inventory books. However, their arrival in Cologne is confirmed by press reports according to which these new acquisitions were shown in the ‘Kunstgewerbe-Museum’s’ so-called war exhibition. Shortly before the start of the war, in the late summer of 1939, valuable collection items were moved to depots outside Cologne and the museum was closed. In December of that year, a few rooms in the basement reopened. A selection of objects from the ‘Kunstgewerbe-Museum’ and the ‘Schnütgen-Museum’ were presented there, among them new acquisitions for the collections including purchases from Munich. After that, their trail is lost. The war exhibition was closed in the spring of 1941 due to the increasing danger of air raids. It has not yet been possible to determine whether the works of art on display there were taken out of the city or stored in the basement of the museum along with other objects. On June 29, 1943, the ‘Kunstgewerbe-Museum’ was severely damaged by aerial bombs.
In any case, the modern works of art did not return to the ‘Kunstgewerbe-Museum’ with the objects that had been stored in external depots and were gradually retrieved after the end of the war. Their mention in the reconstructed acquisition lists remained the only reference in the museum to their purchase in March 1939.
Dr. Iris Metje, February 2022