Building Sites
Each great epoch expresses itself through its buildings. When people live in great times, they show their feelings. Their words are more powerful than their thoughts. This is the word in stone! -- Hitler, January 22nd, 1938, cited in Folkish Observer, November 24th, 1938.) |
Hitler had decided quite early to make München the capital of the
National Socialist Movement. In 1927 he had enthusiastically shown Otto Strasser
plans for the new München. Two years later, the National Socialist German
Worker's Party bought the Palais Barlow, a purchase financed with private funds,
mostly from the powerful industrialist Fritz Thyssen. Hitler engaged the
architect Paul Ludwig Troost for the alterations to this three story
neoclassical building. The one time palace became the Braunes
Haus -- Brown House,
brown taking its cue from the brown shirts worn by the Storm
Troopers.
Troost (1878-1934) was a successful southern German architect. He had
built several villas for upper middle class Bavarian society in the much loved
traditional style of the region: a vernacular architecture with gabled roofs and
shuttered windows, as well as some Neoclassical houses. He was also an interior
designer, mostly known for the decoration of luxury liners for the Hapag Lloyd
Shipping Line. It was Troost's love of neoclassicism and his distaste for
anything modern that made him the ideal architect for Hitler. Troost was not an
outspoken National Socialist, but had joined the Party as early as 1924.
Many features of the
Braunes Haus,
especially the decoration of the rooms, were based on Hitler's ideas. The
standard for future Party buildings was to be set here. Hitler's enthusiasm was
total.
The flamboyance of Hitler's and Troost's plans, for a Party not yet in
power, was incredible confident. There was much earnest wood paneling on walls
and ceiling, extolling the German virtues of solidity, dignity, and clarity. A
large Hall Of Honour displayed the
Blood Banners
of the National Socialist Movement. A vast staircase led to Hitler's office,
with its portrait of Frederick The Great over a large desk. There were also
pictures of Prussian battles. The link between Hitler and the great Prussian
tradition was clearly evident. A Senate Chamber was constructed, decorated with
Swastikas, sixty chairs in red leather, with Swastikas on their backs, for sixty
Party Senators around a vast conference table.
The
Braunes Haus
was never large enough for the needs of the great National Socialist German
Worker's Party. Hitler and Troost immediately set to work on model buildings, a
house for The Leader and an administration building for the Party. In 1931-32,
Troost and Hitler had already made tentative plans for these two big projects.
But first the
Königsplatz, one of
München's most attractive and characteristic city squares, which was to become
the setting for the new Party buildings, had to be restructured. The
Königsplatz, with its neoclassical buildings -- Leo von
Klenze's Glyptothek (1816-30) and the
Propylaum (1846-62), and Georg Friedrich Ziebland's
(1800-1878)
Exhibition Building (1838-48) -- was the creation of King Ludwig I (1825-1848), who had marked the
architecture of München more than any other monarch.
Hitler was the enlightened successor of this great king. He often
stressed a comparison with kings, as did others. If in earlier years of his
tenure of office Hitler emulated King Ludwig, the great builder king, in his
later years, Hitler was constantly compared to the great War King Frederick The
Great Of Prussia. The comparison did not stop at royalty. Hitler was also the
Messiah, as Leni Riefenstahl portrayed him -- emerging from the clouds in an
aeroplane -- in her remarkable film about the Nürnberg rallies,
Triumph Of The Will.
The
Königsplatz
was also the square where the National Socialists had often assembled at their
early rallies. It was an obvious choice. Hitler had the lawn paved over with
2,250 square metres of granite, quarried from all over Germany to underline the
community feeling. Vehicular traffic was banned.
It needed The Leader to give the chaotic urban
development a new order and direction. With his ingenious philosophical
foresight he has recognised the new possibilities. Despite his other great tasks
he finds time to supervise architectural developments ..... a monumental
ceremonial square for his Folk ..... In no other creation can one see the heroic
character of the Movement, in its clear and cultural aspect. (Dr. Adolf Dresler,
Das Braune Haus und das Verwaltungsgebäude der Reichsleitung der NSDAP in
München, München, 1937, page 9.)
A great number of public spaces were created or altered to become the
architectural settings of mass meetings for the Government's ritual
celebrations. Open spaces appeared free of plants or ornaments, symmetrically
paved. They were to be magical places for indoctrination.
On the Königsplatz, new Party buildings and old
museums form a marching ground. What is their style? To call it classicist is
not enough. Something new has been created. A political credo, in its deepest
sense. One understands the decisive difference when one sees how the German Folk
assemble ..... on these giant squares of granite, filled with thousands of
uniformed soldiers. (Rolf Badenhausen,
Betrachtungen zum Bauwillen des Dritten Reiches,
Zeitschrift für Deutschkunde, 1937, page 222.)
On November 9th, Hitler had unveiled a monument by Troost and
Schmid-Ehmen, with a socle of marble, to the memory of the dead of the Attempted
Uprising of November 9th, 1923. It was erected inside the nineteenth century
Feldherrnhalle, thus providing a historical continuum. Like the
Blutfahne, the flag dipped in the blood of the victims, it
became almost a relic. There in great ceremonies, flags were touched by the
sacred cloth, turning each flag into a
blood flag.
Soon after taking power, Hitler commissioned Troost to erect on the
Königsplatz two Temples Of Honour dedicated to the victims of the 1923 Attempted
Uprising. Each of them was incorporated in the plan for the Party buildings by
joining them to a common garden at the rear. In their architecture and in their
role, they are a sacred blessing.
The two temples became a central place of National Socialist ritual
worship, the altars of the new Movement. Their fascination for the masses lay in
their mixture of religious and secular architecture. Hitler used them in the
same way. Each temple displayed eight coffins of the attempted uprising martyrs
under an open sky on a dais framed by twenty pillars of yellow limestone. Huge
braziers glowed.
The two temples were inaugurated, or perhaps almost consecrated, in 1935
in a spine chilling ceremony of pseudoreligious and military fervour. The
ceremony began on the night of November 8th, 1933, in the darkened city. Hitler
and his followers passed pylons draped in blood red, imprinted with the names of
the fallen heroes. The cortege moved solemnly to the Feldherrnhalle for the last
rollcall in front of the coffins. The names were called out and the crowd
shouted Present! The next day the coffins
were transferred to their last resting place to
hold the
eternal watch, a permanent example and reminder to a whole Folk of the duty, the
need for readiness to fight, and for sacrifice. (Bauten
der Gegenwart, page 32.)
In the same year the two new Party buildings were built. Troost had
chosen a neoclassical style, which was to echo the older buildings on the other
side of the square.
