Tag Archives: The Conway Library

Richard Cray: Researching and Re-Cataloguing the 19th Century Print Collection (including the 20th Century Russia box)

Architecture Internship Photographic Library Digitisation Project Photographic Prints Prints The Conway Library No Comments

I’ve been engaged by the Courtauld on one of its digital internships since August of last year, and in the two and a half years prior to that, I was a volunteer on the Conway Library digitisation project, clocking up over 250 hours either side of the pandemic.

My background is not what you might expect from someone in my position – I’ve done two tours of duty in broadcasting, in both production and administration capacities, and I was a market research coder for more than a decade in the days when surveys were mostly completed on paper.

Regarding the internship, the intention was that I would assist with preparing image metadata prior to the Conway Library being uploaded; however, very early on, Tom encouraged each intern to find a small project to work on.  It was suggested that my small project could be the 19th Century Prints collection – and nearly a full year later I’m still working on it.

The first issue was locating the entire collection.  A large part of it, covering about 140 boxes, had been accessioned to a degree some years back, but there were another 15 boxes of mixed content on another shelf that had barely been looked at.  Then several boxes of unsorted prints from John Bilson’s collection were located. Then some oversized prints in Melinex pouches were located a shelf or two down, followed by another bunch located just at the very moment when I thought I was finally ready to get everything in some sort of order.

Then I looked at the spreadsheet containing the data from the prints already accessioned.

Up to that point, accessioning had been done very literally – everything on the mount and on the image had been entered into the spreadsheet largely verbatim.  Many descriptions that were not in English had not been translated, architects were frequently listed in the photographer column, and if there was nothing but a town or city written on the mount that was all that had been entered, even if the image was of a specific building. Photographic credits that were embossed on the mount or image had not been listed, presumably because nobody was looking out for them.

Buildings such as ecclesiastical premises and town halls were listed under numerous names in anything up to four different languages. It was clear that, in order to ensure images of the same building were kept together, some standardization of the information on the spreadsheet would need to be performed before the missing images were added, well before any reordering or renumbering took place.  Also, anything that made no sense or was incomplete was flagged for special attention.

Aside from images in one city being split between two folders in different boxes – one listed under the city’s English name and the other in its native form – there were other glaring issues with the way the collection had been boxed that required resolution.  An entire collection meant to be ordered alphabetically began with a box marked ‘Algeria, Morocco and Peru’, for some reason.  Another box randomly paired Holland – rather than the Netherlands – with Denmark.  The part of the collection dealing with England veered from cities to counties and back again and the box marked ‘England S-Z’ had the helpful addition of the words “excluding Wales”. Well, it would, wouldn’t it?  That said, the folder marked “Wales” was, rather confusingly, to be found in that very box.

The numbering of images went awry in the third box.  There had been no standard method of numbering mounts with multiple images on one side or an image on both the front and reverse – sometimes they were given consecutive numbers, sometimes the same number with a alpha suffix.  One particular folder contained 34 images, all of which had been given the same number with a numerical suffix from 1 to 34.

After consulting with Tom, the decision was taken to start again. Not only would there be a need to add the many images that had not already been accessioned to existing folders and boxes, with images being re-ordered and renumbered accordingly, but some ground rules would need to be set about how individual buildings would be listed.

As volunteers had already been adding biographies for photographers with content in the Conway Library to Wikipedia, it was decided that, wherever possible, a building should be listed on the spreadsheet by how it appears on English Wikipedia.  If no entry existed for the building on English Wikipedia, it was decided to use the name listed on the native Wikipedia entry.  In cases where a building was not listed on Wikipedia at all, it was decided to search for an official website or a listing on a local government website, or, failing that, establish a clear consensus from looking at other reputable websites.

Sometimes an alternative name or a native name has been added to the spreadsheet in parentheses, and once the images are digitized and uploaded alongside the descriptions, it should be possible to add all alternative names for a building, particularly ecclesiastical premises and Italian palazzi, as well a full timeline of changes to building names or uses, to all applicable images with some form of global edit.

At the end of January, with all located images accounted for in the spreadsheet, and three-quarters of the images previously marked as “missing” located in various nooks and crannies, the reordering, renumbering, and re-boxing of the collection finally commenced.

And that was where the fun really started.

