Museum

ART OF THE MIDDLE AGES
MUSEUM SCHNÜTGEN

Museum Schnütgen is a place where you can experience art from the early Middle Ages to the end of the Baroque period in the unique ambiance of a medieval ecclesiastical building. It holds a thousand years of masterpieces of international rank. Among them there are works of church treasure art in bronze, silver, gold and ivory, works of art in wood, stone sculptures and architectural sculpture, one of the largest museum collections of textiles worldwide and one of the largest collections of glass painting in Germany. With a large number of top quality objects in all of these fields the Museum Schnütgen is among the ten most important museums of medieval art in Europe.

Alexander Schnütgen, the founder of this museum assembled a huge collection of works of art from roughly 1870 onwards. Schnütgen’s treasures and the exhibitions he organised between 1876 and 1904 laid the foundation for a new understanding of the world of the Middle Ages and approaches to research. Since he gave his collections to the City of Cologne in 1906, the museum has become one of the most important centres of research and venues for exhibiting medieval art in Europe.

In the sixties the Kunsthalle as the “Window of the Cologne Museums” and the Kölnischer Kunstverein were established in the immediate vicinity. By around 2008 a new complex will be built to replace them which will be linked architecturally with the Museum Schnütgen. It is intended that in addition to an extension of the Museum Schnütgen it will also house the Rautenstrauch-Joest Museum, the exhibition area of the Kunsthalle, the Museumsdienst (museum service) and premises of the adult education centre. The Museum Schnütgen in St Cäcilien will be the historic focal point of this new neighbourhood.
 

Collection

The Collection of Museum Schnütgen

The marble bust of Alexander Schnütgen by Ferdinand Seeboeck, 1910/11


From the collection of wood and stone sculptures.



From the collection of glass painting

Museum Schnütgen is continuously and systematically expanding the great foundations laid by Alexander Schnütgen by the many donations and targetted acquisitions by “Pro Arte Medii Aevi”, the society of friends of Museum Schnütgen, and also with the help of public and private sponsors. The collection now contains masterpieces of international rank from more than a thousand years.
 
Among them are roughly 2000 works of church treasure art in bronze, silver, gold and ivory and roughly 1100 works of art in wood and roughly five hundred Romanesque and Gothic stone sculptures. The textile collection with more than 250 liturgical robes and 3,500 materials from late antiquity until the 20th century and the collection of glass painting are among the largest of their kind worldwide.
 
With this abundance of first-rate works of art in every field Museum Schnütgen is among the 10 most important museums of early art in Europe.
 
At present the collection includes 13,000 works of art of which up to now only a good10% could be displayed – a situation which will improve markedly with the planned new building.

From the textile collection

From the metalwork arts

From the collection of works in ivory
Crucifix of St George, Cologne, around 1067 Tympanonrelief von St. Cäcilien, um 1160 St. Jerome, Lower Rhine, around 1460-1470, lime wood, H 160 cm Aachen Madonna, Cologne around 1230, oak, H 102 cm. Tobias hauls the fish from the water St Margaret, Freiburg, 1528, glass painting 147 x 53 cm Scene from the Altenberg cloister cycle Two boys blowing soap bubbles, Cologne around 1530, glass painting, 82 x 58 cm Fragment of a chasuble staff with the Virgin, St. Peter and St. Ursula, Cologne, around 1500, linen with gold and silver embroidery, 108 x 13.5 cm Chasuble of the silver vestments from Altenberg cathedral, Rhineland early 18th century, silver and silk embroidery, 140 x 300 cm Wall-covering with the adoration of the Magi, Erfurt, around 1470 Chasuble of St Anno, Byzantium, around 1000, Cologne braid 15th century, silk, braid: silk and cotton, 146 x 112 cm Birth of Christ, Cologne, around 1160/70, walrus tusk, relief panel, 15 x 11 cm Maria Immaculata, Ehrgott Bernhard Bendl, beginning of 18th century, ivory, H 19.4 cm Harrach Diptych, Aachen around 810, ivory, 32 x 21 cm Memento Mori (Tödlein), Western Switzerland around 1520, ivory and wood, 12 x 42 x 15 cm Comb of St Heribert, Metz, 2nd half of 9th century, ivory, 19 x 12 cm Casket of relics with the martyrdom of St Thomas à Becket, Limoges, 1st half of the 13th century, enamel, 20 x 19 x 8.4 cm Lion’s head as a door knob, 2nd half of 12th century, bronze, diameter 23.6 cm Romanesque cross with an engraved ornament ( St. Modualdus cross) Ecce Homo, around 1500 Chalice,Rhineland, around 1300, silver, gilded, H 15.7cm St Catherine, Cologne, around 1380, silver, partly gilded, H. 9.3 cm
Realisation: Redaktionsbüro Dank
 

Address

Museum Schnütgen
Cäcilienstraße 29, D-50667 Cologne, Tel.: +49/221/221-23620, Fax +49/221/221-28489
E-mail: schnuetgen@ museenkoeln.de

Public transport
Bus/underground/tram: 1, 3, 4, 7, 9, 12, 14, 16, 18 Neumarkt

Parking
Parkhaus Dyckhoff, Cäcilienstraße
Underground car park Leonhard-Tietz-Straße

Service:

Open Tuesday to Friday 10 a.m. – 5 p.m., Saturdays and Sudays 11 a.m. – 5 p.m.

Admission
€ 3,20 / reduced € 1,90

Team

Team

Prof. Dr. Hiltrud Westermann-Angerhausen, director
(church treasure art, sculpture and textiles of the Middle Ages)

Dr. Dagmar Täube,
deputy director
(Glass painting 15th -18th centuries, panel painting 14th -15th century)

Dr. Manuela Beer, curator
(wood sculpture to 1400, ivory)

Dr Carola Hagnau, curator
(Glass painting to 1400, verre églomisé painting, panel painting 14th – 15th century)

Ralf Hofenbitzer, head of administration

Nora Kreutz, secretary

Anke Müller, sculpture restorer

Anja Lienemann, textile restorer

Hendrik Strelow, metal restorer

Copyright

Pictures and text are protected by
Copyright.
Unless otherwise stated:
© Rheinisches Bildarchiv und Museum Schnütgen, Cologne