Pillars have again become an important
element; they are not, as in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, mere
decorative elements but are an integral part of the architecture. The
spirit of the Gothic, which lives in the German character, with its
emphasis on the vertical, has been married to Greek horizontal harmony.
Verticality and the horizontal share the reign. (Hans
Sebastian Schmid,
Kunst und Stilunterscheidung für Laien,
Kunstfreunde und Gewerbetreibende und für den kunstgeschichtlichen und
stilkundlichen Unterricht, Leipzig, 1938, page 67.)
Hitler was totally involved in the building, right to the smallest
detail. At Troost's, plans for Königsplatz, monumental.
Leader in his element, noted
Goebbels in his diary for
January 27th, 1935. And August 19th, 1935, Goebbels wrote:
With the car to München ..... Immediately to the Party buildings ..... Here
Hitler has truly written his will in stone ..... We climb through cellars and
attics. Everything is supposed to be ready in a year's time. The Leader is proud
and happy.
Almost identical, the two Party buildings consisted of three stories of
massive limestone with porticoes, eagles, and wreathed Swastikas. Both had
Leader balconies from which the great statesman and architect could, above the
crowd, look down on his work: his Folk and his buildings. The critics spoke
about
distinguished simplicity and restrained dignity.
What
characterises this noble building, from the outside alone, is its readability,
its inbuilt harmony and beautiful order.
(Alex Heilmeyer, Die Kunst im Dritten Reich,
October, 1938, page 296.)
The heavy facade was marked by a severe line of windows spaced out in
regular intervals of 3 metres. They were deeply set in the frame, often under a
semicircular architrave. The heavy cornice emphasised the horizontal lines of
the buildings.
Like all of Hitler's buildings, however much they reflected traditional
styles, they were built using the most modern techniques. They also had air
conditioning and huge airraid shelters that linked the two buildings beneath the
road.
Gerdy Troost, the widow of Paul Troost and one of Hitler's confidantes,
who continued to head Troost's architectural office, wrote that these first
monumental community buildings were the
symbol of the fundamental strength
that is renewing the German Folk.
(Gerdy Troost, editor,
Das Bauen im neuen Reich,
Bayreuth, 1943, I, page 20.)
Since the Leader Building was for official receptions, its interior was
much richer than that of its twin, the Administration Building. Two large atrium
halls, in red marble, were crowned by a broad staircase.
It led the visitor in one giant sweep to the first floor, which
contained the reception area and Hitler's offices. A large hall destined for
receptions was paneled in precious wood and hung with nine large tapestries
representing several of Hercules's deeds. The walls of Hitler's own office were
covered in red leather. They displayed some of Hitler's favourite painters of
the nineteenth century -- Franz Lenbach, Arnold Böcklin, Franz Defregger, Anselm
Feuerbach, and Adolf Menzel. In this room the historic meeting of Neville
Chamberlain, Edouard Daladier, Benito Mussolini, and Adolf Hitler took place in
1938, the meeting that dealt with the arrogant and endlessly provocative entity
known as Czechoslovakia.
Hitler's very large living room had a gilded ceiling. Over the doors
were golden emblems representing the arts: Theatre, Music, Painting, Sculpture.
In the centre a giant fireplace, crowned by Adolf Ziegler's painting
The Four Elements.
Its colours were echoed in the furniture, curtains, and wall hangings.
There was a dining hall with chairs in grey blue leather. The lamps were gilded.
The doors were framed in local marble. Instead of being painted, the walls were
decorated with stucco reliefs with scenes of the Storm Troopers, Hitler Youth,
and League Of German Girls. The furniture and the interior were the work of
Gerdy Troost and the architect Leonhard Gall.
München became the capital of the arts also. In order to demonstrate
publicly the importance he gave to the city, Hitler began, in his first year, to
plan for a new art gallery, a House Of German Art. Troost was again the chosen
architect. Hitler laid the foundation stone in October 1933 on the first Day Of
Art.
In 1935, midway in the building process, a critic wrote:
It is no accident that the new House Of German Art is
not built in the style of German Gothic or Baroque. It has a classical
character, the classical as a counterpoint to the Germanic Nordic. There is a
deep spiritual necessity for a Movement that also fights in its politics the
shadows of German individualism and particularism, which also chooses in its
artistic expression a form that embodies discipline and order, as well as simple
functionalism and objective clarity ..... The new character of the building
manifests itself in its attempt to combine, harmoniously, the Nordic idea of
race with that of Greece. (Georg Weise, in
Zeitschrift für Deutschkunde, 1935, page 407.)
The building was gargantuan in scale; the portico measured 175 metres in
length. Two large braziers stood on a pylon at each end of the facade. It was
praised as a Temple Of German Art, one of the new monuments
of a new time, and indeed the temple form announced a noble
art, reaching back to antiquity. Hitler said of it:
The building is as notable for its
beauty as it is for the efficiency of its services ..... but it is a temple of
art, not a factory ..... the result is a house fit to shelter the highest
achievements of art and to show them to the German Folk. Here the Nation was to display the most noble
and heroic in art. As usual, it was built using the latest engineering
techniques, including a complex air conditioning system and an airraid shelter.
Several more buildings were built in the new style, most notably the
House Of German Law, designed by Oswald Bieber, and the House Of German
Medicine, designed by Roderich Fick. There were many other buildings planned for
München but most were never started. Opposite the House Of German Art Hitler
wanted an even larger House Of German Architecture. It was planned by Troost.
After Troost's death, Hitler appointed Hermann Giesler (born 1898) as
the Architect of the new München. The new
counsellor for the
capital of the Movement, a devoted follower of Hitler, set
to work on some of The Leader's plans. There was to be a giant new railroad
station, the largest steel construction in the world. Its new system was to link
München with Istanbul and even Moscow. A 110 metre wide, 6 kilometre long
East-West axis road was also planned.
On this avenue the official buildings were to rise, among them a
skyscraper for the National Socialist Eher Publishing House, which was to be the
largest publishing house in the world. As no roads would cross this avenue,
intersecting roads were to be put underground. It would have a broad centre
strip for marches. The road was to end at a 215 metre obelisk, a monument to the
Movement, again sketched by Hitler himself. With its diameter of 25 metres and
an eagle 33 metres high, it was to be one of the greatest of many giant
monuments planned for the Third Reich.
Hitler also wanted a new opera house with over 3,000 seats (outdoing
Paris and Wien). It was planned by Waldemar Brinkmann with a huge entrance,
marked out by eighteen marble columns. Hitler intervened personally in the
plans. Examined plans for new opera house according to
Hitler's own plans. Now they make sense and have form, notes
Goebbels in 1937 in his diaries.