First off, it was decided that the collection would be split between prints that could fit in our standard red boxes without folding and oversized prints, which would be kept separate.  Previously, some of these folded images were kept in the boxes, while others remained loose.  Our thinking was that one photographic studio could handle the content in the boxes, without having to adjust the focal length, while the second studio could handle content where the focal length and focus would need to be adjusted for every shot. Currently, the boxed images outnumber the oversized ones by about five-to-one.

It seemed to me that uploading an image of a building onto an internet database with only a city for identification may be considered somewhat inertial, so I decided early on to try, wherever possible, to locate and/or verify the locations featured in every architectural image in the collection, which make up most of its total sample of 10,500 individual images. For example, if a named building was listed purely as an “exterior” shot, could a more precise description be added – a façade, an angle of view, even the location from which the image was shot, if that could be determined.  Was it worth pointing out other landmarks adjacent to the focal point of the image, or in the background?  Could I determine a building from a close-up of a balcony or balustrade, a column or capital, a pier or a pilaster?  Sometimes yes, sometimes no.

With a little bit of searching, images featuring a specific frontage that were previously described as street scenes could be pinpointed, such as Dante’s birthplace in Florence.  An image previously thought to be of Rotterdam was proved to be of a canal in Amsterdam that has since been filled in, merely by locating a recent photo on, of all places, Trip Advisor, identifying a rooftop, a bridge and a particularly decorative street lamp, and then verifying the location on Google Maps, because, as any fule no, one shouldn’t assume that what one finds on the internet at first time of looking is any more accurate than what one already has to hand.

Aside from pinpointing locations and buildings featured in images that would have been close to impossible in pre-internet days, even for someone with a specialist knowledge of a particular geographical area, and possibly even for natives, it has also been possible to correct errors and confirm descriptions that have been adorned with a question mark, perhaps for several decades.

Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been accessioning the last half-dozen boxes of Italian architecture, specifically Venice, which had more than its fair share of questionable filing and misleading descriptions.

These included:

  • Two close-up shots of the Bridge of Sighs [both sides of 5275] filed with images of the Doge’s Palace, when two more distant shots of the bridge [including 5274] were in a dedicated folder but had been accessioned on the spreadsheet under the name of the canal, Rio di Palazzo Ducale. One of the images itself is even mislabelled, claiming the picture was taken from one bridge when in fact it was taken from the next bridge along. And, to make things even more confusing, the Wikipedia entry also contains images that say they’re looking south when they’re actually looking north.

Fig. 1: Bridge of Sighs, Venice, Italy. 19th Century Print 5274, The Conway Library, The Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-CC.

 

Fig. 2: Bridge of Sighs, Venice, Italy. 19th Century Print 5275a and 5275b, The Conway Library, The Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-CC.

  • A folder marked ‘Palazzo Vendramin Calergin’ contained eight images of two different buildings: six of Ca’ Vendramin Calergin on the Grand Canal [including 5193] and two of Ca’ Vendramin Zago, now the Hotel Ca’ Vendramin, on the Rio di Santa Fosca [including 5205].

Fig. 3: Ca’ Vendramin Calergin on the Grand Canal, Venice, Italy, 19th Century Print 5193, The Conway Library, The Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-CC.

 

Fig. 4: Ca’ Vendramin Zago on the Rio di Santa Fosca, Venice, Italy, 19th Century Print 5205, The Conway Library, The Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-CC.

  • An image marked ‘Palazzo Cappello’ [5208], when there are currently two buildings by that name in Venice, as well as six or seven others that carry the Cappello name in some shape or form. Wikipedia only had entries for two or three of these buildings, so whittling down the possibilities was tricky.  Through a process of elimination and a battle with Google Maps, which is a nightmare to use for Venice – I don’t know why – it was established that the building was once known as the Palazzo Bianca Cappello, not to be confused with a Hotel of the same name a few doors down.

Fig. 5: Palazzo Bianca Capello, Venice, Italy, 19th Century Print 5208, Th Conway Library, The Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-CC.

  • There were several sets of different shots of the same building or buildings taken from virtually the same angle that had been filed in two or three different folders.

That is not to say that I’ve been able to identify everything.  There are a couple of hundred prints from the previously unaccessioned sample that have absolutely no identifying information at all, as well as images of untraceable buildings in certain towns, cities and countries.  Two such images were of the same building in Venice, yet were placed in different folders – one, inexplicably indexed under C, was of the “Palazzo Bordulmier” [5237], of which I could find no trace, and the other, indexed under S-Z was question marked as “Palazzo Tron” or “Palazzo San Benedetto” [5238] – probably the Palazzo Tron a San Beneto, which is similar but has four bays of windows, not three as pictured. A wider version of one of the two shots exists in the V&A catalogue, which list the location as unknown, so that’s how it’s been left in our database for now.

