Historismus

Historismus » collections

I'm a 40+ year collector of Historismus glass (historical revival), predominately Heckert, and Bauernglas or Volksglas (peasant glass). I've been cataloging Heckert'I'm a 40+ year collector of Historismus glass (historical revival), predominately Heckert, and Bauernglas or Volksglas (peasant glass). I've been cataloging Heckert's 'i altdeutschem Stil' (Historismus) glass as long as I've been collecting. I should add that my expertise is in German/Austrian/Bohemian enameled glass. Having lost a huge collection in an earthquake, I started adding pieces to what survived of my collection. Having also lost a substantial antique beer stein collection, most of the miniatures in the collection survived and has been substantially added to. Consisting mainly of salesman samples, this collection is now one of the largest of its kind in existence. I also collect books on German, Austrian, and Bohemian glass. I've assembled quite a substantial glass and beer stein reference library (predominately in German) over the years that includes some very rare books, such as Ludwig Lobmeyr's 1874 published 'Die Glasindustrie', and Helmut Ricke, et al's 'Lötz. Bömisches Glas. 1880 bis 1940'. I am a student of German heraldry (as well as calligraphy and genealogy) which accounts for my love of Historismus glass. The term "Bohemian Glass" is a misnomer. How so? Something that the authors of English language books on the subject consistently neglect to tell the reader is, the western half of Bohemia (now the Czech Republic) was known as the German half since approx. 38% of the population were ethnic Germans. When one considers the names of the names of the glass masters and their glass works, they are overwhelmingly Germanic: Beckert, Egermann, Meyr (just one of the many variations of Meyer), Hoffmann, König, Lenhardt, Moser, Mühlhaus, Oertel, Palme, Pfohl, Pohl, Preißler, Riedel, Rößler, Schreiber, Steigerwald, etc. How did these authors get this so wrong? None of those authors are from Germany, or understand the German language/history/culture, and unwittingly bought into the propaganda fed to them by the Czechs. Glass works such as Fritz Heckert and Josephinenhütte, contrary to what English language authors lead one to believe, were never located in Bohemia. These same people use the excuse that “borders were constantly changing”. Nonsense. I defy anyone to present me with a map showing that either of these two glassworks were ever located in Bohemia. Did I happen to mention that, amongst everything else, I also collect maps of central Europe? As a 40+ year genealogist specializing in German genealogy, and my maternal line stemming from an area very near Petersdorf and Schreiberhau (located in Silesia, Prussia, and later, in the German Empire), and having traced the family back to the late 17th C., I have genealogically proven that they were at no time located in Bohemia. Of my library of almost 3,500 titles on glass and ceramics, 99.9% of those are in the German language. In the words of an unnamed author whose name unfortunately escapes me, I couldn’t have put the following better (translated from the German original): “Scattered across many countries, the production of glass in Central Europe has one thing in common. It arose exclusively from German craftsmanship, German cultural work and the joy of creation and felt purely German artistically. In Bohemia, for example, the Czech parts of the country were not involved in glass production in any way; all glassworks founders and owners were Germans, all enamel painters, yes, even in the 19th century all engravers, ballers and other glass artists; just as in general Bohemia has not only all art but also all industry and its highly developed trade to thank German spirit and German strength. This is confirmed by the available literature on the history of industry in Bohemia up to 1850, which includes 2275 works and treatises in German, while hardly any publication in Czech is significant. When visiting the Prague Museum of Applied Arts or the former Adalbert Lanna Collection, one thought one was dealing with good German collections.” All of this having been said, such glass should rightly be referred to as German glass and not Bohemian glass. (Read more)