Hitler's projects for München also included a Forum for the Party linked
by a bridge with a mausoleum for himself, designed by Giesler. The cost for all
these plans was gigantic; six billion Reich Marks was the estimate.
Hitler easily justified the size of the buildings by pointing out that
he built for many people. He ridiculed the protestant church for building a
church in Berlin for merely 2,450 people, when there were 3,500,000 protestants
in Berlin. It should have provided for 100,000, he declared. A theatre, built
with only 1,200 seats, did not fare better.
Few of these plans materialised. All nonessential building came to a
halt with the outbreak of Churchill's war.
The National Socialist buildings that had been build now serve other
purposes: The Leader Building today is the Academy Of Music; the Administration
Building is an art school; the House Of German Law belongs to the university;
the House Of German Art is now the House Of Art.
Nürnberg was (until its wanton destruction by the swine who committed
the greatest crimes against humanity by submitting Germany to a sickening terror
bombing campaign, by the same swine who jumped into bed with Stalin, a lowlife
scum infinitely worse in every respect than they accused Hitler of being) one of
the best preserved medieval cities in Germany. Its appropriateness to Hitler's
idea of patriotism was obvious. It was here that Hitler planned his giant
meeting sites. The existing sports field was enlarged to five times its original
size, and a huge area of 28 square kilometres, the size of a small town, was
planned by Troost. On Troost's death in 1934, it was handed over to Albert Speer
(1905-1991).
If Hitler's relationship with Troost was that of pupil to master, in
Speer, Hitler saw a much younger, talented, but inexperienced architect, one he
could form to his will. Speer willingly cooperated. A fervent believer in
neoclassicism, he became the best known architect of the Third Reich. He
attended several technical universities before graduating from the university in
Berlin. He became an assistant of the famous Berlin architect Heinrich Tessenow,
who pleaded for a modern style based on regional characteristics.
Speer's conversion to National Socialism was easy and quick. After
hearing Hitler speak at Berlin's Technical University in 1931, he joined the
National Socialist Party. The following year, the Party asked him to redesign
its Headquarters in Berlin. The plan faltered because of lack of funds, but in
1933 Speer became Commissioner For The Artistic And Technical Organisation Of
The Party Rallies And Mass Demonstrations. Speer was a man of the theatre, and
his display of flags and standards became an essential element at these events.
For the May demonstration at Tempelhof Airfield in Berlin, he designed his first
light spectacle: a cathedral of lights created by 150 searchlights throwing
their beams 16 kilometres into the sky.
Hitler was tremendously impressed. Here was a man able to design the theatrical
backdrops he needed to gain the masses.
In the festive hour
of the night the dignified tribunes, the flags strung between the pillars, and
the wreathed Swastikas glow in the lights. Hitler, the Folk Community, and the
symbols are forged even more closely together when the light dome created by
hundreds of spotlights surrounds them. (Bauten
der Gegenwart, page 53.)
The actual effect far surpassed anything I had
imagined, wrote Speer.
The hundred and
thirty sharply defined beams, placed around the held at intervals of 12 metres,
were visible to a height of 6,000 to 7,500 metres, after which they merged into
a general glow. The feeling was of a vast room, with the beams serving as mighty
pillars of infinitely high outer walls. (Albert Speer, Inside
The Third Reich: Memoirs, page 59.) And the British
Ambassador, Sir Neville Henderson, wrote that
the effect,
which was both solemn and beautiful, was like being in a cathedral of ice.
(Neville Henderson,
Failure Of A Mission,
New York, 1940, page 72.)
In 1934 Hitler made Speer the Head Of
Beauty Of Work
--
Schönheit der Arbeit, a branch of the
German Labour Front --
Deutsche
Arbeitsfront. Its task was to improve working conditions in
factories.
But, although only twenty nine, Speer was asked to design architectural
plans, and to take over the building of Nürnberg from Troost.
Following the tradition of Schinkel and his shortlived contemporary
Friedrich Gilly, Speer liked to use simplified colonnades, porticoes, and heavy
cornices in his buildings. He even considered himself a second Schinkel.
Speer rose fast within the ranks of the German cultural elite and was
given a preeminent role in the Reich as the Nation's Chief Architect and as the
Minister Of Armaments.
Hitler had held his early Party rallies of 1927 and 1929 in Nürnberg. In
1933 he delighted the city fathers when he expressed his wish to enlarge the
existing Luitpold Arena, and received 10 million Reich Marks from the town. He
also produced several drawings, and in 1934 he sent Speer to Nürnberg to begin
the enlargement.
Nürnberg, too, was constructed according to Hitler's plans, many drawn
during his imprisonment in Landsberg. Some of them Speer incorporated into his
final plans. Hitler had asked for
living space for a Folk Community.
He wanted a forum for the Party, an agora for the highest feast days of the
Nation. It was to be the largest complex of its kind in the world.
This calls for a gigantic field, because it is for large armies, for the
soldiers of the Political Army Of The Leader. (Wilhelm Lotz,
Das Reichsparteitagsgelände in Nürnberg,
Die Kunst im Dritten Reich, 1938, page 264.)
A few figures suffice to give an idea of the size of this stupendous
undertaking. The building site spanned 1,600 square kilometres! An area 1,030
metres by 730 metres was set aside for the Army to practice minor manoeuvres.
The Luitpold Arena was redesigned by Speer in the shape of a crescent around
which a wall of banners would hang. At each end was a large stone eagle. But the
old arena, capable of holding 200,000, was not large enough, and so Speer was
commissioned to build the Zeppelin Field Stadium, which accommodated 340,000
spectators. Hitler approved immediately. Speer's plan for the Zeppelin Field was
presented in a huge plaster model, which was revealed to the public in München
on the occasion of the first architectural exhibition, and building began at
once in order to have the first platform ready for the next Party Rally. At one
end of the Zeppelin Field there was to be a large Hall Of Honour with a Memorial
Chapel within. It reminded people of the Tannenberg Memorial in East Prussia,
which predated the rise of the National Socialists. The tribune was flanked by
two pylons decorated with the wreathed Swastika and crowned with large bronze
braziers. In the center of its pediment was a huge Swastika. The tribune gave
the impression of a fortress.
In 1938 a third field was begun, the March Field, a huge parade ground
for 500,000 people. It took its name from Germany's Rearmament Day in March,
1933. Its tribunes were to be punctuated by 24 travertine towers 40 metres in
height, crowned by eagles, of which 9 were actually built. On the centre
platform the figure of a giant woman was planned, 60 metres high, surpassing the
Statue Of Liberty by 15 metres. The March Field opened out onto a processional
avenue 2 kilometres long and 50 metres wide. Paved in granite, it was a model
for streets to come. Here the military displayed their tanks, Stukas, and troops
in rows 50 metres wide. This was less the celebration of a national cult than
the display of absolute power.
