15 February 2008 – 18 May 2008

ARCHITECTURE IN the realm of THE - 200 YEARS OF THE ACADEMY Of FINE arts MUNICH

To mark the 200th anniversary of Munich’s Academy of Fine Arts, the Architekturmuseum der TU München is launching the festival year with a show of works by its lecturers in architecture and their students. Impressive works on paper, pictorial material, plaster casts and models illustrate in the first two rooms of the exhibition the specific form of architecture studies at the Academy. Just as in the 19th century the study of architecture at the Academy was incorporated into the »realm of the arts« together with copper-plate engraving, sculpting and painting, so this tradition of teaching architecture along particularly artistic lines is continued there to this day. The »Royal Academy of Fine Arts« founded in May 1808 had its origins in the public school for drawing dating back to 1766. In its constitutional certificate it was stipulated that the »charitable influences of the Fine Arts« should be disseminated to all members of society in order to propagate »inclinations towards the aesthetic and well designed« through »this powerful means of education« and thereby refine »the spirit and morals of the people«. With the founding of the Academy the study of architecture received equal status in Bavaria as an academic discipline alongside the other arts.

The architects of the Academy not only played an outstanding role in architectural projects realised in Munich and Bavaria. In some cases, their influence reached far beyond Germany too. Among the famous teachers in the19th century were Carl von Fischer, who designed Munich’s National Theatre, and his pupil Friedrich von Gärtner, under whose direction the Academy achieved international fame and formed a counterweight to the Schinkel school in Berlin. The major building works, with which Ludwig I. commissioned Gärtner from 1828 onwards, attracted pupils from all over the world to the architecture school of the Academy. Right up to the 1870s Gärtner’s »rounded arch style« dominated architecture not just in Bavaria but also saw its influence spread all the way from Southern Europe to the USA via his many students. August von Voit, architect of Munich’s Glaspalast, Ludwig Lange and Georg Friedrich Ziebland were Gärtner’s successors before architectural studies were transferred in 1868 to the newly founded Polytechnic School, now the Technical University of Munich.

The remaining departments of painting, works on paper and sculpting moved to a representative new building designed by Gottfried von Neureuther near the Siegestor (‘Victory Arch’), still the home of the Academy today. Since 1946 architecture and interior design have also been taught here. Confronting architectural studies at the Technical University is the inter-disciplinary approach of the Academy »in the realm of the arts«. It is a distinctive feature of the Academy that to this day it has adhered to the system of training based on the master-pupil-principle. Through teachers like Sep Ruf, Paolo Nestler and Otto Steidle the study of architecture at the Academy has won international acclaim.

Address

Pinakothek der Moderne
Kunstareal München Barer Strasse 40
80333 München
phone +49 89 23 80 53 60
http://www.pinakothek.de

Opening Hours

Daily 10 a.m. - 6 p.m., Thursday 10 a.m. - 8 p.m., closed on Monday

Description of the Museum

With four major museums presenting art, works on paper, architecture and design under one roof, the Pinakothek der Moderne is one of the world’s greatest collections of 20th and 21st century art. The open and spacious building invites visitors to explore, to discover connections and gain new and surprising insights. Temporary exhibits and events from various cultural domains complete the supradisciplinary program.

Within 10 days
starting exhibitions
ending exhibitions