How Prinzregentstraße was intended to look, with the Bavarian Prime Minister's residence in the background and the phallic Haus der Kunst currently covered with its 'pubic hair' on both sides in an attempt by the city to somehow hide the building completely. For Hitler, whose private residence was located on the second floor of Prinzregentenplatz 16, Prinzregentenstraße met his expectations of a boulevard that always was an expression of power and political importance for him. In this respect, he provided the impetus towards its redevelopment. First, the House of German Art was built from 1933-1937 at the northern end of the street. The building with its endless portico, described by art historians as being much too wide, sealed off the English Garden and thus interrupted the smooth transition of garden courtyard and the city. Furthermore, several town houses were destroyed, such as those next to the Bavarian National Museum. In 1937 the Luftgaukommando, now serving as the offices of the Bavarian Ministry of Economic Affairs, Infrastructure, Transport and Technology since the 1950s, was inaugurated. In this way Prinzregentenstraße lost its lightness and for severity which still dominates.
Between Wilhelm-Tell-straße and Brucknerstraße residential blocks, which were conceived as Versuchsbauten for an unrealised Südstadt, were built between 1941-1943 and flanked at both ends by square air-raid shelters, which form part of the building block. Südstadt was to have been extended as a model Nazi estate with around 14,500 residential units which would have been provided from the outset with high bunkers, either as found at the Versuchsbauten, or in the middle of the building with direct access from the apartments. The Versuchsbauten are today virtually unchanged, one of the two seven-story bunkers now containing an art exhibition centre since 1993 featuring national and international individual pieces and group exhibitions.
House of German Art (Haus der Deutschen Kunst)
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Golden model presented by Hermann Göring to Hitler on the latter's fiftieth birthday.
Internationally
the building was highly appreciated during the construction period. At
the world exhibition Paris 1937, a model of the House of German Art was a
central exhibition of the German House. Gerdy Troost received the Grand
Prize of the Architecture Jury. The fact that Christoph Vitali,
director of the Haus der Kunst, described the building as an example of "wonderful
museum architecture" and praised the architectural
quality of the exhibition rooms, the beauty and balance of proportions
and spatial sequence, and the lighting which further contributes to the quality of the
monumental spaces. On the other hand, architecture historian Winfried Nerdinger argued that this ignores the ideological and systematic framework of Nazi construction. Vitali justified his statement in retrospect with the fact that the walls are
not to blame. It was the fault of those who had been responsible for the
work from 1937 to 1944.
The House of German Art was described by Hitler as "the first beautiful building of the new Reich" and "a temple for genuine and eternal German art." In designing the structure in 1933, Hitler already revealed his plan for eventual war by providing for an air raid shelter in the basement. Irreverent locals nicknamed the building "the Athens railway station" and "a sausage stand."Spotts (170) Hitler and the Power of Aesthetics
During construction of the building. The double-axis symmetrical building is in the style of a reduced neoclassicism, 175 metres long and 50 metres wide, based on a continuous grid constructed of steel beams clad with stone slabs so that the building looks like a stone building. The main entrance is in the middle of the south façade, further entrances lead from the middle of the north side to the north gallery and the narrow sides into the side wings. A 21-axle portico of colossal, non-desalted columns, occupying the entire building height, is enclosed in each of the longitudinal sides, each of which is terminated by corner pillars. The portico on the southern side of Prinzregentenstraße was originally a full-width staircase, which was reduced in the course of road reconstruction in 1971. In the rear of the building the ground floor is accessible on the ground floor due to a drop in the terrain. There, a staircase leads to the level of the ground floor. The two vestibules and the stairs provide a total depth of 75 metres. The base area is covered with Nagelfluh, the exterior façades with limestone from the Donautal near Kelheim. The stairs and outer floor surfaces are made of granite. 
Hitler viewing the progress on the construction of the House of German Art with architects Professor Gall and Albert Speer. After Hitler became Reichskanzler in January 1933, he gave the order for a new planning personally to Paul Ludwig Troost, who had already converted the Braunschweig Nazi head office for Hitler. The site in the old botanical garden was not sufficient for Hitler's monumental plans. He ordered the new entrance to the southern entrance to the English Garden. Originally, Hitler wanted to build a "Parteiforum" there, which would consist of the House of German Art, a Museum of Contemporary History, and a House of the Party-Statthalter, arranged around a representative square. Troost rejected these plans because their space requirements would interfere too strongly with the English Garden. At this early stage of his career, Hitler was still able to convince himself of professional arguments and limited the project to the House of German Art at this point.
The plaque engraved on bronze over the entrance reading "Die Kunst ist eine erhabene und zum Fanatismus Verpflichtende Mission" (Art is an Ennobling Mission Demanding Fanaticism). In Nazi cultural policy, the building was designed as the decisive exhibition building of the German Reich. The Kunsthalle, planned from 1936 onwards, should not be in competition with the House of German Art. This should also restore the role of Munich as the leading art city in Germany, which was the capital of German art for the Munich capital. The planning was expanded to a new design of the environment. Prinzregentenstraße, which was originally built under "picturesque aspects", was demolished, and the development on the south side of Von-der-Thann-Strasse at the financial centre was demolished. On the north side the Jugendstil façade of the Elvira studio had to be simplified. The Von-der-Thann-Straße was also widened and expanded.