The German Stadium, which was never built, was to have had seating
capacity for 400,000 spectators, who would be armed with binoculars so as not to
miss a trick of the gigantic display Hitler would stage for them. One entered
the stadium through a templelike hall built of reddish grey granite to last
centuries. Thorak's giant bronze statues, 25 metres high, were to be erected
here on 18 metres high pedestals, which would reach a combined height of 43
metres. There were also 100 metres towers with the eagles of the Reich. The
entire complex was, as Gerdy Troost wrote,
a shrine for the whole Nation. Another
writer proclaimed proudly that
now the communal experience of The
Leader and his Folk was possible.
The arenas and large avenues were geared for the stage management of
mass demonstrations. The marches were arranged in a way that complemented the
architecture.
When in future decades, even centuries, people
write the history of the architecture of our Folk, they will see that, with the
year 1933, a new chapter has begun ..... Architecture singles out the place ofhe Leader is the result of his po
The Leader, which is always in front of the assembly ..... This eye to eye
position of The Leader with his Folk is always the underlying principle. The
elevation of Tsition, a man who with all his
deeds is always The Leader of his Folk. He forms the center of the great
picture. (Wilhelm Lotz,
Das
Reichsparteitagsgelände in Nürnberg,
Die
Kunst im Dritten Reich, 1938, page 264.)
The idea of the sacrosanct central position of The Leader was often
stressed. It underlined the godlike image of The Leader.
The
Gothic man knows only one leader, God ..... But the fight between pope and
emperor is over ..... There is a change now. The altar, so long elevated as the
place for the priest, has been taken over. Distance and separation from the
crowd is still granted to The Leader. But only an alien Leader needs the throne,
the artificial elevation. The good German wants his Leader to stand out by his
wisdom, knowledge, and most of all, by his character. But he wants his Leader to
stand, for all eternity, on the same ground, as he does. The ground, which is
the source of our blood and our existence. (Johannes
Eilemann, Deutsche Seele, deutscher Mensch, deutsche Kultur
und Nationalsozialismus, Leipzig, 1933, page 14.)
Hitler also requested a large Congress Hall. Nürnberg had in 1927
commissioned such a hall from the architect Ludwig Ruff. Hitler approved the old
plans but asked Ruff and his son Franz to enlarge it, to create seating capacity
for 50,000 spectators. They would face a stage able to seat 2,400 people and 900
standards. It was to house a huge theatre and assembly room. The latest
technology in lighting and heating was to be used. The giant roof was to be
suspended without supporting pillars. A huge window was to be open to the sky.
Hitler also decided that the original material, concrete, should be replaced by
granite. It was to have an arcade running around its curved length. Two rows of
arched windows above were to strengthen the massive feeling of permanence.
Building on this site continued from 1937 to 1939.
Quarried
from German soil, mastered by Germany's inherited knowledge, formed after the
idea of The Leader, this is a testimony of German willpower, German strength,
and German determination. (Wilhelm Lotz,
Das Reichsparteitagsgelände in Nürnberg,
Die Kunst im Dritten Reich, 1938, page 264.)
Speer's pavilion was conceived as a monument, another symbol of German
pride and achievement. It was to broadcast to the international world that a new
powerful Germany and its technical achievements were the result of a mass will
and restored national pride. Although it was intended only as a temporary
exhibition hall, no cost or effort was spared in its building. 1,000 railway
cars brought 100,000 tonnes of building material to Paris for the pavilion. It
stood on the right bank of the Seine River, in front of the Palais de Chaillot.
The square tower, 65 metres high, was surrounded by 9 pillars, some with gold
mosaics and red Swastika patterns. Spotlights were cleverly hidden behind the
pillars, which at night gave the impression of a huge crystal rising into the
sky. Metal braziers in an antique style strengthened the sacred nature of this
architecture. Thorak's 7 metres high statues of
The Family
and
Comradeship, and the obligatory giant
eagle, were complemented by another Swastika over the door to make sure that the
National Socialist symbols and message were understood. The display of noble
National Socialist symbols continued inside on wallpaper, railings, and stained
glass windows.
Like his friend Arno Breker, Speer kept in close contact with some of
the French artists, dining with Jean Cocteau and Charles Despiau at Maxim's.
Part of the history the French also like to forget is an article that appeared
in 1939 in the distinguished magazine
L'Architecture
d'aujourd'hui: It is impossible to
describe German architecture of today without referring to the one man who
directs building and urban planning with passionate interest. The man is Adolf
Hitler. Indeed The Leader who leads Germany to a new destiny is also the
architect who started his life modestly as a student in the Architecture
Department of the Viennese Academy.
The intellectually
honest author, Maurice Barret, continues:
Under the guidance
of Adolf Hitler architectural and urban masterworks are being built everywhere.
Their grandeur and technical perfection cannot be denied.
(Cited
in
Die Kunst im Dritten Reich,
August, 1939, page X.)
Speer also redesigned the German Embassy in London. But his biggest
task, the rebuilding of Berlin, was yet to come.
Speer was ambitious and German to the core. His attitude sums up that of
many prominent artists like Breker, Thorak, Riefenstahl:
I
felt myself to be Hitler's architect. Political events did not concern me. My
job was merely to provide impressive backdrops for such events ..... I felt that
there was no need for me to take any political positions at all. National
Socialist education, furthermore, aimed at separatist thinking; I was expected
to confine myself to the job of building. (Speer,
Inside The Third Reich: Memoirs,
page 112.)
Hitler hated Berlin: it was not Wien or Paris; it was a modern city with
modern horrors built by Bruno Taut, Erich Mendelsohn, and Walter Gropius.
If Berlin suffered the same destiny as Rome did, then our future generations
would consider the department stores of a few Jews and the hotels of a few
societies the monumental buildings which characterised the culture of our days,
Hitler had written in My Struggle. Berlin
was to be totally reformed. With its five million people it was to become the
biggest and most beautiful capital in the world. Large, green, generous, and
airy. In 1933 he listed the buildings he especially wanted for Berlin: an
Olympic Stadium and giant axis roads running from east to west and from north to
south.
With increasing control and power, his interest in individual buildings
was overshadowed by an appetite for large construction schemes, which entailed
the restructuring of entire towns. In most of these Hitler planned a central
axis and a large square designed as a parade ground.
