Museum Tour
Old Museum
Altes Museum
Bodestraße 1-3
10178 Berlin
The Old Museum is one of the most renowned neo-Classicist structures and Germany's oldest museum apart from the Glyptothek in Munich. In 1823, Karl Friedrich Schinkel began planning the clear-cut four-winged building and its two courtyards. 1830 saw the opening of the first museum in Berlin.
In the spirit of his mental forerunner Wilhelm von Humboldt, Schinkel's architecture falls back on the Antiquity. The portico of the Museum is supported by 18 ionic columns and contains a dual staircase leading to the upper floor. The staircase and the rotunda, modelled on the Pantheon in Rome, are both elements hitherto reserved for buildings associated with the ruling class: the time had come for education to rule.
The museum was burned down during the Second World War. The fire destroyed valuable ceiling pictures and murals by Peter von Cornelius and Heinrich Herrmann. The building was reconstructed between 1951 to 1966 under the direction of Hans Erich Bogatzky and Theodor Voissen. At the beginning of the 1980s, renovation was carried out yet again and in 1991 a glass wall placed behind the columns.
The architectural offices of Hilmer & Sattler and Albrecht were commissioned in 1998 to plan complete refurbishment, which will begin in 2012. In accordance the glass wall inserted in 1991 will be removed, the courtyards covered over with a glass roof, and lifts, air-conditioning and wheelchair accesses installed.
The Greek Collection of the Collection of Classical Antiquities has been on display on the ground floor of the Old Museum since 1998. The Egyptian Museum will be housed here until refurbishment of the New Museum has been concluded in 2009.
Further information:
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Images:
Landesarchiv Berlin (2)
Landesarchiv Berlin / Klaus Lehnartz
Landesarchiv Berlin / Barbara Esch-Marowski (4)
Partner für Berlin / FTB-Werbefotografie
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