Speech OB 01.12.2007

on the occasion of the opening of the Museum Gunzenhauser on 1 December 2007

The spoken word counts!

Dear Mr Federal President, Dear Prime Minister, Dear Dr Gunzenhauser, Dear Prince of Hohenzollern, Dear Minister of State, Dear Members of the German Bundestag and the Saxon State Parliament Gunzenhauser, Honourable Prince of Hohenzollern, Honourable Minister of State, Honourable Members of the German Bundestag and the Saxon State Parliament, Honourable representatives of the partner cities Akron, Tampere and Volgograd, Honourable City CouncillorsAkron, Tampere and Volgograd, Dear City Councillors and Mayors, Dear Sponsors of the Sparkasse, Dear Mrs Mössinger, Dear Festive Assembly. It is a great pleasure for me to welcome you on this special day in the history of the city.

It is a great honour for us that you, Mr President, are here with us today; it makes us happy and encourages us.

Today's opening of the Gunzenhauser Museum is the result of a century-long decision in favour of Chemnitz.

Ladies and gentlemen,
Modernism began with Picasso in 1907, an era which, from Chemnitz's perspective, represents an economic, intellectual and cultural heyday. It still characterises the face, pace and self-image of this city today.

At the beginning of the last century, numerous art-loving and patronising entrepreneurs, such as the Vogel family with their commissions to Max Klinger and the Esche family with Henry van de Velde, had already set the course.

This blossoming sense of art manifested itself from 1909 onwards in the impressive König-Albert-Museum with its rich art collection. Over the course of the past one hundred years, the collection has, for historical reasons, not been free of disruptions. This makes every single patronage commitment to the art collections all the more valuable, especially in more recent history. Thanks to the foundation of Hartmut Koch from Chemnitz, for example, the entire graphic work of Wolfgang Mattheuer was added to the collection.

Ladies and gentlemen,
The willingness of donors from the old federal states to give individual works of art or entire collections to Chemnitz, as recently demonstrated by Mr and Mrs Flügge from Düsseldorf, cannot be taken for granted and is therefore particularly gratifying. However, it seemed almost impossible to bring one of the very large collections of classical modern art to the city.

A fierce dispute usually breaks out over such well-endowed and inspired collectors, in which Chemnitz initially seemed to have no chance.

Dr Alfred Gunzenhauser's resolute decision to go from being a gifted collector to a generous benefactor and to choose Chemnitz as the location for his collection cannot be overestimated.

Dear Dr Gunzenhauser, you are giving us Chemnitz residents and our guests a magnificent, invaluable gift.

Ladies and gentlemen,
The Gunzenhauser Collection consists of almost 2,500 works of art. The focus is on works of classical modernism. The list of artists represented is impressive, including Dix, Corinth, Heckel, Kirchner, Paula Modersohn-Becker, Pechstein, Schmidt-Rottluff, Beckmann, Gabriele Münter, Altenbourg, Grützke and Warhol. The numerous paintings by Nolde, Jawlensky and Felixmüller are remarkable. Dear Dr Alfred Gunzenhauser, on behalf of the city and its citizens, I would like to express my deep and great gratitude for your generous donation. Dear Dr Gunzenhauser, with the help of public and private sponsors, we were fortunately able to fulfil our wish to create a suitable building for your wonderful collection.

First and foremost is the Sparkasse Chemnitz, which, together with the Ostdeutsche Sparkassenstiftung, made a significant contribution to the realisation of Chemnitz's dreams. I am indebted to Mr Holtmann, President of the East German Savings Banks Association, and Mr Grimm, Chairman of the Board of Sparkasse Chemnitz. I am also indebted to my predecessor, Dr Peter Seifert, and the Chemnitz City Council, without whose encouragement, courage and decisiveness the museum would be unthinkable and unsustainable. Only with this passion can seemingly utopian plans be realised. I would therefore like to thank our Director General, Ms Ingrid Mössinger, for convincing Dr Gunzenhauser to give his valuable collection to Chemnitz. Thank you for this historic milestone

Ladies and gentlemen,
An author who seeks the truth must be present. Not in his material, not in his characters - but in his view of the world. Incorruptible observation is the key that opens the door to realisation.

This is also the case with Amos Oz - without doubt one of the most outstanding writers of our time. In his works, a gift for observation and a feel for political culture merge with brilliant language. Layer by layer, Amos Oz strips away the obvious to find the essential. Like Stefan Heym, he often reflects the big world in miniature. He looks at relationships or families to show that political circumstances or social conflicts follow similar patterns.

"Hell and paradise can be found in every room," writes Amos Oz. "Behind every door. Under every marriage bedspread. It's like this: a little malice - and man prepares hell for man. A little compassion, a little generosity - and man prepares paradise for man."[1]

Ladies and gentlemen,
Fred Otto's Sparkasse building, completed in 1930 and sensitively converted into a museum by the renowned Berlin architect Volker Staab, is a tribute to Dr Gunzenhauser and his valuable collection.

The architectural transformation is so successful because it adopts a serving, but not subservient, attitude towards art. I am very grateful to the architect Volker Staab for this achievement. A beautiful setting still elevates even the best art. The era of modernism began in 1907. Today, 100 years later, Chemnitz is well on the way to flourishing as an economically strong city with an inspiring intellectual and cultural life thanks to the drive of many. The Gunzenhauser Museum symbolises both a personal and our shared German-German history. Dr Gunzenhauser from Munich and his museum in Chemnitz - in view of this conscious connection, we sense the unifying power of a shared dream. Art is a daughter of freedom, according to Friedrich Schiller [1]. What this means can be seen, felt and experienced in a wonderful way at the Gunzenhauser Museum.

[1] Friedrich Schiller: On the Aesthetic Education of Man, in a series of letters. Second letter, first published in: Die Horen, 1795