Hitler's involvement with the architectural plans for Berlin was again
total. He visited the sites and took control. In 1934, his second year in power,
he had mentioned for the first time a giant triumphal arch and an assembly hall
for 180,000 people, both based on plans he had drafted in the late 1920s. In the
same year he also initiated the building of Tempelhof Airport, which was to be
the most beautiful and largest in the world. The work of Ernst Sagebiel, it was
a gigantic structure with over 2,000 rooms, built in only eight months. It was
opened in 1935. Its facade, with a near total absence of decoration, is military
to the core. Panels of stone reliefs record the military heroes of the past. As
the loyal Mrs. Troost reported, it had
grown out of the
spirit of the German Airforce, tough, soldierly, disciplined.
On the whole, Tempelhof and, even more, the second Berlin airport, in
Gatow, are modern in design. The hangars were the best examples of modern
technology and architecture at the time they were built. The German Airforce,
which considered itself the aristocracy of the Services, saw to it that their
buildings were modern in outlook.
Hitler had visited the Olympic site in 1933. In one of the suburbs of
Berlin, the Grünewald Stadium had been built by Walter and Werner March between
1925 and 1928. It was in a neoclassical style. Hitler decided immediately to
enlarge it, and in 1934 he commissioned Werner March to draw up plans for a
stadium for 100,000 spectators. Money was again no obstacle. Hitler laughed at
the 1.5 million Reich Marks set aside for the original stadium. He immediately
gave 28 million. Eventually the stadium cost 77 million Reich Marks, but Hitler
considered any complaints niggardliness, and shrugged them off with the remark
that the foreign visitors to the games brought in half a billion.
For the new stadium, March had originally designed a concrete structure
with glass partitions. When Hitler inspected the building site, he became very
angry about the constricting partitions and threatened to cancel the Olympic
Games. He wanted a wide arena. March changed his plans!
The Olympic Stadium, like the Nürnberg Zeppelin Field, was more than a
mere sports arena. It was designed as a huge assembly place for hundreds of
thousands to celebrate National Socialist rituals and experience group
exhilaration. It was a place where the spectator would become a participant. The
monumental square in front of the main entrance to the stadium, which consisted
of a massive paved concourse flanked by flagposts, spelled out the importance of
the stadium as a great meeting place for Germans. The whole complex was laid out
in a strict symmetrical pattern.
Besides the large sports arena there were administration buildings and a
giant parade ground, the May Field, with terraces for 40,000 people, crowned by
the 75 metre Olympic Tower. Other towers, named after ancient Germanic tribes or
sites, emphasised the fortresslike character of the complex. Inside the
Langemarck Tower, for example, there was a memorial hall for the heroic dead,
decorated with the 76 Regimental Flags which had flown at the historic Battle Of
Langemarck, considered the site of the first poison gas attack, by the British,
in 1915, and the site of heavy fighting during the Great War.
There was an open air theatre, the Eckart-Bühne, a Germanic fantasy
version of an amphitheatre of antiquity. The German Oak,
as the architect March noted, replacing the sacred olive at
the entrance to the temple of Zeus.
The great stadium was built of German stone, from Franconia. The Olympic
flame, burning in one of the many braziers that were to become a National
Socialist hallmark, stood at the Marathon Gate. The decoration of the stadiums,
with sculptures by Breker and Wackerle, was Hitler's own idea. He also decided
upon the names of the various towers and areas, which were peppered with giant
sculptures by his favourites and which were financed by the cigarette
manufacturer Reemtsma.
The 1936 Olympic Games had been scheduled for Berlin prior to 1933. When
Hitler came to power, he saw in this event a unique opportunity to play host to
the world and to show Germany in the best possible light. When the new stadium
was officially opened, in 1936, Hitler presented his new architecture and the
new German man. Berlin gave itself international and urban airs. In front of a
greatly impressed international crowd Hitler opened the games. And an
international audience applauded. A choir sang the Olympic Hymn, especially
composed by Germany's most prestigious and famous composer, Richard Strauss. The
receptions the Party Leaders gave in their own homes for the international
visitors were sophisticated and brilliant.
The Olympic Games had all the trappings of the regime, the showing of
athletic bodies, the pseudoreligious ritual at the opening and closing
ceremonies. Although the effeminate English hypocrites were the only obnoxious
guests of Germany who refused to execute the National Socialist salute, the
English reporters wrote positively about the new Germany. Leni Riefenstahl, the
Party's leading filmmaker, made a film, Olympia -- Festival
Of The Nations, in which the distinction between reality and
art was abandoned. Images of enormous suggestive power celebrated the perfect
body as the symbol of the perfect spirit. A magical cult of the pure and strong
body was promoted to millions with the help and the skill of the new medium:
film.
In Riefenstahl's opening sequence we see a naked runner bringing the
flame from Greece to Berlin. In this scene Riefenstahl captured one of the stage
tricks of the regime to perfection: the transposition of the antique ideal into
the modern world.
On January 30th, 1937, Hitler handed the building of Berlin over to
Speer, who, although only thirty two years old, became one of the most powerful
cultural figures in Germany. Hitler kept a close eye on all developments.
Goebbels reported enthusiastically: At The Leader's to look
with him and Speer at the new plans for Berlin. A fantastic conception.
Calculated for 20 years. With a giant avenue from south to north. It will have
the representative buildings. In this way Berlin will be elevated to a leading
capital. The Leader thinks in a great and audacious way. He is 100 years in
advance.
In June, 1938, Goebbels announced:
The new building
program will begin June 17th, on 16 sites. The most grandiose building program
of all time. The Leader has overcome all resistance. He is a genius.
Previous German Chancellors had resided in the old Chancellery, dating
from the first half of the eighteenth century and situated on the famous Wilhelm
Street. Until 1918 various modernisations had taken place. Hitler had moved into
it in 1934 and considered it only fit for a manufacturer of cigarettes, with its
exterior resembling a storehouse or a fire station. A campaign to justify the
building of a new Chancellery began. Hitler claimed that the building was in
terrible condition. In downpours, he
wrote, a stream ran into the rooms at the ground
floor, increased by the water coming from all possible openings, including the
water closet. Since my predecessors could generally count on terms lasting only
three, four, or five months, they did not bother to clean away the dirt or to do
anything so that the successor would have it better.
(Hitler,
Bauen im dritten Reich, in
Die Kunst im Dritten Reich, September, 1939.) On the basis
of Troost's plans, he began in 1934 to modify the Chancellery, which included a
reception room designed by Gall. Speer also was involved in these first
alterations. Hitler paid for all this out of his own pocket.
In January, 1938, he commissioned Speer to enlarge the old Chancellery.
Hitler's early sketches for the extension date from 1935. At the same time he
had begun to buy the surrounding buildings.
