Cornelius Gurlitt (art historian)
Cornelius Gurlitt Gustav ( born January 1, 1850 in Nischwitz, † March 25, 1938 in Dresden ) was a German architect and art historian.
Life
Cornelius Gurlitt was the third of seven children of the landscape painter Louis Gurlitt and his wife Elisabeth, née Lewald, a sister of the novelist Fanny Lewald, in Nischwitz at Wurzen. Namesake was Gustav Cornelius Gurlitt, a paternal uncle, a noted composer and music theorist.
Even as a youth, Cornelius Gurlitt, architect decided to become. After visiting the Berlin Academy of Architecture he learned in Gotha at Ludwig Bohnstedt before he entered the architectural firm of Emil von Förster in Vienna 1868. This was followed by erratic years at the Polytechnic Stuttgart, as a volunteer in the Franco-German war 1870/1871 and in architectural studios in Kassel and Dresden, before he began to be interested in art and architectural history in the course of construction of the Muldentalbahn. In the following years, Cornelius Gurlitt published numerous articles in newspapers and magazines, gave lectures and wrote pamphlets on the architecture of the city of Dresden. His tireless dedication to the city and its architectural and art history led in 1878 to offer an assistantship in the Museum of Decorative Arts Dresden, the Gurlitt held until 1887.
Over the next three years he published his first important work with a three-volume history of the Baroque. With its extensive and positive representation of the epoch, the publication led to a reassessment of the time, which had previously been devalued as wasteful. In 1889, Cornelius Gurlitt worked for a short time as a lecturer at the Institute of Technology ( Berlin -Charlottenburg ) before 1893 as the successor of Richard Steche as an associate professor, the Chair of the History of the technical arts at the Royal Saxon Technical University, founded three years earlier took over in Dresden. The professor was also the acquisition of inventory of the monuments of Saxony, which was launched in 1881 by the Saxon antiquity club into being connected. By Richard Steche emerged until his death in 15 volumes, Gurlitt sat in training and Inventarisator to band 41, with the number 1923 has been completed.
It was not until 1899 Cornelius Gurlitt was appointed a full professor. When a year later for the first time students of architecture was given at the Technical University Dresden consideration for promotion, Cornelius Gurlitt became a doctor father of the first doctoral Hermann Muthesius, who is considered the father of functionalism today. From 1902 Gurlitt held one of the first on a technical university lectures on urban planning. For the year 1904/1905 he was elected rector of the university. He had limited to one academic year mark Office 1915/1916 held. Under his rectorship falls, inter alia, the planning of the building was inaugurated in the summer of 1905 in the mechanical department of the Technical University of Dresden, today, inter alia, Berndt- construction and construction - Zeuner.
With 70 years Cornelius Gurlitt ended as a professor (Prof. Dr. phil., Dr. theol. Hc Dr. -Ing. E. h ) at the Technical University Dresden, his last years were busy. In 1922 he became the president of the Free Academy of Urban Design, he also was 1920-1926 President of the Association of German Architects ( BDA), which he co-founded. It was followed by numerous book publications. Over 100 monographs bear witness to an extremely productive life. In the Third Reich was Cornelius Gurlitt, who had sympathized beginning with Adolf Hitler, declared a half-Jew. On the occasion of his death in March 1938 there was therefore no official appreciations. Cornelius Gurlitt is located at Dresden St. John's Cemetery buried.
Importance
Cornelius Gurlitt is now regarded as the founder of Baroque art historical research and thus became the founder of the Saxon monuments. He was a member of the Commission of 1900, held in Dresden first German tags for Conservation, which commissioned Georg Dehio with the creation of a handbook of German art monuments.
Some works Cornelius Gurlitt can still find scientific interest: In addition to his work to the Baroque and the inventory of architectural and art monuments in Saxony, this also includes his great age work on Augustus the Strong, which he finished in 1924.
Cornelius Gurlitt was in frequent contact with major figures of his time, such as Paul Wallot, Arno Holz, Max Klinger and Alfred Lichtwark. Parts of the literary estate Cornelius Gurlitt are owned by the Archives of the Technical University of Dresden. In the south of Dresden today carries a street its name.
Family
Cornelius Gurlitt married in 1888 Marie Gerlach ( 1859-1949 ), daughter of the Judicial Council, Heinrich Ferdinand Gerlach. The couple had the musicologist Wilibald Gurlitt (1889-1963), the painter Cornelia Gurlitt (1890-1919), who took his own life, as well as the art historian Hildebrand Gurlitt (1895-1956), father of the art collector Cornelius Gurlitt.
Quote
" In studying the Saxon art history no one came past Gurlitt. He was the unrivaled master of his craft. What distinguished him from his followers, was in addition to his almost unsurpassed meticulousness the fact that he was personally on site, self -researched, took measurements, made sketches, took pictures. In a word: Unlike many other art historians Cornelius Gurlitt knew the buildings, which he has described. And that's what he did while he was in office, demanded of his disciples. "
The Grimmaer local historian Rudolf Priemer in 2013 about Cornelius Gurlitt