Fig. 6: Unknown, 19th Century Print 5237, The Conway Library, The Courtauld  Institute of Art, CC-BY-CC.

 

Fig. 7: Unknown Palazzo, 19th Century Print 5238, The Conway Library, The Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-CC.

There are also a few images where I’ve gone with the information provided on the mount but online research has provided more questions than answers.  Hopefully, once these images are made available to the public there will be individuals out there who will be able to identify them and people at the Courtauld who will be able to verify that identification and update the record accordingly.

I hope that one of the main benefits of taking the time to research these prints in greater detail will be to make the searching easier for those who will be searching from their homes or places of study, rather than physically removing the box from a shelf in a library.  The proof of the pudding, of course, will be in the eating, but what I’ve done is certainly an improvement on what we had for publication a year ago. And, as I alluded to earlier, it will invite users to suggest further contextual information that can be verified and added as and when.

There are plenty of images in this collection, as well as the Kersting collection and the wider Conway Library, that would benefit from being exhibited to the public and, where copyright permits, being made available to the public in the form of prints, either bespoke or off-the-peg, or in the form of other gifts, such as calendars or diaries or coffee-table books.  Personally, I’d take a photo of a long-demolished London building over Van Gogh’s bandaged ear any day, but that’s just me.

I would also argue that further licensing opportunities may arise by establishing a proactive relationship with publishers of books and periodicals to establish whether there are titles in their pipelines that would benefit from the use of an image in which the Courtauld holds the necessary rights of exploitation, rather than waiting for an author or editor or production manager to request something, and having a clear and pre-established rate card that is appropriate for any and all uses.

 

Richard Cray
Courtauld Connects
Digitisation Project
Metadata Assistant

Iris Campbell-Lange: A Conway Visual Song

Architecture Internship Micro-Internship Photographic Library Digitisation Project Photographic Prints Placement Sculpture The Conway Library No Comments

I have composed a visual song made of the images from the Conway archive. I like the idea that associations between images are what cause us to put them together – that there are certain ways that shapes interact which make us grasp them. Images have rhythms and tones, like a song. I have tried to incorporate the patterns of a song to reflect this, freely associating images from the archive – some from the same boxes – to create a whole piece which appears to randomly fit together. I have repeated some images and have tried to give the verses similar rhythms, and to give the chorus a rhythm of its own. I have tried to make these rhythms out of images.

When you are looking through the Conway archive, you are drawn to one box, then to another. They do not seem forcefully connected, but your mind draws mirrors between the images you have selected. Some of the images form a narrative, some do not. Images lead onto other images, and some appear more important than others and some do not feel worth noticing. The images feel as if they mean something together and against each other. I like the idea that making a visual song out of images is similar to the process of collecting and of taking images: it appears random but has a reason only you can fully recognise. And from this, images can become like phrases. And each phrase has a logic, just as each box in the archive has a logic which I cannot understand.

In my song, I have tried to order coloured and black and white images so that they relate to each other and create a kind of order. The intro has no colour images, until colours are slowly introduced in the verses and then repeated in the chorus. I repeated the motif of a grid in the chorus to reinforce the chorus structure. The last verse has an image which is situated at the bottom right corner of the archive page, as if finishing the progression of the verses and leading to the final choruses. The song finishes on a colour image, blue and yellow, of a small house – an image also used in the chorus. This is to mark the ending of the song and to refer to the slow progression to colour images at the beginning, which create the ending of the song.

The associations are free and tempting and indulgent – just like looking through an archive. You do not always notice the meanings or the history of images, but they show other opportunities.

 

Please click the link below to access a PDF file of the Visual Song.