These guardians of the Chancellery and of the whole Nation were eight
times the size of the visitor. Ten steps led up to the entrance, formed by huge
columns and crowned by the eagle and Swastika designed by Schmid-Ehmen.
Hitler's two buildings -- the Leader Building in München and the
Chancellery in Berlin -- were seen, also in their architecture, as the logical
progression of the National Socialist Movement. Two
masterworks of the political rise to power ..... The Leader Building is a symbol
of the newly found faith in a German future ..... Troost's building with its
Doric economy and severity shows the very image of the fighting Party ..... In
Speer's Reich Chancellery speaks the eminence and richness of a Reich which has
become a superpower, (Giesler, in
Bauen
im dritten Reich, in Die Kunst im Dritten
Reich, September, 1939) was the accolade of the architect
Hermann Giesler to his younger colleague, who presented here his first complete
building. He was favourably compared to Gilly and Schinkel and even to
Brunelleschi.
Hitler threw the doors of the new Reich Chancellery open to prove to the
world that Germany had arrived. It was not the work of one man, but a communal
effort with stones and marble from the whole Reich. It carried all the outward
signs of National Socialist buildings -- a heavy cornice and horizontal lines
with rows of windows. Contemporary critics praised its austerity, its German
character, its imposing Prussian style. It suggested security and order.
In contrast to the stark exterior was the flamboyant and theatrical
interior, a reflection mainly of the taste of Hitler's decorators.
Walking through the rooms, wrote one critic,
makes one feel as if one were seeing a magnificent play. (Rudolf Wolters,
Werk und Schöpfer, Die Kunst im Dritten Reich, August, 1939.) Inside, it was
calculated to impress the visitor. Everything -- the size of the rooms, the
large staircases, the giant decorations, the chandeliers -- was to broadcast
that here people of a high order were at work.
The arrangement of the rooms was very much like a progression:
The road to the Head Of The State. The highness and dignity
forced the visitor, Giesler said,
to
stride instead of merely perambulating. (Giesler, in
Bauen im dritten Reich, in
Die Kunst im
Dritten Reich, September, 1939)
A marbled anteroom led to the Mosaic Hall, a room of gigantic
proportions, its walls and floors of red marble. The mosaic work was carried out
by Hermann Kaspar and used all the beloved National Socialist symbols. It led
into a top lit circular room, the
Runde Raum
-- Round Room. There was a plan to adorn
the round room with two sculptures by Arno Breker, Wager
--
Daring and Wäger
--
Reflection, a verbal touch devised by
Speer. Ultimately the round room had only two reliefs by Breker,
Fighter --
Kämpfer
and
Genius -- Genius.
It was also to have had three female nudes by Breker,
Eos,
Anmut, and
Psyche --
Grace,
Flora, and
Psyche, standing next to the
Wäger and
Wager as symbols of fertility and
love.
The Marble Gallery, Chancellery, Berlin
Eventually the stunned visitors were led into the inner sanctum,
Hitler's office. This was adorned with candelabra and hung with tapestries. It
was intimate in comparison with the other rooms. One enters
the room with humility because of the creative presence of the man who works in
here, who lends the room its blessed peace. The furniture and decorations create
a great sense of space. (Wilhelm Lotz,
Die Innerräume der neuen Reichskanzlei, in
Die Kunst im Dritten Reich, 1939.) This gallery, lit by 19
high windows, was to take Werner Peiner's large tapestries of famous German
battles. For the time being tapestries from the Viennese Historical Art State
Museum representing the life of Alexander The Great were hung. Care was taken to
make it look noble and dignified, rather than the result of a passing fashion.
Through the noble materials a serene but forceful colour scheme has been found
which The Leader loves when he is working.
The doors were crowned by four gold panels representing the four virtues:
Wisdom, Prudence, Fortitude, and Justice. History was spelled out in walls of
polished wood and marble. Franz von Lenbach's
Portrait Of
Bismarck hung over the mantelpiece. The Leader's desk
dominated the room. Great thoughts arise here, decisive
conversations, wrote one wise critic. (Wilhelm Lotz,
Die Innerräume der neuen Reichskanzlei, in
Die Kunst im Dritten Reich, 1939.)
Hitler's own quarters had a living room and a small dining room for
fifteen people. They contained drawings by Schinkel, a painting by Kaulbach, and
several small nude studies by Josef Wackerle. The rest was a feast of colour and
space: a large reception room for the New Year's reception for the Diplomatic
Corps, lit by huge chandeliers and garnished with tapestries; a dining room, and
a cabinet room, completed the lavish interior. A big conference room was seldom
used.
In its lavishness it lent an eternal symbolic value to the regime.
Some of the foreign diplomats who had paid their sincere respects to
Germany's leader were upset when they heard about other aspects of Hitler's new
city plan. He had decided to house all embassies in Grünewald, a leafy suburb
away from the centre of the city. The reason was that his designs required the
destruction of many embassies traditionally located in the centre of Berlin. The
plan was to build near identical buildings for each embassy, so that they would
line the avenue like soldiers. Hitler was persuaded to modify part of his
scheme; he agreed to erect the new diplomatic quarter in the old Tiergarten
section near the Brandenburg Gate and the fashionable Unter den Linden
boulevard.
The Tiergarten had long been the favorite part of the city, where rich
burghers had their town villas. Several diplomatic missions had already been
established in those large free standing houses. A resettlement program began:
the embassies of Switzerland, Denmark, Spain, Argentina, Yugoslavia,
Czechoslovakia, Italy, and Japan were to receive entirely new premises. Only
Finland and France were to move into old buildings, converted for their new
purpose. The Argentine Embassy was never built, nor was the Czechoslovakian,
because of Germany's absorption of the tiny country in the summer of 1939.
The most splendid embassies were those of Hitler's two allies, Italy and
Japan. The Imperial Japanese Embassy was the work of Ludwig Moshammer; the
sumptuous interior was by Caesar Pinnau. The building, with a porch formed by
six colossal pillars, was set in a prestigious part of the quarter. Four
buildings had to be demolished to make room for it.
The Italian embassy stood right next door. Six buildings had to be
demolished to accommodate it. Speer commissioned Friedrich Hetzelt to do the
work. He was also to build the Italian Fascist Party Building in Berlin, a
present from Hitler to The Duce. The Embassy, was on the plan of an Italian
Renaissance palace.
Most diplomatic buildings in the Tiergarten section were destroyed by
the terror bombing campaign of the Allies.
