Databáze uměleckých výstav v českých zemích 1820 – 1950

On Sunday, October 1, 1922, the national newspaper Deutsche Zeitung Bohemia published an undated and unsigned extensive report on the opening of the Die Pilger exhibition in Ústí nad Labem [Anonymous author 1922]. The exhibition took place in the upper rooms of the Municipal Library, the so-called Weimaneum, built in 1912 according to the design of Josef Zasche and demolished in 1945. The exhibition lasted two weeks, and the press, especially the Aussiger Tagblatt, published detailed information about it in the following days [R. Th. 1922]. The show was accompanied by a modest, square catalogue listing the names of the artists and the titles and techniques of the works. It was published only in German by the Ústí nad Labem publisher Stephan Tietze. 

From the perspective of history of art in the Bohemian lands, the exhibition had a few interesting features. The members of Die Pilger, a group that formed at the Prague Academy around Professor August Brömse, almost all participated in the show (except for Theodor Sternhell, who was no loner alive, and Julius Pfeiffer, who was missing) – this was the culmination of their short time together (1921–1923, or rather, 1925). They exhibited their typical works imbued with spiritualism and emotional tension. In contrast to the previous exhibitions, which had been held successively in Prague (Rudolfinum), Brno (House of Artists), Cheb and Mariánské Lázně between 1921 and 1922, the Ústí nad Labem exhibition was the first (and last) to include colleagues and friends from Dresden, as well as several other guests from North Bohemia. The exhibition took place outside of Prague, about halfway between Prague and Dresden. These two cities determined the artistic direction of Die Pilger: In the autumn of 1922, Maxim Kopf and Mary Duras went to Dresden after graduating from Prague’s Academy of Fine Arts and Josef Hegebarth and Anton Bruder also lived in Dresden [Habán 2013].

Ústí nad Labem was one of the strongholds of Bohemian Germans in the early 1920s. Although the city lacked venues for large national exhibitions, the top floor of its municipal library was perfectly suitable for a medium-sized group show. The exhibition featured a total of 114 artworks by 17 male artists and one female artist, the sculptor Mary Duras. There were two other sculptors - Jost Pietsch, a native of Jablonec nad Nisou, a member of Die Pilger and a graduate of the Prague Academy, who listed Ústí nad Labem (Aussig) as his place of work, and Karl Nisrath, who represented the German Reich artists. More than half of the exhibited artworks were prints (woodcuts, monotypes, lithographs, engravings). In addition, the exhibition included 23 oil paintings, 16 sculptures, and 11 drawings; in the case of some works, the technique was not specified in the catalogue. Fritz Lehmann exhibited thirteen unspecified architectural designs, who regularly reported on Die Pilger members’ exhibitions in Prager Tagblatt. In his review of the Ústí exhibition, he did not hesitate to describe the exhibition space in the Weimaneum as beautiful [Lehmann 1922].

All the critics wrote that this was the art of young Bohemian Germans and that Reich Germans had also participated. The Aussiger Tagblatt devoted an extensive text to the exhibition, which was published in instalments. The reviewer R. Th. focused mainly on the personal characteristics of the artists and their works. He concluded by saying that the exhibition had been poorly attended so far. All the reviews began by commenting on the work of August Brömse, but they did not suggest that a central work dominated the exhibition or that any one artist stood out. One reviewer mentioned that Josef Hegebarth painted with glue paints and was described as the “Bohemian-German Michelangelo of engraving” [Anonymous author 1922].

Like the activities of the Tvrdošíjní group, which exhibited in Berlin and subsequently arranged for the Novembergruppe to exhibit in Prague and Košice (1921), the Ústí nad Labem exhibition testifies to the interest in maintaining contacts with the German art scene in the early years of the Czechoslovak Republic. However, it is not helpful to apply the linear modernist perspective and compare the mystical work of Die Pilger with the avant-garde of the Tvrdošíjní and Novembergruppe. The Reich German counterparts of Die Pilger were their Dresden peers – young, emerging artists, some of whom were probably still students. Nevertheless, the Ústí exhibition can be seen as a significant undertaking, demonstrating both the progressive expressionism of Bohemian Germans in the early postwar period and, more generally, the pluralistic and multiethnic character of cultural developments in the Czechoslovak regions at this time.

The show represented the culmination of Die Pilger’s activities. During the following year, the lives and artistic paths of the group’s main protagonists diverged, with some members gradually turning to a more down-to-earth, French-inspired work. The group’s existence came to a definitive close with Brömse’s death in 1925. In terms of artistic direction, the Ústí exhibition also marked the end of efforts to formulate a unified, existentialist artistic expression of the Bohemian Germans, corresponding to the broader postwar current of the second wave of Expressionism in Europe, which the members of Die Pilger tried to join from their specific Central European position.

Ivo Habán

Works Cited

Anonymous author 1922: Anonymous author, Eine „Pilger“-Ausstellung in Aussig, Deutsche Zeitung Bohemia 95, 1922, č. 231, 1. 10., s. 8

Habán 2013: Ivo Habán, Praha – Drážďany. Skupina Die Pilger a spirituální tendence počátku dvacátých let, in: Anna Habánová (ed.), Mladí lvi v kleci. Umělecké skupiny německy hovořících výtvarníků z Čech, Moravy a Slezska v meziválečném období, Liberec – Řevnice 2013, s. 40–59

Lehmann 1922: F. L. [Fritz Lehmann], „Die Pilger“ -Ausstellung in Aussig, Prager Tagblatt 47, 1922, č. 237, 10. 10., s. 8

R. Th. 1922: R. Th., Kunstausstellung in Aussig. Die „Pilger“ in der Volksbücherei II, Aussiger Taglatt 66, 1922, č. 224 , 7. 10., s. 4–5

Další literatura

Ivo Habán, Praha – Drážďany. Skupina Die Pilger a spirituální tendence počátku dvacátých let, in: Anna Habánová (ed.), Mladí lvi v kleci. Umělecké skupiny německy hovořících výtvarníků z Čech, Moravy a Slezska v meziválečném období, Liberec – Řevnice 2013, s. 40–59

Ivo Habán, „Že bylo počítáno také s účastí našich německých krajanů, je samozřejmé.“ Německy hovořící umělci v meziválečném Československu mezi Prahou a Drážďany, in: Karel Srp (ed.), V novém světě. Podmínky modernity 1917–1927, Ostrava – Řevnice 2018, s. 76–86

Marie Rakušanová, Vzplanutí, in: Ladislav Daněk (ed.), Vzplanutí: expresionistické tendence ve Střední Evropě 1903–1936: sbírka Galerie Ztichlá klika, Praha, Olomouc 2008, s. 7–32

Anonymous author, Ausstellung der Gruppe „Die Pilger“, Prager Presse 2, 1922, no. 274, 6. 10., p. 6