State Academy of Fine Arts Stuttgart

History

The Academy is a fine art university in the federal state of Baden-Württemberg which formed in 1941 through the merging of the former Academy of Fine Arts (Württembergische Akademie der bildenden Künste) with the former School of Applied Arts (Württembergische Staatliche Kunstgewerbeschule) to make the Staatliche Akademie der bildenden Künste Stuttgart. This was reconstituted under the same name in 1946 by Theodor Heuss. Under the rectorate of Wolfgang Kermer, on 22 February 1975, the ″Gesetz über die Kunsthochschulen im Lande Baden-Württemberg (Kunsthochschulgesetz)″ passed by the Landtag of Baden-Württemberg came into force. For the first time in the history of the Stuttgart State Academy of Art and Design, this regulated the status and guaranteed the equality of rank with universities. ″The Stuttgart Academy", said Rector Wolfgang Kermer on the occasion of the ″State Art University Weeks 1981″ (Landeskunsthochschulwochen 1981) in Baden-Baden, ″sees its task and responsibility as a ′universitas artium′, whose - certainly high - standards must be to be part of the constantly changing art reality and at the same time to contribute to these changes.″

On 25 June 1761, Charles Eugene, Duke of Württemberg, established an Académie des Artsin his New Palace in the center of Stuttgart, ″where youth can develop as young plants in a nursery″.

This institution went into decline after a second art educational institution founded by Eugene, the Karlsschule, gained in importance so that the Académie des Arts existed only by name. The Karlsschule was an elite school with military education methods, situated behind the New Palace in Stuttgart. In 1781 the Karlsschule was raised by Emperor Joseph II to university status under the name Karls Hohe Schule. One of the unique features was the print workshop, founded in 1776 under the copper engraver Johann Gotthard von Müller.

After the death of Eugene in 1793, the Hohe Karlsschule was disbanded in 1794 by his brother and successor Louis Eugene, Duke of Württemberg.

35 years later, in 1829, King William I of Württemberg founded an art school in Stuttgart, initially in conjunction with other educational institutions (Vereinigte Kunst-, Real- und Gewerbe-Schule). The ″Royal art school″ (Königliche Kunstschule) gradually developed as a training center, which in 1901 under the direction of Leopold Graf von Kalckreuth received the title ″Royal academy of fine arts″ (Königliche Akademie der bildenden Künste, after 1918 Württembergische Akademie der bildenden Künste).

List of rectors

List of rectors at ABK Stuttgart (since 1946):

Honorary members and honorary senators of the Academy

Honorary Members of the Académie des Arts

Anna Dorothea Therbusch (1762)

Honorary Members of the Stuttgart State Academy of Art an Design (appointment period 1942–1999)

Bernhard Pankok (1942)

Ida Kerkovius (1962)

Rolf Nesch (1962)

Wilhelm Wagenfeld (1962)

Walter Gropius (1968)

Karl Schmidt-Rottluff (1964)

Erich Mönch (1975)

Hannes Neuner (1976)

Camille Graeser (1977)

Herbert Hirche (1977)

Oswald Oberhuber (1982)

Honorary Senators (appointment period 2004 to today)

Wolfgang Kermer (2004)

Oswald Oberhuber (2004)

Gerd Hatje (2006)

"Against forgetting"

Alumni of the Stuttgart art schools, who died in the Holocaust

Carry van Biema (1881–1942)

Alice Haarburger (1891–1942)

Maria Lemmé (1880–1943)

Käthe Loewenthal (1878–1942)

Paula Straus (1894–1943)

Marianne Weil (1909–1942)

Artists who participated in the Stuttgart Jewish art exhibitions in 1935 and/or 1937, presumably studied at the Stuttgart art schools and whose fate is unknown

Ly Bernheimer

Hilde Brandt

Trude Munk

Else Samuel

Alumni from the Stuttgart art schools who survived the Holocaust

Ellen Auerbach (1906–2004)

Erwin Broner (1898–1971)

Dina Cymbalist (1907–1989)

Paul Elsas (1896–1981)

Hermann Fechenbach (1897–1986)

Margarethe Garthe (1891–1976); art studies in Stuttgart not cleared

Liselotte Grschebina (1908–1994)

Boris Grünwald (1933–2014)

Elli Heimann (1891–1966); art studies in Stutttgart not cleared

Lily Hildebrandt (1887–1974)

Erich Kahn (1904–1980)

Hermann Kahn (Aharon Kahana) (1905–1967)

Ignaz Kaufmann (1885–1975)

Fyodor Khitruk (1917–2012)

Susan Kozma-Orlay (1913–2008); Hungarian–Australian designer

Frans Krajcberg (1921–2017)

Klara Neuburger (1882–1945)

Charlotte Posenenske (1930–1985)

Imre Reiner (1900–1987)

Grete Stern (1904–1999)