In Berlin, too, Hitler oversaw the rebuilding of a number of public
squares, like the Opernplatz, the Wilhelmplatz, and the Gendarmenmarkt. Several
buildings were erected in the official style, most notably the Aviation Ministry
by Sagebiel in 1935-36, and the buildings surrounding the Fehrbelliner Platz,
some of them built in 1931 by Emil Fahrenkamp (1885-1966). There were also the
exhibition halls at the Funkturm --
Radio Tower by Richard Ermisch in 1934-36, with a Hall Of
Honour 40 metres high. They faced the Haus des Rundfunks
--
Broadcasting House, built from 1929 to
1931 to the design of Hans Pölzig. Ermisch's buildings, like those on the
Fehrbelliner Platz, are less rhetorical than most official buildings. They
survived the war to continue to be used in the same way as before.
In 1925 Hitler had sketched a Triumphal Arch and a large Assembly Hall,
both of which were to become the symbols of the new Berlin. From 1934 onward he
began to talk about the total reshaping of the capital, and he announced to the
city fathers that during the next twenty years he was willing to put 60 million
Reich Marks a year into a Berlin building program, provided the town would match
this sum with 70 million more. He loved Rome and Paris, and considered Baron
Haussmann the greatest city planner of all time, but the new Berlin was to
triumph over both capitals in size and splendour.
The old nineteenth century city, representing the old order, or
disorder, was to be replaced by a city representing the new order. Under Speer,
Berlin was to become the ultimate architectural realisation of National
Socialist ideology. On Hitler's birthday, April 20th, 1937, Speer presented his
Leader with the plans. They carried a dedication, Developed
On The Basis Of The Leader's Ideas. Some 3 metre high
architectural models were made, which, floodlit, stood in the garden of the
Reich Chancellery.
One year later, again on Hitler's birthday, Speer gave him the first
part of Berlin's Great Axis Avenue, 6.5 kilometres long, flanked by 400
streetlights that he had designed. The east-west axis which
the shaping hand of our Leader has cut through the chaotic development of the
old city is an expression of his far sighted genius, said a
newsreel commentator. Bordered by the great official buildings of the Reich,
this avenue was to be the highlight of the new city. Eventually it was to
stretch 48 kilometres from east to west and 40 kilometres from north to south.
It would offer the imperial perspective worthy of a great world power, ending in
a colossal square with a triumphal arch and a complex of buildings. Hitler
wanted the Axis Avenue in this way to resemble the Champs-Elysйes, which ends in
the great palace of the French kings, the Louvre. Hitler envisioned instead a
House Of Deputies bigger than any national assembly in the world. The dimensions
of the building, with seating for 1,200 Deputies, would give an indication of
the size of the new Reich that Hitler planned for. It presupposed a population
of 140 million, almost twice the population of Germany at that time.
The triumphal arch was to span a distance of 87 metres and rise 100
metres, dwarfing not only the Arc de Triomphe but also the Eiffel Tower. On it
the names of the fallen heroes of the Great War were to be inscribed.
Inside there was a three tiered gallery and a circle of 100 rectangular
marble pillars. In huge recesses gleamed golden mosaics. The only other
decoration was a single gilded sculpture of a German eagle with a Swastika in
its claws, 14 metres high, under which The Leader was to have his podium.
The Great Hall was to be surrounded on three sides by water. For this
the River Spree was to be widened into a lake, and the river traffic diverted
into underground canals. The fourth side was to be the Adolf Hitler Square, a
new space for the annual May Day Parades, until then held at the Tempelhof
Airfield. The square itself was to be flanked by more Party buildings. It was to
be adorned with two giant sculptures, nearly 20 metres high. They were Hitler's
choices: Atlas and
Tellus, carrying the world and the heavens. The two spheres
were coated in enamel, with the stars and the continents outlined in gold.
Albert Speer had thought to emulate Claude Ledoux's and Etienne Le
Boullйe's grandiose architectural projects for France. But in contrast to these
eighteenth century masters, he thought that his plans were technically
realisable.
To make room for the Great Hall, whole streets were bulldozed. Speer
began to construct a skeleton of a steel frame from which the shell of the dome
would be suspended. A big sample of the concrete floor, which was to support
such a structure, was sunk into a plot of earth in the suburbs of Berlin to test
its quality.
For the vast Adolf Hitler Square, Berlin's old Königsplatz was covered
in granite and enlarged to hold up to one million people. The sculptor Arno
Breker was asked to design a fountain 125 metres in diameter with a figure of
Apollo reaching 6 metres into the sky. Imagine my joy in
creating a fountain of that dimension ..... I remained faithful to my Greekness
and sketched Apollo with the chariot of the sun ..... The main group of Apollo
was framed by four pillars of water, 15 metres high. Spotlights in the middle of
the water pillar transformed them at night into giant silvery gleaming towers.
on the edge of the huge basins stood, in the axis of the six avenues, six
Maenads in flowing robes, announcing, so to speak, the great event: the arrival
of Apollo. (Arno Breker,
Im
Strahlungsfeld der Ereignisse 1925-1965,
Preußisch Oldendorf, 1972, page 95.) This was to be the
showpiece of a new Germany, surpassing anything other Nations could ever boast.
On June 23rd, 1940, immediately after the Armistice in France, Hitler
visited Paris for the first time. In a Mercedes sedan, Hitler, as usual sitting
next to the driver, set out on a city tour with Speer, Hermann Giesler, and Arno
Breker. A newsreel recorded the conqueror's flying visit in the early hours of
the morning. They stopped at Charles Garnier's neobaroque Opera House, Hitler's
favorite building. After that they passed the Madeleine and went on to the
Trocadйro. Hitler stopped at the Arc de Triomphe and at the Panthйon. After the
visit Hitler ordered a change in his architectural plans. Our
architecture is too heavy, he observed.
It does not know the play of variety and details. The Arc de
Triomphe impressed him particularly.
Berlin was to be renamed Germania.
Goebbels wrote in his diaries: The projects are truly grandiose. They are of a dimension that will suffice for
the next three hundred years. Their construction means that Berlin will be the
metropolis of the world from the point of view of architecture as well.
It was estimated that the building program would take twelve years to
complete. In 1944 Goebbels stated that 150 architects were making plans to turn
Berlin into the biggest and most beautiful city in the world. There was talk of
two new airports and a third airport in the lakes for seaplanes.
The forest of Grünewald was to become a big centre for leisure
activities. Work began in 1938 and was stopped in 1942. Part of the east-west
axis road was built; the rest remained on the drawing board.
Hitler and his architects Speer and Giesler dreamed extravagantly.