A Conway Visual Song

The photographs used are listed below:

 

Intro

LINCOLN Cathedral. Corbel in Song School, Upper Floor. CON_B00181_F003_004, Conway Library, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

La Maison de l’Homme – ‘Centre Le Corbusier’, Architect: Le Corbusier, Zurich, 1963, CON_B04418_F003_012, Conway Library, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Corbel in room West of South East Transept (song school), CON_B00181_F003_003, Conway Library, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

La Maison de l’Homme, le Corbusier, Centre le Corbusier, 1963, CON_B04418_F003_008, Conway Library, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Verse 1

Resurrection group 49: J. North west Tower: north face. CON_B00237_F001_027, Conway Library, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

International Conference Centre, 1987-90, arch: Arata Isozaki, 20th Century Architecture, CON_B04430_F004_012, Conway Library, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Basin in the Washroom Illustration: Starck – Benedikt Taschen, Verlag, Cologne 1991 20th Century Architecture, CON_B04430_F004_036, Conway Library, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Upper room west of south east transept. (song school), Lincoln, Lincolnshire Cathedral, CON_B00181_F003_001, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Beaux Arts No. 231, Aug. 2003, Miami, Hotel Clinton, CON_B04433_F001_022, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Verse 2

F52, f53, Sketchbook of Master W.G., Frankfurt Stadelsches Kunstinstitut, CON_B04492_F001_026, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Interior – wall drawings in cafe space, London, Serpentine Gallery Pavilion, Architect: Oscar Niemeyer, 2003, CON_B04434_F001_066, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Exterior from west (Courtauld Institute Negative A3/406) 20th century Architecture, England and Wales, London Serpentine Gallery Pavilion, CON_B04434_F001_056, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Oxydized cladding at rear. Illus: Starck -Benedikt Taschen Verlag, Cologne 1991, CON_B04430_F004_039, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Beaux Arts No. 186, November 1999, Yamanashi Communication Centre, CON_B04430_F004_041, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Pre-Chorus

West panel – face of Sophia. Chapel in the Amphitheatre, Durres, Albania, CON_B00003_F001_023, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

P. Jodidio/Contemporary American Architects, published Taschen, Cologne, 1993: 20th century Japanese Architecture. CON_B04430_F004_015, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Art Tower, arch: Arata Isozaki, Japan: 20th Century Architecture, CON_B04430_F004_016, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Chorus

North west tower: north face. Resurrection group 58: N., Wells Cathedral, Somerset, CON_B00237_F001_043, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Tim Benton negative 20th Century Architecture, Vevey, Villa le Lac, CON_B04418_F002_031, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Birr Castle [colour interior: sitting room], CON_B01143_F005_038, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Literature: Emanuelle Lequeux, ‘Maisons: Une Nouvelle Adresse’, Beaux Arts, No.245, October 2004, pages 72-79. 21st century Architecture. CON_B04433_F001_009, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Le Corbusier, Paris, Studio Nungesser et Coli, CON_B04340_F001_016, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Verse 3

Overhead view of plaza and buildings Illustration: Robert A.M. Stern, Classicismo Attuale, Milan, 1990. 20th Century Architecture – Japan, CON_B04430_F004_042, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Tsukuba, Civic Centre, arch: Arata Isozaki, 1979-83, Illustration: Robert A.M. Stern, Classicismo Attuale, Milan, 1990, CON_B04430_F004_043, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Illus. Programme trimestriel – April – June 1999 – Louvre, Hyogo, Museum of Wood, CON_B04430_F004_010, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Alexandria, CON_B01218_F002_002, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Roman Basilica, Luxor, CON_B01218_F009_002, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Outro

Rome, Villa Madama: Exterior: Gardens, CON_B03184_F003_008, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Hotel Clinton, Miami, Beaux Arts No. 231, Aug. 2003., CON_B04433_F001_022, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Window, taken in 1972, Qasr Ibn Vardan, Syria, Church, CON_B03803_F007_017, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Literature: Emanuelle Lequeux, ‘Maisons: Une Nouvelle Adresse’, Beaux Arts, No.245, October 2004, pages 72-79. 21st century Architecture., Gratkorn, Austria, CON_B04433_F001_009, Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

 

Iris Campbell-Lange
Courtauld Connects Digitisation
Oxford University
Micro-Internship Participant

John Hurst: When Modernism and Fascism Collide – Tracing the Lives of Five Art Historians in Germany and Austria in the 1930s

Conway Photographers Photographic Library Digitisation Project Photographic Prints Prints Sculpture The Conway Library Volunteers No Comments

There are many different strands to the Digitisation Programme and I’ve been lucky to have researched and written a number of photographer’s biographies. Recently I came across a very interesting thread amongst a group of German/Austrian art historians and photographers linked by politics, persecution and war.

In the late 1920s and 30s the rise of the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nazis) brought about changes within German society that led to the persecution of many ethnic minorities and ultimately World War II.

