Planning, foundation and construction of the original building There was long discussion of the desirability of establishing a national gallery in Berlin, particularly during
the period of revolutionary nationalism around 1848, and it became an increasingly serious proposition from 1850, when publications appeared advocating it. From the start it was bound up with the ambitions of
Prussia and the wish for Berlin to become a capital of world renown. The decision was finally taken in 1861, after the death of the banker and art patron
Joachim Heinrich Wilhelm Wagener, who bequeathed his extensive collection (262 artworks) to the then Prince Regent, the future King
William I, in the hope of catalysing the formation of a gallery of "more recent" art. The collection was initially known as the
Wagenersche und Nationalgalerie (Wagener and National Gallery) and was housed in the buildings of the
Prussian Academy of Arts.
Friedrich August Stüler began working on a design for a gallery building in 1863, based on a sketch by William I's father, King
Frederick William IV of Prussia. Two years and two failed plans later, his third proposal was finally accepted. Stüler died before planning was completed and
Carl Busse handled the remaining details in 1865. In 1866, by order of the king and his
cabinet, the
Kommission für den Bau der Nationalgalerie (Commission for the construction of the national gallery) was created. Ground was broken in 1867 under the supervision of
Heinrich Strack. In 1872 the structure was completed and interior work began. The opening took place on March 22, 1876 in the presence of William I, who was by then German Emperor. The building, today the
Alte Nationalgalerie, resembles a Greco-Roman
temple (a form chosen for its symbolism that, it has been pointed out, is not well suited to displaying art) and is stylistically a combination of late Classicism and early
Neo-Renaissance. It was intended to express "the unity of art, nation, and history", and therefore has aspects reminiscent of a church (with an apse) and a theatre (a grand staircase leading to the entry) as well as a temple. An
equestrian statue of Frederick William IV tops the stairs, and the inside stairs have a frieze by
Otto Geyer depicting German history from prehistoric times to the 19th century. On his first visit to Berlin, in November 1916, the young
Adolf Hitler sent a postcard of this building to a comrade in arms to congratulate him on receiving the
Iron Cross.
Until 1933 The first director of the National Gallery was
Max Jordan, who was appointed in 1874, before the building was completed. In 1896, he was succeeded as director by
Hugo von Tschudi, formerly assistant head of the Berlin museums under
Wilhelm von Bode. He also rearranged the exhibition spaces, putting many items in storage to make room for works by
Manet,
Monet,
Degas and
Rodin as well as the earlier
Constable and
Courbet. One of the first, soon after Tschudi took up the post, was Manet's
In the Conservatory; This moved the gallery decisively away from emphasis on Prussia and the rest of the German Empire. In response to complaints from the academic connoisseurs, William II decreed in 1899 that all acquisitions for the National Gallery must have his personal authorisation; Tschudi initially complied and rehung the old works, but the imperial decree proved unenforceable, prompting the Kaiser to build public monuments to his power instead. In 1901, at the inauguration of the memorials on the
Siegesallee, he gave a speech denouncing "gutter art" which became known as the
Rinnsteinrede (gutter speech). , which became the National Gallery's annexe for modern art in 1919 Tschudi also had a great appreciation for the
German Romantics, many of whose paintings were included in Wagener's original bequest. An exhibition of 100 years of German art at the National Gallery in 1906 contributed to reawakening interest in artists such as
Caspar David Friedrich. It opened with works by the
Berlin Secessionists, the Impressionists and the
Expressionists. This was the first state promotion of Expressionist works, which were unpopular with large numbers of the public, but the collection was, in the judgement of Justi's assistant
Alfred Hentzen, superior to that of all other German galleries then collecting modern art. By far the largest share of artworks in
the 1937 exhibition of 'Degenerate Art' under the Nazis were taken from this collection.
Nazi Germany Justi was one of 27 art gallery and museum heads forced out by the Nazis in 1933 under the
Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service, to be succeeded for a few months by
Alois Schardt and then by
Eberhard Hanfstaengl, who was in turn dismissed in 1937; he had refused to meet with the commission under
Adolf Ziegler, president of the Reich Chamber for the Visual Arts, who were charged with purging the gallery of "degenerate" works. Some artwork from a dealer had been burnt in the furnaces of the National Gallery building in 1936, and the modern art annexe in the Crown Prince's Palace was shut down in 1937 as a "hotbed of cultural Bolshevism". The gallery was placed under the control of the Berlin State Museums and Hanfstaengl was after a while replaced by
Paul Ortwin Rave, who despite being more acceptable to the Nazi regime, conscientiously guarded the artworks and as the war drew to an end, went with them to the mine where they were to be stored for safety's sake and was there when the
Red Army arrived. He remained in charge of the gallery until 1950.
Post-war After the Second World War, the gallery and the other museums on
Museum Island were located in the Soviet Occupation Zone which became East Berlin. The National Gallery's collection, much of it confiscated and then returned by the various occupying powers, was split between East and West and had been further diminished by the war; 19th-century paintings from the former annexe had been destroyed by fire. this was eventually merged with the Western branch of the National Gallery,
Werner Haftmann, who had become the director in 1967, said he was nervous about the gallery moving into the prestige modern building, comparing himself to "a wretched learner ... getting into a luxury
Mercedes." The
Friedrichswerder Church, a Gothic landmark designed by
Karl Friedrich Schinkel, was ruined in the war; between 1979 and 1986 it was restored, and it was then reopened in September 1987, as part of the celebrations of Berlin's 750th anniversary, as an annexe of the National Gallery displaying 19th-century sculpture. There is a Schinkel museum in the gallery. Following
German reunification, the old building was extensively renovated and the new building is now used for 20th-century art and the old building for 19th-century art. In 1996, while the Alte Nationalgalerie was still being slowly renovated, two further exhibition spaces were added for modern art. In September, the
Berggruen Museum, housing
Heinz Berggruen's collection of modern classics, especially focussed on Picasso, opened in the western of a pair of neoclassical buildings opposite the Charlottenburg Palace, like the Alte Nationalgalerie designed by Friedrich August Stüler as realisations of sketches by Frederick William IV; it had housed the West Berlin Museum of Antiquities until that collection was returned to Museum Island after German reunification. Berggruen initially leased the collection to the Berlin State Museums for a ten-year period, but in 2000 sold it to them for a small fraction of its assessed value. In November, the
Hamburger Bahnhof, formerly a museum of technology but ruined in the war, opened after a six-year renovation as the
Museum für Gegenwart, housing contemporary art, initially most from
Erich Marx's collection. In December 2011, it was announced that the Old Masters currently displayed in the
Gemäldegalerie in the Kulturforum would be moved out to make way for a representative permanent exhibition of modern art, for which the Neue Nationalgalerie does not have adequate space.
Directors ; on the right,
Berggruen Museum • 1874–1895:
Max Jordan • 1896–1908:
Hugo von Tschudi • 1909–1933:
Ludwig Justi • 1933–1937:
Eberhard Hanfstaengl • 1937–1950:
Paul Ortwin Rave • 1950–1957:
Ludwig Justi • 1957–1964:
Leopold Reidemeister • 1965–1966:
Stefan Waetzold • 1967–1974:
Werner Haftmann • 1974–1975:
Wieland Schmied • 1975–1997:
Dieter Honisch • 1999–2008:
Peter-Klaus Schuster • 2008–2020:
Udo Kittelmann (with
Joachim Jäger as deputy director and head of the Neue Nationalgalerie from December 2011) == See also ==