Originally Hitler made master plans for Berlin, München, and Nürnberg. He relied
on Himmler to find the necessary forced labour in his concentration camps. By
1941, while the war was raging, twenty seven other cities -- among them Hamburg,
Augsburg, Köln, Münster, Hannover, Dresden, Bremen, Linz, and Weimar -- were to
be rebuilt as visible monuments to the new German Reich. Cities were given new
attributes:
In order to safeguard architectural unity, Hitler worked with only a
handful of architects responsible for entire cities. Giesler looked after Weimar
and Augsburg. Linz was entrusted to Roderich Fick. In Dresden, Wilhelm Kreis
(1873-1953) worked. The whole of Germany from the noblest
building of faith to the humblest farmhouse will grow together in an orderly
unit. A true image of a Folk united in their ideology and their will to work and
to create. (Troost, editor,
Das Bauen im
neuen Reich, I, page 20.)
The plans for the new towns were rigidly worked out and could easily be
applied to towns of any size. Most were based on the grid system of a cross,
with the Party buildings on a central axis. A Party monument, the administration
building of the NSDAP, and an assembly square became obligatory for all towns
with more than 20,000 inhabitants. This central square was to be open, like a
sports arena, not enclosed by houses as in the old towns. The National
Socialists favoured large open spaces for their rallies. It is notable that the
plans did not include the building of churches.
National Socialist architecture involved much more than a revival of
monumental buildings to celebrate the powerful State. It meant control of
people's lives through architectural structure. Even concentration camps
followed a similar architectural scheme, thus giving a Fascist order to cities,
villages, and places of imprisonment and rehabilitation.
Salzgitter and Wolfsberg were only two of the cities built according to
these new architectural principles. They were meant to be prototypes of the new
cityscape and to look into the future; they did not have to disguise their
economic importance behind quaint vernacular facades.
All over Germany buildings became more and more impressive. The
disguised airraid shelters by Friedrich Tamms planned for Berlin in 1942 are
only one of the many examples. The Academy Of The NSDAP at Chiemsee in Bavaria
was never built, but it gives an idea of the architecture to come.
Gerdy Troost wrote:
The Leader forms with these
buildings the image of the noblest characteristics of the German Folk Community.
Architecture becomes the education of the new Folk. This
rigid monumental building was planned by Hermann Giesler. When the model was
exhibited in München, the papers spoke of yet
another gigantic work of the National Socialist Movement. According to the will
of The Leader, the exterior of this building will be unique. Its style will
reflect its role. Here National Socialist philosophy will be constantly formed
and reexamined. This building will guarantee the formation of a new type of
German for all times. (Alfred Rosenberg,
Die
Kunst im Deutschen Reich, January, 1939, page 17.)
The vast complex, 500 metres long and 1,500 metres deep, was to be
erected along the banks of a beautiful Bavarian lake. Above a socle would rise
four floors with living quarters. A tower 110 metres in diameter and 120 metres
in height was to contain the huge communal hall and the reception rooms for The
Leader. The building was to have its own radio station and an observatory. The
breathtaking vision of this architecture has seldom been matched. It inspired
worldwide fascination.
Linz was to become a cultural mecca, an ongoing festival of the arts.
Hitler devised plans for the construction of a large theatre, a concert hall
devoted to Anton Bruckner, who was, after Wagner, his favorite composer. There
would also be a special operetta theatre, an opera house with 2,000 seats, and a
large Leader Museum -- all placed along a grand boulevard. Most of the buildings
were to be based on his own sketches.
At a dinner in Berlin on April 28, 1942, in the presence of Speer and
Martin Bormann, Hitler spoke about his plans to outshine Budapest and to make
Linz the most beautiful town on the Danube River. The river was to be built up
in a magnificent fashion, with grandiose buildings and a triumphal arch. On one
side there was to be an eighteen floor hotel, with 2,500 beds reserved for the
Strength Through Joy
organisation. Plans for another Leader Hotel, in Italian Renaissance style, had
been worked out between Hitler and Roderich Fick, down to the minutest detail.
Municipal buildings and an Adolf Hitler School in Baroque style were to be built
by Hermann Giesler. Guesthouses for the Party and a new Town Hall with a facade
resembling the Viennese Opera House were also planned, as well as a Party House
by Fick. On the other side of the river, linked by a suspension bridge, was to
be an observatory with a vast cupola, by Wilhelm Kreis,
as a
counter to the pseudoscience of the catholic church. In it would be represented
the three great cosmological conceptions of history -- those of Ptolemy, of
Copernicus, and of the Austrian engineer Hans Hörbiger. The interior of this
edifice was to commemorate the ideas of Troost. There were plans for a District
Government Centre, a place of assembly for 100,000 visitors, and a festival hall
to hold 35,000. Hitler continued to sketch plans for more and more buildings.
Speer and Bieber were asked to submit plans. Linz cost an
awful lot of money, noted Goebbels in his diary, May 17th,
1941, but it is so important to The Leader.
Linz was also to have the largest art gallery in the world, the Leader
Museum, a pendant to the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. Fick designed the building
with a facade by Giesler. A library for it by Leonhard Gall was planned.
Originally Hitler had wanted to make this a Museum Of The Nineteenth Century. As
early as 1925 he had drawn up plans for a gallery with sixty rooms, each filled
with the masters of his beloved period. His list included: Anselm Feuerbach,
Wilhelm Leibl, and Hans von Marйes. Adolf Menzel was to have five rooms for
himself, and Arnold Böcklin and Moritz von Schwind three each. An inventory of
1940 lists 334 works of the nineteenth century, all earmarked for Linz. In 1939
he had appointed Dr. Hans Posse, one time Director Of The Dresden Gallery, to
look after the contents of the new museum. Posse's task was to buy masterworks
of earlier periods in Belgium, Italy, and the Netherlands. Rosenberg in the
meantime requisitioned and borrowed for safekeeping artworks from museums and
churches in the occupied territories, and confiscated them from abandoned Jewish
homes, while Himmler's Storm Troopers did the same in churches and monasteries
in the East. Entire collections were taken from Jewish families in Austria,
Holland, and France -- not only paintings but also furniture and silver. Most of
it was destined for Linz, some went to other museums or was earmarked for
Rosenberg's fantastic dream: a University For Aryan Art.
In 1944 Robert Scholz, responsible for the special Rosenberg Requisition
Force, drew up the balance sheet of the acquisitions: from March, 1941 to July,
1944, twenty nine transports had brought 137 wagons comprised of 4,174 crates
containing 21,903 works. Much of it was destroyed by the terrorist area bombing
campaign of the criminal airforces of the Allies.
There were other plans for Linz. A new bridge was built across the
Danube River and finished in 1941; it was to have special bridgeheads by Fritz
Tamms.
Hitler's plan had been to transform the town into an international
metropolis, with a crypt in which he would be buried.