Under the dictatorship of Adolf Hitler the term Entartete Kunst (Degenerate Art) was used to describe Modern Art – both German and international as it was viewed as being an insult to nationalistic German feelings. Anyone perceived as being responsible for the creation of such art and those who purchased and displayed it in museums and galleries across the nation were sanctioned and in many cases dismissed from their posts. These actions led to many so called ‘degenerate’ works of art being taken off display or placed in storage – some never to be seen again.

In September 1933 the Reichskulturkammer (Reichs Culture Chamber) was established under the control of Joseph Goebbels – Hitler’s Reichs Minister for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda. He decreed that only artists who were “racially pure”or supportive of the Party would be allowed to be involved in the cultural life of the ‘new” Germany. By 1935 the Reichs Culture Chamber had over 100,000 members.

Modern art styles were prohibited, with the Nazis promoting paintings and sculptures that were traditional in tone and which exhibited values of racial purity, militarism and obedience. These same restrictions were applied to films, plays and music – especially jazz which was seen to stem from black influences.

In 1937 Die Ausstellung “Entartete Kunst” (The Degenerate Art Exhibition) was organised by Hitler’s favourite artist  Adolf Ziegler a member of the Nazi Party since the 1920’s.

Besichtigung des Hauses der Deutschen Kunst durch Adolf Hitler. Daneben Frau Prof. Troost, Präsident der Akademie der Bildenden Künste Ziegler und Dr. Goebbels am 5.5.37. Hitler visits the House of German Art alongside Professor Troost, President of the Academy of Fine Arts. Ziegler is seen pictured wearing a bow tie and standing next to Goebbels. 5th May 1937. [Bundesarchiv, Bild, 183-1992-0410-546/CC-BY-Sa 3.0]
He became the foremost official painter of the Third Reich and had recently been appointed the President of the Prussian Academy of Arts.

Under the direction of Goebbels, Ziegler headed a five man commission that toured state collections in various German cities and seized over 5,200 art works deemed to be “degenerate”. The works were taken to Munich – the fervently pro-Nazi Bavarian capital to be installed at the Institute of Archaeology in the Hofgarten. This venue had been chosen especially for its rooms which were dark and narrow and provided the desired depressing atmosphere.

The Führer was the arbiter of what was considered “Modern” and on the eve of the exhibition opening, he had made a speech declaring “a merciless war” on cultural disintegration, describing the people who produced such art as “incompetents, madmen and cheats”

To further emphasise their distaste and disgust the organisers decided that many of the paintings were to be displayed without frames, hung at angles and partially covered or accompanied by derogatory slogans such as:

“An insult to German womanhood”

“Nature seen by sick minds”

“German farmers – a Yiddish view”

and as a reference to the museum and gallery directors loathed by the regime:

“Even museum bigwigs called this “the art of the German people”

The exhibition contained paintings, sculptures and prints by 112 primarily German artists and also works of art by Picasso, Chagall and Mondrian which had been confiscated by Ziegler and his cronies.

Some of the paintings had labels next to them detailing the amount of money a museum or gallery had spent to buy them. Prices were greatly exaggerated using costs based on the post WWI Weimar hyperinflation period where money had been devalued.  All of this was designed to promote the idea that “Modernism” was a conspiracy by people who hated German decency (without a hint of irony !) and that money would have been better spent providing citizens with food or essential services.

Die Ausstellung “Entartete Kunst” was timed to coincide with the “Grosse Deutsche Kunstausstellung” (Great German Art Exhibition) – a showcase of art by German artists approved by the Nazis. Over 2 million people had visited by the time it closed on 4th November 1937. By comparison “Grosse Deutsche Kunstausstellung” was viewed by half that number.

After Munich, it toured other cities such as Berlin, Leipzig, Düsseldorf,  Vienna and Salzburg where another 1 million people visited.

Children were denied entry to these exhibitions due to the perceived harmful and corruptive nature of the works of art.

After the exhibition had completed its tour of Germany and Austria, many of the paintings which had been seized were sold to foreign art dealers who were assured by the regime that the proceeds would be used to upgrade and replenish collections in Germany’s museums. This was not true and most of the money raised went to fund the massive increase of Germany’s armed forces and armaments. In 1939, the authorities burnt over 5,000 works of art that it could not sell.

