Wilhelm von Bode

Wilhelm von Bode (December 10th, 1845 with Calvörde - March 1st, 1929 with Berlin), initially Arnold Wilhelm Bode, was anobli in 1914. He was a historian of German art and a considerable specialist in the museums, and one looks it like the cofounder of the current organization of the museums. He created in 1904 the Kaiser-Friedrich-Museum (today Bodemuseum) in the Island of the Museums of Berlin; he there was managing director of the collections of arts of the State and published essential works on the history of paintings and the sculptures German, Dutchwomen and Italian. Its decisive influence on the development of the artistic collections of Berlin, was worth to him to be called “the Condottiere of the Museums” and “the Bismarck of the museums of Berlin”.

Biography

Wilhelm von Bode attended initially the college of Brunswick then, of 1863 to 1867, he studied the right in Göttingen and Berlin. In Göttingen, it adhered to the student Body Brunsviga Göttingen ; as of the time of its studies of right, it expressed interest for the history of Article While he was trainee in Brunswick, he occupied part of its time to order in a systematic way the ducal collections of arts. At that time it started to travel to visit the Dutch and Belgian museums and of the private collections, but also Italy. After its studies to become “listener” (studies which it did not finish), it still studied the history of art and archeology in Berlin and Vienna. Like listener, it remained all the time on leave, so much so that until his death he was officially “ducal listener on leave”. In 1870 it passed the doctorate to Leipzig.

In 1872 it started to work with the royal museums of Berlin as assisting for the section of sculptures of which he became director in 1883. As from 1890 it directs also the picture gallery and he became managing director of the museums of Berlin in 1905. Its competence concerning the history of art and its close relationships with artists and collectors as with the imperial family allowed him spectacular purchases at the beginning of its activity - in spite of its initially limited resources. The supreme leader of the Island of the Museums was the crown prince Frederic.

When it started to work, Berlin could not have competed like new capital in the artistic field with Munich or Dresden, and even less with Paris and Louvre. Having noted that for art the money was always lacking in Prussia, Bode was worried all its life to weave bonds with collectors, founders and patrons. Having started with approximately 50 Berliner private collectors, like James Simon, Adolphe Thiem, Louis Ravené (whose Fontane made an incisive portrait in its novel L' Adultera), Oscar Hainauer, Oscar Huldschinsky, Eduard Simon, Eugen Gutmann, Paul Davidsohn, Karl von der Heydt, Jacques Mühsam, Markus Kappel, Leopold Koppel, Eduard Arnhold, Carl von Hollitscher, Bode sought more and more collectors whose life was based on the currency of its pupil max J. Friedländer: “The possession of works of art is really the only manner suitable and permitted by the good taste to spread out its richness. ” Exemplary were its relations with James Simon, probably for Bode the private collector most important, with which it also collaborated in Deutschen the East-Gesellschaft (DOG). With its agreement, Bode advised it in the creation of its collection, so much so that thereafter, thanks to a donation, its works of art could marvelously enrich the reserves by the museums of the State.

In 1883 Bode presented to the Academy Arts fifty collectors of Berlin with 300 works of art in their possession. He had written the catalog. These activities of Bode enabled him to reinforce the cultural climate of Berlin, the trade of antiquities flowered. New cultural chronicles made their appearance thanks to the draftings of the recently founded reviews of arts whose most known representatives were Julius Meier-Graefe, Fritz Stahl, Adolf Behne, Karl Scheffler, max Osborn, Adolph Donath, without forgetting Ludwig Pietsch which was not to be the last. In Berlin of the editors of important newspapers as Rudolf Mosse started to collect works of Article.

In good terms with the emperor Guillaume II, Bode could be defended against many intrigues against him. Its diplomacy, which especially consisted in taking the coffee with the emperor to encourage it with the patronage, was worth to him many adhesions with its “Association of the Friends of the Museum of the Frederic emperor” who became the model of many similar organizations for other museums. Thus it succeeds in assembling a collection of sculptures of the first Rebirth Italian, able to hold its row in Europe, and developing the picture gallery around the most important works of the German and Dutch Masters among whom Rembrandt, Rubens and Dürer.

Von Bode was associated with the construction or rather with the extension of a great number of other sections, like cabinet of engravings on copper and the collection of the currencies, the Islamic section and the section of Eastern Asia, the archaeological and Egyptian collections. It gave also councils to the private collectors and the regional museums in their purchases and was at the origin of the new building of Pergamonmuseum and the museum of Dahlem. For the Kaiser-Friedrich-Museum (today Bodemuseum), inaugurated in 1904, it developed a principle which made school, while putting in each coin of the works of art and the only one time old objects.

Its works, whose some include/understand many volumes, on painting Dutchwoman and the Italian sculpture were regarded a long time as essential work in this field. Its judgment concerning the history of art made authority among the specialists, it was inter alia one of the experts in the debate on Holbein in Dresden. Thanks to him the museums of Berlin could be compared with the most considerable museums of Europe.

Works

Vorderasiatische Knüpfteppiche aus älterer Zeit . Leipzig
Geschichte DER deutschen Plastik , 1887
Rembrandt , 8 volumes, in collaboration with C. Hofstede de Groot, 1897 - 1905
Kunst und Kunstgewerbe amndt Ende of the neunzehnten Jahrhunderts . Berlin, 1901.
Florentiner Bildhauer DER Rebirth , 1902, 4. edition 1921
DER deutsche Verein für Kunstwissenschaft . Berlin 1907, in: Boarding school. Monatsschrift für Wissenschaft, Kunst und Technik. 1. Sp.1069-1074
Kunstmuseen, ihre Ziele und Grenzen . Berlin 1907, in: Boarding school. Monatsschrift für Wissenschaft, Kunst und Technik. 1.Sp.15-22
Die Provinzialmuseen und ihre Aufgaben . Berlin 1907, in: Boarding school. Monatsschrift für Wissenschaft, Kunst und Technik. 1. Sp.437-444
Rembrandt und the Seine Zeitgenossen: Charakterbilder DER grossen Meister DER holländischen und vlämischen Malerschule im siebzehnten Jahrhundert. , 2. , several editions Leipzig 1907
Der Generaldirektor der Berliner und der Münchener Kunstsammlungen. , Berlin 1908, in: Boarding school. Monatsschrift für Wissenschaft, Kunst und Technik. 2. Sp.1073-1082
Die Werke der Familie della Robbia. Hrsg. von Wilhelm von Bode. Berlin 1914.
Die deutsche Kunstwissenschaft und der Krieg. Leipzig 1915, in: Boarding school. Monatsschrift für Wissenschaft, Kunst und Technik. 9. , Sp.97-102
Die Meister DER holländischen und vlämischen Malerschulen , 1917, 9th éditione 1958
Sandro Botticelli , 1921
Die italienischen Bronzestatuetten DER Rebirth. Kleine, neu bearb. Ausg. Berlin 1922.
Die italienische Plastik. 6th edition Berlin 1922.
Mein Leben , 2 volumes, 1930

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