The Baden State Museum under National Socialism
Seemingly unsuspicious - for a long time, this was the role ascribed to museums during the Nazi era. Even more: due to the state-ordered confiscation of objects ("degenerate art"), they were even regarded as victims. But with the "Washington Conference on Holocaust-Era Assets" in 1998, the realization prevailed: All museums and institutions preserving cultural property were proven to have profited from the looting of Jewish-owned cultural assets. Now the Badisches Landesmuseum is facing up to its past.
The exhibition shows around 70 objects from the museum's own collections: Ceramics, paintings, sculptures and textiles from antiquity to Art Nouveau. The exhibits being presented for the first time were all unlawfully confiscated from their owners during the Nazi era: They illustrate the extent to which the Badisches Landesmuseum profited from the robbery of the Jewish population. One focus is on the years 1933 to 1945, but two acquisitions from the 1970s are also presented.
Wall hanging, exhibition impression: wool, silk, linen; Manufacture nationale des Gobelins Paris, around 1620; The wall hanging comes from the collection of Dr. Ernst Gallinek, which was restituted to his heirs in 2021. Badisches Landesmuseum © Badisches Landesmuseum, Photo: ARTIS - Uli Deck
Another theme of the exhibition is the museum's function as a powerful backdrop: The former residential palace was at the center of political campaigns by the Nazi regime and the palace façade and the square in front of it were used for rallies. The exhibition design also illustrates the work of provenance research: large-format illustrations of newspaper cuttings, confiscation lists and press photos explain the sources and provide important clues in the often years-long search for clues ...
April 12 to September 28, 2025
