The Museum : The 'Joseph Durm' lecture hall, which was built
in 1880 at the Neurologic Clinic in the vicinity of the Psychiatry,
has been reconstructed as modern museum for the Prinzhorn Collection.
It was transformed in 2001 into an architecturally interesting space
for exhibitions, including an open basement area where the wooden
sculptures of Karl Genzel are on permanent display. Furthermore the
building has a well equipped restoration studio, a small but expanding
library, a workshop, a museumsshop and storage rooms. The collection
is available for research and to all who are interested. The climatically
controlled museum guarantees professional care for the collection
and makes it possible to show its unique works to the public in changing
exhibitions.
Fund: The core collection comprises approximately 5000 pieces
of art created by approx. 450 patients of psychiatric institutions.
These pieces comprise mostly drawings, water colors, writings, like
letters, notes, drafts of books and exercise books, which were often
self-manufactured, as well as oil paintings, material manual work,
collages and 70 wooden sculptures
Origin: Approx. 1880 until 1933; main collecting period between1919-22.
Authors/Artists: Approximately 450 Patients of all ages, social
classes and professions. Only 20% of the artists are female. The duration
of admission is diverse, sometimes lifelong or unclear because of
missing case files.
Sites of Origin: State-run or private institutions and asylums
in Germany, but also in Switzerland, Austria, some in Italy, France,
Poland and Japan.
Affiliated Collections: In addition to the core Prinzhorn
collection, permanent loans and donations were deposited in the Psychiatric
Clinic, such as works created at the Rhine Federal Hospital Viersen
(around 1900), wooden sculptures by Carl Genzel from the Wesphalia
Psychiatric and Psychotherapeutic Clinic, Eickelborn near Lippstadt
(approx. 1920), the Petschner Collection, Psychiatric Hospital Merxhausen,
Bad Emstal (1960-1980), as well as works of art of contemporary patient-artists.
Documentation: A data bank of the collection is in process.
A nearly complete photo library can be viewed by appointment. Almost
2/3 of the case files could be found and their main data could be
compiled. (Access for scientific purposes).
Introduction
During its search for authentic art at the beginning of the Twentieth
Century, the Modern movement discovered not only "primitive art" and
children's drawings, but also "psychotic art". Simultaneous to this
a number of psychiatrists began eagerly collecting their patients'
pictorial works, although this was principally in the hope that these
could be used to assist diagnosis.
Hans Prinzhorn (1886-1933), who as an art historian and doctor was
versed in both fields, is regarded nowadays as having pioneered an
interdisciplinary approach. He was interested in questions of cultural
anthropology, such as the origins of the artistic impulse, or the
"schizophrenic sense of existence" he witnessed in contemporary Expressionist
art. And he hoped to gain direct, primal insight into these questions
through the patients' works. During the years after the First World
War, he built up with the support of Karl Wilmanns, the head of the
Psychiatric Department in Heidelberg, a unique collection of works
from psychiatric hospitals. His richly illustrated book The Artistry
of the Mentally Ill (Berlin 1922) not only documented the collection,
but partly interpreted it and contextualised it through a critical
examination of the prevailing culture. Here he departed once and for
all from any questions about the relevance of the works for diagnostics.
Instead, he emphasised that all of these creative phenomena are equally
valid in psychological terms, and that some have recognisably artistic
quality - thus allowing this disparaged "insane art" and its creators
to be given a positive re-evaluation. Prinzhorn's great achievement
was, in effect, to open up the blinkered viewpoint of psychiatry to
include the realms of both art and art history. This was a courageous
step which, in the long term, helped the patients' creative production
receive its just acclaim and to promote a reintegration of the patients
into society.
Such artists as Alfred Kubin, Paul Klee, Max Ernst and Pablo Picasso
were full of enthusiasm for the Collection, and drew on the works
as a source of inspiration. And after the Second World War psychopathologically
informed artists (Peter Gorsen) became important transformers of these
works. Along with other discoveries in the fields of outsider art
and art from psychiatric hospitals, which in the Fifties the artist
Dubuffet termed "Art Brut", they continue to provide an important
aesthetic stimulus. In the meantime the psychiatric profession has
by and large changed its attitude to such creative production. Once
again works are being collected, but this time for their aesthetic
value, and art therapy has become an established procedure in modern
psychiatry.