Photographs contained in the Conway Library, and part of the Digitisation Programme are attributed to Drs Georg Swarenski, Alfred Scharf, Ernst Nathan, and Susanne Lang. They were all of Jewish faith or origin so at risk of dismissal from their jobs or worse.

Georg Swarzenski

Swarzenski had been appointed Director General of all the museums in the city of Frankfurt-am-Main in 1928 and was responsbile for purchasing works of art from many genres, some of which were seen as ‘degenerate’ when the Nazis came to power. In 1933 he was dismissed from his posts in public office but allowed to remain as a director of a private gallery. Five years later he was arrested by the Gestapo on the grounds that he had written an anti-authority article in a local newspaper.

He was set free without charge a short while later, but being Jewish, Swarzenski realised that he had become increasingly in danger and within a few weeks he and his family had emigrated to the U.S.A.  At the time of his death in 1957 he had been working as a Curator in the Medieval Arts department of Boston’s Fine Arts Museum.

Two black and white photographs mounted on card, depicting two angles of “The Martelli David”. Burlington Magazine, April 1959. Pope Hennessy “The Martelli David” (ex Casa Martelli Florence). Washington N.G. (Widener Coll) David, ascribed to Antonio Rossellino. CON_B05578_F002_005, The Conway Library, The Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC.

Alfred Scharf

Scharf was the son of the founder of the Goldring audio equipment company and studied art history and classical archaeology in Berlin before becoming a research assistant at the Kupferstichkabinett (Museum of Prints and Drawings) part of the Berlin State Museum. As a freelance writer of art history in the early 1930’s he had planned to write a dissertation on the Italian Renaissance painter Filipo Lippi at the University of Frankfurt, but his Jewish descent and the growing anti-Semitic attitudes in the country prevented him doing so. In May 1933, he emigrated to Britain where he worked as a freelance art expert.

He also lectured on 15th century Italian and 17th century Dutch/Flemish painting at the Courtauld and was a consultant at the Warburg Institute.

Due to his considerable reputation as an art historian, in 1940 the German authorities placed Scharf on Hitler’s Sonderfahndungsliste G.B. (Special Search List. Great Britain). In the event of a successful German occupation of Britain after the retreat of British forces from Dunkirk, he would be arrested and used as an advisor on which works of art and sculptures were worthy of looting and taking back to Germany to be added to the ever growing “collections” of Hermann Göring and other prominent Nazis. Scharf’s name was one of over 2,800 on the list.

He became a British citizen in 1946 and aspects of his life and work were featured in an episode of the BBC series “Fake or Fortune”.

Ernst Nathan

A black and white photograph of Ernest Nathan/Nash. Bildarchiv, “Ernest Nash”, Goethe Universität, Frankfurt-am-Main

Nathan was born in Potsdam Germany in 1898 to a Jewish family. He studied law and Roman history in Berlin and served in the German army during WWI, where he took up photography to relieve the boredom of being stationed on the Italian Front.

After the war he resumed his studies and by 1926 had set up his own legal practice in Berlin. In the mid 1930s, the rise of the Nazis started to make life difficult for Jews like Nathan and his membership of the Communist Party added to his problems. In 1936 he and his wife and children moved to Italy but by 1938 the rise of national socialism under Mussolini meant that they were unsafe in their adopted country so they moved again – this time to New York where he set up a photographic studio.

He decided to change his name to the less Germanic Ernest Nash and over the following years established a reputation as a portrait photographer taking pictures of amongst many others – jazz musician Benny Goodman and composer Benjamin Britten who had moved to the U.S.A. as a pacifist during WWII.

After the war, Ernest resumed his studies of Roman history and architecture, moved back to Italy and devoted his life to photographing and chronicling ancient Roman and Christian sites in Italy, North Africa and the Middle East. He died in Rome in 1974.

A black and white photograph mounted on card, depicting Michelangelo’s La Pietà. La Pietà. Michelangelo, Rome, St. Peters, 15th Century Italian Sculpture, CON_B05530_F001_015. The Courtauld Library, The Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-CC.

A black and white photograph mounted on card, depicting La Pietà, more specifically a detail of Jesus’ face. La Pietà Michelangelo Rome, St. Peters, 15th Century Italian Sculpture, CON_B05530_F001_035. The Courtauld Library, The Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-CC.

