Joachim Heinrich Wilhelm Wagener
Joachim Heinrich Wilhelm Wagener (* July 16, 1782 in Berlin, † January 18, 1861 ) was a German banker and patron. His collection of paintings forms the basis of the Old National Gallery in Berlin.
Life and work
Wagener's father Heinrich Wilhelm Wagener († 1820) had founded together with his brother Otto Henry Anhalt ( 1740-1820 ) in 1775, the trade and forwarding house of Anhalt & Wagener. It had its headquarters in leading to Palace Square brothers in Berlin Center at St. Peter's Church. 1814, Joachim Heinrich Wilhelm Wagener partners and 1820 after the death of the two founders sole owner of the company whose banking business he expanded. In 1820 he was co-founder of the Berlin Merchants and was until 1827 their elder. 1831 Wagener was appointed Swedish-Norwegian consul.
In 1815 he had purchased his first painting, a work of Karl Friedrich Schinkel, which has two years earlier Gothic church on a rock by the sea. Over the years he amassed an extensive collection of art of his presence and also promoted artists through specific orders. In his will he left in 1859 translated the entire collection of 262 paintings now the Prussian state:
" For a number of years, I have paintings by living artists purchased and in this way an art collection acquired, which will be for the art history of interest, since it makes the progress of modern art at individual images of important painters of year vividly to year. The printed catalog is facing 256 images excreted of which, however, No. 10, because I have the picture listed under this number returned. In contrast, the collection has increased since the printing of the catalog to five images that are already grudge in the written catalogs of me, and perhaps will get even more distant growth through new purchases when affords me the opportunity to do so. This is my wish that this collection of paintings, unseparated get to the extent that they will find at my death, and that they 'll be here erected in Berlin in a suitable premises and made available to all artists and art lovers always accessible to get the at to enjoy individual paintings or even kopiren same or to make any additional studies. Relying on the judgment of many experts on the not inconsiderable artistic value of the collection, which I did. At a cost of well over 100,000 Thaler brought together and maintained with ever increasing joy have, I dare the same Sr. Royal Highness the Prince Regent, and, in my death the regency should be completed insofar His Majesty offered to the then reigning kings as a legacy of the same order gracious acceptance humbly ask for the sake of art. It ties at this my request any other condition or restriction, as I have already utter in my above wishes for the unseparated maintenance, installation and use of the collection allows me. In particular, I leave it entirely to the Most High discretion, whether about the collection still remembered in the input will be intensified and continued sense so as to grow into a national gallery, which represents the more recent painting in its further development, and the purpose of me had in mind when commencing the collection, fully satisfied, than is possible during the short life of an individual. "
After Wagener's death William I took by decree of 27 February 1861 the donation. He drove another 20 paintings from the Royal Collection at. On the birthday of the King, on 22 March 1861 the Wagenersche and National Gallery was opened in the former building of the Academy of Arts Unter den Linden. 1876 , according to its own building on the Museum Island completion, the collection moved there. At the same time sparked Max Jordan as Director of the National Gallery in the relationship and the hitherto preserved original numbering of the Wagenerschen collection on.
In addition to the collection of paintings Wagener also had an extensive collection of autographs, as well as an artist archive created in which the letters of the artists with whom he had been in contact were. The Autograph Collection, whose catalog included 1289 numbers, was sold at auction in February 1878. The 4 volumes in the filed letters cover the period from 1834 to 1859, came in the archives of the National Gallery.
Wagener was buried in the St. Peter's Cemetery in Berlin. His grave was leveled at the end of the 20th century.