The Collection contains drawings, paintings, collages, textiles,
sculptures and a great diversity of texts which were produced in hospitals,
mainly in the German-speaking world, between 1880 and 1920. The majority
of the patients, who were often interned for years on end, were viewed
as schizophrenic. Their works reflect a variety of social backgrounds
and broad differences in their authors' educations. Furthermore, they
reveal the history and ideologies of the times - if often in a fragmentary
or alienated way - as well as the authors' lives before the onset
of illness, and the distressing and warping experience they underwent
within the hospital walls.
Only a handful of the patients had received professional artistic
training, but many others gained first hand experience in various
forms of art and design at school or during vocational training, or
while working in such fields as the arts and crafts or architecture,
or in technical and skilled manual professions. The use the patients
made of their "previous experience" varied from carefully reproducing
what they had to learnt, to freely varying and totally departing from
these "basics". A small but important part of the Collection is particularly
fascinating due to the highly individual means and singular yet compelling
formal solutions that are employed, and which contain a meaning of
their own. These works are art in the closer sense of the word. They
use aesthetic means to convey an understanding of extremes of human
feeling and experience - often of a pre-linguistic nature, as is encountered
in psychoses - and of how these are assimilated in madness, which
has its own specific mental horizons. This "other" view of life appears
to be quite hermetic, yet we for our part are generally unaware of
the relativity of our own thinking, as laid down and shared by the
society we live in. These works enable us to experience an underlying
dimension of humanity that is potentially present in us all.
Selected literature
Zwischen Wahnsinn und Kunst
- Die Sammlung Prinzhorn,
Documentary film from Christian Beetz,2008.
<€ 17,90>
Künstler in der Irre/Artists off the Rails, Ausstellungskatalog,
hg. von Thomas Röske u. Bettina Brand-Claussen, dt.-engl., Heidelberg
2008.
<€ 34,80>
Hans Prinzhorn, Bildnerei der Geisteskranken,
1. Aufl., Berlin 1922, 2. Aufl., Berlin 1923, 3. Aufl. Heidelberg/New
York 1968, 5. Aufl., Wien (Springer) 2001. <out
of stock>
Hans Prinzhorn, Artistry of the
mentally ill, ed. Eric von Brockdorff, 1. Aufl. 1972, 2. Aufl., New
York (Springer) 1995. <out of stock>
Hans Prinzhorn, Expressions de
la folie. Dessins, peintures, sculptures d`asile, ed. Marielène
Weber, Paris (Gallimard) 1984. <out of stock>
Die Prinzhorn-Sammlung. Bilder,
Skulpturen, Texte aus psychiatrischen Anstalten, ed. Hans Gercke und
Inge Jarchov (Jádi), Ausstellungskatalog Heidelberg, Kunstverein
u.a., Königstein/Ts. (Athenäum) 1980. <out
of stock>
"Leb wohl sagt mein Genie Ordugele
muß sein". Texte aus der Prinzhorn-Sammlung, ed. Inge Jádi,
Heidelberg (Wunderhorn) 1985. <€ 20,50>
Hans Prinzhorn und Arbeiten von Patienten
der Heidelberger Klinik aus der Prinzhornsammlung, Ausstellungskatalog
Heidelberg/Hemer, Heidelberg (Brausdruck) 1986. <out
of stock>
Oskar Panizza. Pour Gambetta,
Sämtliche in der Prinzhorn-Sammlung und im Landeskirchlichen
Archiv Nürnberg aufbewahrten Zeichnungen, ed. Armin Abmeier,
Michael Farin und Roland Hepp, München (edition belleville) 1989.
<€ 17,25>
Ferenc und Inge Jádi, Muzika.
Musikbezogene Werke von psychisch Kranken, Katalogbuch zur gleichnamigen
Ausstellung, Heidelberg (Wunderhorn) 1989. <19,40>
M. Tuchmann/C.F. Eliel (Eds.), Parallel
Visions. Modern Artists and Outsider Art, Ausstellungskatalog
Los Angeles, County Museum et al., 1992.
Franz Karl Bühler (Offenburg
1864-Grafeneck 1940). Bilder aus der Prinzhorn-Sammlung, Ausstellungskatalog
Offfenburg, Museum im Ritterhaus, 1994. <nur in der Sammlung erhältlich
€ 4,00>
Heinrich Anton Müller (1869-1930).
