Max Liebermann House, Berlin, Germany

The foundation Stiftung Brandenburger Tor was founded in December 1997. The foundation is located in the Max Liebermann Haus at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, the symbol of freedom and tolerance and of the unity of Germany and Berlin, which gives the foundation its name. As the cultural foundation of the Berliner Sparkasse, Stiftung Brandenburger Tor sees its particular responsibility in emphasizing and strengthening the importance of culture for our civil society. Its work is dedicated to aesthetic education, organizing exhibitions and initiating cultural debates, conferences and projects.

The Brandenburger Tor Foundation is the cultural foundation of Berliner Sparkasse and has its headquarters in the rebuilt house of Max Liebermann on Pariser Platz next to the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin.

Activity
Founded in 1997 by Bankgesellschaft Berlin, the Brandenburger Tor Foundation has had its headquarters in the Max Liebermann Haus am Brandenburger Tor since 2000. As a cultural foundation of the Berliner Sparkasse, it is dedicated to Aesthetic Education, organizes exhibitions in-house and initiates cultural debates as well as conferences, projects and educational programs. The program focuses of the foundation are

Exhibitions and literature
Aesthetic education
Cultural debates of the city of Berlin and Germany
Art market and cultural policy

Organization
The organs of the foundation are the board of trustees and the board of directors. He will be assisted by an advisory board in the fulfillment of his operational work in the funding areas. The Management Board, consisting of Kai Uwe Peter, Bianca Richardt, both of Berliner Sparkasse, and Peter-Klaus Schuster, is responsible for the management and representation externally. He is responsible for the fulfillment of the articles of association through operational work and promotion. The Board of Trustees oversees the management of the Board of Directors and Asset Management. Since 2015, the Chairman of the Board of Trustees has been Jürgen Mlynek, former President of the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centers When selecting and designing projects, the board is advised by an advisory board.

The foundation’s educational and discourse programs are implemented by three divisional heads.

Former speaker of the board was Monika Grütters from 1997 until the end of 2013, together with Pascal Decker as a simple board member. Pascal Decker was then from 2014 until his resignation on May 31, 2018 Executive Board of the Foundation. The former German President Roman Herzog was from 1999 to 2015 Chairman of the Board.

Max Liebermann House
In 1844 the house was built by the Schinkel student August Stüler. With its functional architecture, the three-storey house was clear and sober. At the request of the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm IV., It was ensured that the house did not tower above the Brandenburg Gate. For reasons of symmetry, the Brandenburg Gate received an architectural counterpart from the same architect on the other side.

In 1857, Max Liebermann’s father bought the house on Pariser Platz No. 7, or as Max Liebermann himself liked to say: ” Come on, Berlin!”, In 1892 he moved to the second floor of the house with his wife Martha and daughter Kathe. His neighbors included Prussian landlords, old and new nobility, industrialists and the French Embassy. The German-Jewish painter and most important representative of the German impressionism lived not only in the house at the Pariser Platz, but also worked there, on the roof he had his legendary studio, by the architect Hans Grisebach, after a long trial against the emperorWilhelm II, build. In 1933, after the seizure of power by the National Socialists, Max Liebermann was banned from work, after which he resigned from the Prussian Academy of Arts, of which he was president until then. In 1935 he died in his house at the Brandenburg Gate. Martha Liebermann was expelled from her home in 1936 after the Nazis imposed the so-called Jewish ban on her.

In the winter of 1942/1943 she suffered a stroke. After receiving the invitation to be deported to Theresienstadt on March 5, 1943, she took an overdose of sleeping pills and died on March 10, 1943. A stumbling block by artist Gunter Demnig in front of the entrance reminds her.

In 1943 the house fell victim to a bombing raid. The today’s Max Liebermann house was rebuilt after the fall of the wall and the regained unity of Germany in the sense of a “critical reconstruction” by Josef Paul Kleihues on the basis of the historical model. The interior designer Margit Flaitz was responsible for the interior design.

Today the house belongs to the family Harald Quandt from Bad Homburg.

Projects

Current Projects
Scorekeeper at Pariser Platz
ART. TALKING BUSINESS.
Art trade in Berlin
Kultursalon
Hauptstadtkulturfonds conversation
Max – Artists in Residence at Elementary Schools (The Max – Artists in Residence program at elementary schools won the 1st prize in the ” Kinder zum Olymp” competition, an educational initiative of the Kulturstiftung der Länder, on July 10, 2018. Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier won the award awarded.)
Resident of the Pariser Platz
Art and Games
Arnhem Lecture
Aesthetic education
Berlin Foundation Week
World Poetry Day
in the studio Liebermann

Past Projects
Literary tandem
Bridges in the neighborhood
Schools take responsibility
Instead of school – learn in life
Youth takes responsibility

Cooperations

Current Cooperations
Allianz Cultural Foundation
Robert Bosch Foundation
German Culture Council
University of Art in Berlin
VBKI: Association of Berlin merchants and industrial gGmbH
Mercedes Benz Berlin
Society of Friends of the Academy of Arts
Cultural Political Society eV

Past cooperation
Literaturport
Fairyland eV
Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences
German Children and Youth Foundation
Schering Foundation