Perceiving Heritage. Orange Paintings in Anhalt-Dessau

• Applicants: Dr. Anette Froesch; Professorin Dr. Caecilie Weissert
• Subject Area: Art History
• Term: since 2025
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 561954330

The UNESCO World Heritage Site Gartenreich Dessau-Wörlitz has preserved a top-class collection of Flemish and Dutch paintings by Anthonis van Dyck, Peter Paul Rubens and Jan Brueghel the Elder, among others. According to historical sources, the paintings came from the high-quality collection of Amalie von Solms (1602–1675), the widow of the Dutch stadtholder Friedrich Heinrich von Oranien (1584–1647). After her death, the paintings came into the possession of the Principality of Anhalt-Dessau and later the Ducal House of Anhalt through various, sometimes complicated inheritance processes and sales. They are in the holdings of the Kulturstiftung Dessau-Wörlitz, but some of them are also in the Anhaltische Gemäldegalerie Dessau. It is of great rarity that intact historical presentation constellations of the 18th century for paintings containing heirlooms of Amalie von Solms have survived to this day in three museum palaces – in Schoss Mosigkau, in Schloss Wörlitz and in the Gothic House. This unusual constellation of heritage on the one hand and preserved historical presentation contexts on the other forms a unique starting point: here, the transregional and identity-creating handling of cultural heritage at smaller princely courts can be examined and evaluated in an exemplary manner. A description of the history of development of historical presentation practices and their analysis will yield valuable insights into the handling of valuable heritage. This also applies to the effect on the viewer. The project presupposes a comprehensive art-technological inventory as well as a fundamental art-scientific treatment. The main task is to identify which works can actually still be attributed to the Dutch heritage today (provenance indexing). So far, such a classification has only been possible for about 40 of the probably 100 works of this provenance that still exist. The material-technical, historical and empirical investigation creates innovative impulses for provenance, residency and museum research and makes the 17th and 18th century painting holdings in the UNESCO World Heritage Site Gartenreich Dessau-Wörlitz accessible for future research to an extent that was previously impossible. The project is inter-institutional (Christian Abrechts University of Kiel, Kulturstiftung Dessau-Wörlitz, Anhaltische Gemäldegalerie Dessau) and interdisciplinary (art history, restoration, museology).

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Co-Investigator: Dr. Jana Kittelmann