Katalog der Maschinen, Zeichnungen und Schriften, ed. Roman Kurzmeyer,
Ausstellungskatalog Bern, Kunstmuseum, und Lausanne, Collection de
l'Art Brut, Basel/Frankfurt a.M. (Stroemfeld) 1994. <€ 15,25>
Identità e Alterità.
Figure del corpo 1895/1995, Ausstellungskatalog Venezia, La Biennale
di Venezia, 46. Esposizione Internazionale d’Arte, 1995.
La Beauté Insensée.
Collection Prinzhorn - Université de Heidelberg 1890-1920,
Ausstellungskatalog Charleroi, Palais des Beaux-Arts, 1995. <out
of stock>
Die Wahnsinnige Schönheit.
Prinzhorn-Sammlung, Deutsche Übersetzung zur Ausstellung Heidelberg,
Schloß, Ottheinrichsbau, 1996. <vergriffen>
Beyond Reason. Art and Psychosis,
Works from the Prinzhorn Collection, Ausstellungskatalog London, Hayward
Gallery, 1996. <out of stock >
Wahnsinnige Schönheit. Prinzhorn-Sammlung,
Ausstellungskatalog Osnabrück, Kulturhistorisches Museum, Heidelberg
(Wunderhorn) 1997. <out of stock>
Thomas Röske, Der Arzt als Künstler.
Ästhetik und Psychotherapie bei Hans Prinzhorn (1886-1933), zugl.
Diss., Univ. Hamburg, Bielefeld (Aisthesis) 1995. <out
of stock>
Achim Tischer (Ed.), Die Macht der
hypnotischen Suggestion. Die Bremer Künstler der Prinzhorn-Sammlung,
Ausstellungskatalog Bremen, Krankenhaus-Museum Zentralkrankenhaus
Bremen Ost, 1996 <€ 12,50>, mit Beiträgen u.a. von:
Bettina Brand, Der zerknitterte
Hauptmann Gustav Röhrig (1858-1932), S. 15-30;
Inge Jádi, Die Prinzhorn-Sammlung,
S. 71-78.
Ferenc und Inge Jádi, Die Prinzhorn-Sammlung
der Psychiatrischen Universitätsklinik in Heidelberg, in: Heidelberg,
Geschichte und Gestalt, ed. Elmar Mittler, Heidelberg 1996, S. 458-465.
<nur im Buchhandel>
Kunst & Wahn, ed. Ingried
Brugger u.a., Ausstellungskatalog Wien, Kunstforum, Köln 1997
<out of stock>, mit Beiträgen
u.a. von:
Inge Jádi, Vergangenes gegenwärtig.
Anmerkungen zur Prinzhorn-Sammlung, S. 175-181;
Bettina Brand-Claussen, "KnochenWeltMuseumTheater".
Holzskulpturen von Karl Genzel aus der Prinzhorn-Sammlung, S. 219-239.
Figure Dell'anima. Arte irregolare
in Europa, Ausstellungskatalog Pavia, Castello Visconteo, und Genova,
Palazzo Ducale, Milano 1997, mit Beiträgen u.a. von:
Inge Jádi, Arte e terapia.
Spunti critici e riflessioni personali, S. 43-54;
Bettina Brand-Claussen, Dal Museo d'arte
patologica alla Collezione Prinzhorn, S. 66-91.
Sprachlöchersterne. Dichtung
und Wahrheit von Geisteskranken - Prinzhorn-Sammlung, gelesen von
Herbert Fritsch, CD, ed. Freunde der Prinzhorn-Sammlung e.V., Heidelberg
(Wunderhorn) 1998. <€ 18,50>
Inge Jádi, Im Bilde sein. Verschiedene
Rezeptionsformen von Werken der Prinzhorn-Sammlung, in: A. Borkenhagen
und O. Decker (Eds.), Texte aus dem Colloquium Psychoanalyse,
H. 4, Berlin 1999, S. 119-144.
Christoph Mundt / Gerrit Hohendorf / Maike Rotzoll (Hg.), Psychiatrische
Forschung und NS-"Euthanasie". Beiträge zu einer
Gedenkveranstaltung an der Psychiatrischen Universitätsklinik
Heidelberg, Heidelberg (Wunderhorn) 2001. <€ 29,65>
Vision und Revision einer Entdeckung. Hg. von Bettina Brand-Claussen
und Inge Jádi, Katalog zur Eröffnungsausstellung, Heidelberg,
Sammlung Prinzhorn 2001. <jetzt
€ 9,00 >
Sammlung Prinzhorn - ein Museum der eigenen und anderen Art,
in: Vernissage, Die Zeitschrift zur Ausstellung, 9. Jg., 07/01.