Susanne Lang

Lang was born in Vienna in 1907 and studied art history and ethnology at the Kunsthistorisches Institut. She graduated in 1931 and published her dissertation titled: “ Voraussetzungen und Entwicklung des Mittelalterlichen Städtebaus in Deutschland” (Determinants and Development of Medieval Urban Planning in Germany).

A black and white photograph mounted on card, depicting a stone sphinx. A. Neuturi. Sphinx signed and dated Fra. Pasquale 1286 (from S.M. del Grado) Museo Civico CON_B05180_004_004. The Conway Library, The Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

Lang was Jewish by birth and after the 1938 Anschluss when Nazi Germany annexed Austria she suffered persecution and exclusion because of her religion. She emigrated to England and formed a professional relationship with German art historian Nikolaus Pevsner. Although he had also been born Jewish, he had converted to Lutheranism at a young age, but had been forced to flee Germany due to the Nazi race laws.

They worked together on many books and during her time in London Susanne Lang worked closely with art historians and fellow academics at the Courtauld and Warburg Institutes. She retired to live in Israel and died in 1995.

So, four people whose photographs ended up in the Conway Library and whose lives were affected and changed forever by political upheaval beyond their control. There is however a twist in this story relating to another Dr whose photographs are also in the Conway Library.

Dr. Moritz Julius Binder

Binder was born in Stuttgart in 1877. He studied music at the Vienna Conservatory and then art history in Berlin.

In 1912 he became an employee of the Berlin Arsenal a Baroque style building erected in the early 18th century and which served as an armoury for the Brandenburg-Prussian Army and later as a museum.

A black and white photograph mounted on card, depicting a wooden sculpture of the Madonna and Child. Tafel II MITTLERHEINISCHER-MEISTER. ENDE DES XIV JAHRHUNDERTS. MADONNA MIT KIND Lindenholz, hoch 99cm. Besitzer: Dr M.J. Binder – Berlin. from the Church near Ostein in the Taunus. MJ Binder coll, Berlin CON_B05284_F002_001 The Conway Library, The Courtauld Institute of Art, CC-BY-NC

He was appointed as the Director in 1913 – a post he held for twenty years until he was dismissed under the new Nazi law aimed at ‘restoring professional civil service’ It was essentially a means of getting rid of people of Jewish or other ethic origins or those whose political views and actions were at odds with those of the National Socialists. There is no evidence that Binder was Jewish but his museum policies were criticised by far right circles, most likely due his buying and displaying what was viewed as ‘Degenerate Art”.

Reichsmarshall Hermann Göring was one of the most powerful members of Hitler’s regime and the man who instigated the policy of eliminating Jews from German economic and social life. He was also an avid ‘amateur’ art collector who became a professional looter of art from countries invaded and conquered by the Nazis before and during WWII.

During his time as a museum director, Binder had become a close friend of influential German publisher Dr Helmut Küpper and his wife, the Russian artist Paraskewe “Baika” Bereskine. “Baika” had painted the portraits of Hermann Göring’s first wife Carin who died in 1934 and his second wife Emmy and had become a favourite of the Reichsmarschall whose patronage was very useful to her.

By coincidence, Binder advised a Berlin art dealer who sold paintings to Göring. It was through this dealer Johannes Hinrichen and “Baika” Bereskine that Binder was introduced to Göring around 1935 and he is thought to have acted as a Consultant on which pieces of art were worth buying or stealing from the properties of people who had fled Germany or suffered worse fates at the hands of the regime.

In 1938 he was dismissed by Göring following disagreements about the authenticity of certain works of art and replaced by Walter Andrea Hofer. who became Director of Göring’s art collections. Hofer did not have the breadth of knowledge that his predecessor had so he often asked him for advice on what to buy or “steal”. During the war Mauritz Binder left Berlin to avoid Allied bombing raids and moved to live in the countryside. He died in January 1947.

Swarenski, Scharf, Nathan and Lang may or may not have known each other but they are all linked by their religious and cultural beliefs which brought persecution and danger to their lives. Binder on the other hand, either through choice or as an act of self preservation actively assisted the main perpetrators of their persecution by identifying works of art, some of which would have been in the private collections of Jews or Communist sympathisers which were then ‘stolen’. Most of these artworks were either not recovered or returned to their owners or families so Binder and others bore a great deal of responsibility.

Five individuals connected by chance and coincidence and thanks to the Digitisation Programme we are able to preserve some (at least) of their work and legacy where it was once at risk of being erased.

John Hurst

Digitisation Volunteer,  July 2023