<jetzt €
6,00 >
Inge Jádi / Bettina Brand-Claussen (Hg.), August Natterer.
Die Beweiskraft der Bilder, Leben und Werk, Deutungen, Heidelberg,
Wunderhorn, 2001 (= Monographische Reihe der Sammlung Prinzhorn, Bd.
1) <€ 49,95>
Wahn Welt Bild. Die Sammlung Prinzhorn - Beiträge zur
Mueumseröffnung, hg. von Thomas Fuchs / Bettina Brand-Claussen
/ Christoph Mundt / Inge Jádi, Berlin u.a. (Springer) 2002.
(= Heidelberger Jahrbücher, 2002/XLVI) <jetzt
€ 10,00 >
Ins Gesicht sehen. Christa Mayer, Fotografische Porträts
von LangzeitpatientInnen, seit 1982, hg. von Bettina Brand-Claussen
u. Thomas Röske, Ausstellungskatalog, Sammlung Prinzhorn, Heidelberg
2002. <€ 3,00>
Bd. 2: Anonyme Fotografien aus der Anstalt Weilmünster,
1905-1914. <out
of stock>
Sammlung Prinzhorn. Wunderhülsen & Willenskurven
- Bücher, Hefte und Kalendarien, Ausstellungskatalog Heidelberg/Jena
2002. <out of
stock>
Todesursache: Euthanasie. Verdeckte Morde in der NS-Zeit,
hg. von Bettina Brand-Claussen, Thomas Röske, Maike Rotzoll,
Ausstellungskatalog Sammlung Prinzhorn, Heidelberg, Wunderhorn, 2002.
<€ 29,90>
antworten. Dorothee Rocke im Dialog mit Hyacinth von Wieser,
Ausstellungskatalog Sammlung Prinzhorn, Heidelberg 2003.
<€ 8,00>
Expressionismus und Wahnsinn, hg. von Herwig Guratzsch, bearb.
von Thomas Röske, Ausstellungskatalog Schleswig, Schloss Gottorf,
München/Berlin/London/New York 2003.
<out of stock>
Irre ist weiblich. Künstlerische Interventionen von Frauen
in der Psychiatrie um 1900, hg. von Bettina Brand-Claussen und Viola
Michely, Ausstellungskatalog Sammlung Prinzhorn, Heidelberg, Wunderhorn,
(2004), 2. Auflage 2009.
<34,80>
Rausch im Bild - Bilderrausch. Drogen als Medien von Kunst
in den 70er Jahren, ed. by Henrik Jungarberle & Thomas Röske,
Ausstellungskatalog Sammlung Prinzhorn, Heidelberg, 2004.
<€ 12,00, nur im Museumsshop erhältlich!>
In Persern Büchern steht's geschrieben. Jörg Ahrnt
- im zeichnerischen Dialog mit Ludwig Wilde, Ausstellungskatalog Kunstverein
Göttingen/Museum für Angewandte Kunst Frankfurt/Sammlung
Prinzhorn Heidelberg, Leipzig 2004.
<€ 15,00>
wahnsinn sammeln/collecting madness. Outsider Art aus der
Sammlung Dammann, Ausstellungskatalog, hg. von Thomas Röske, Bettina
Brand-Claussen, Gerhard Dammann, dt.-engl., Heidelberg 2006.
<€ 29,90>
AIR LOOM - Der Luft-Webstuhl und andere gefährliche Beeinflussungsapparate/The
Air Loom and other dangerous influencing machines, Ausstellungskatalog,
hg. von Thomas Röske u. Bettina Brand-Claussen, dt.-engl., Heidelberg
2006.
<€ 29,90>
last modified: Carl Blesius, 2010-01-26