For funding, Nazi Party Gauleiter Adolf Wagner organised an initiative of Bavarian and German industrialists with the invitation to give Hitler the building. He was able to submit his first pledges to Hitler on April 20, 1933 on his birthday. As the bearer of the house, an institution of public law was founded. The constituent meeting took place in June 1933. The statutes of the Anstalthaus der Deutschen Kunst were formally adopted on July 14, 1933.
The plaque engraved on bronze over the entrance reading "Die Kunst ist eine erhabene und zum Fanatismus Verpflichtende Mission" (Art is an Ennobling Mission Demanding Fanaticism). In Nazi cultural policy, the building was designed as the decisive exhibition building of the German Reich. The Kunsthalle, planned from 1936 onwards, should not be in competition with the House of German Art. This should also restore the role of Munich as the leading art city in Germany, which was the capital of German art for the Munich capital. The planning was expanded to a new design of the environment. Prinzregentenstraße, which was originally built under "picturesque aspects", was demolished, and the development on the south side of Von-der-Thann-Strasse at the financial centre was demolished. On the north side the Jugendstil façade of the Elvira studio had to be simplified. The Von-der-Thann-Straße was also widened and expanded.For funding, Nazi Party Gauleiter Adolf Wagner organised an initiative of Bavarian and German industrialists with the invitation to give Hitler the building. He was able to submit his first pledges to Hitler on April 20, 1933 on his birthday. As the bearer of the house, an institution of public law was founded. The constituent meeting took place in June 1933. The statutes of the Anstalthaus der Deutschen Kunst were formally adopted on July 14, 1933.
Hitler at the official cornerstone laying October 15, 1933. After Troost died in 1934, the construction was continued by his co-worker Leonhard Gall with the widow Gerdy Troost.
Numerous activities were scheduled for that day, such as a procession through town depicting “2,000 years of German culture.” In the presence of the Führer, a performance of Tristan und Isolde in the Munich National Theatre opened the festivities. The dedication of the Haus der Deutschen Kunst in the Prinzregentenstrasse took place on July 19. Hitler had laid the cornerstone there in 1933. The new building was to serve as a replacement for the old “Glass Palace,” that had been an art gallery located at the old Botanical Garden. In former times, art collections had been exhibited in the building until it had been completely destroyed by a fire in 1931. The opening of an art exhibition complemented the dedication of the new building.
The Essential Hitler (489)
Hitler formally opened the ”House of German Art” in Munich in a drab, pseudoclassic building which he had helped design and which he described as ”unparalleled and inimitable” in its architecture. In this first exhibition of Nazi art were crammed some nine hundred works, selected from fifteen thousand submitted, of the worst junk this writer has ever seen in any country. Hitler himself made the final selection and, according to some of the party comrades who were with him at the time, had become so incensed at some of the paintings accepted by the Nazi jury presided over by Adolf Ziegler, a mediocre painter who was president of the Reich Chamber of Art, that he had not only ordered them thrown out but had kicked holes with his jack boot through several of them. ”I was always determined,” he said in a long speech inaugurating the exhibition, ”if fate ever gave us power, not to discuss these matters [of artistic judgement] but to make decisions.” And he had made them. In his speech – it was delivered on July 18, 1937 – he laid down the Nazi line for ”German art”:
Works of art that cannot be understood but need a swollen set of instructions to prove their right to exist and find their way to neurotics who are receptive to such stupid or insolent nonsense will no longer openly reach the German nation. Let no one have illusions! National Socialism has set out to purge the German Reich and our people of all those influences threatening its existence and character . . . With the opening of this exhibition has come the end of artistic lunacy and with it the artistic pollution of our people . . .
Shirer (216) Rise And Fall Of The Third Reich
Hitler speaking at the opening of the third "Great German Art Exhibition" July 16, 1939 in the Ehrenhalle. From 1937 until 1944, the hall was used
exclusively for opening exhibitions and holding press conferences, and every
year the Nazis would meet here for the Grosse Deutsche Kunstausstellung. It was Hitler who had determined that the plinths and the wall and pillar
covering of the three-nave sky-lit hall should be clad in blood-red marble from Tegernsee. The omnipresence of the colour red, so
prominent on the Nazi flag, served to reinforce the
ubiquity of the National Socialist world view. The monumental exhibition hall is not a specific, Nazi style, but Troost simplified the formative language of neoclassicism from its pre-war period before the Great War, reduced details and enlarged them into a monumental one. According to his own account, in contrast to "modern practicality," Troost wanted to build a "building sensed from the soul of the people," "noble proportions and solid material" should give the construction "the character of a temple of art." Troost and Hitler repeatedly claimed to create a "temple" or "sanctuary" of art. The architectural elements portico and colonnade were therefore borrowed from ancient architecture, but they remain backdrops. The excessive emphasis on the horizontal is counterbalanced against contrasting verticals, contrary to classical or classical architecture, but remains unilateral. Therefore, an "intrusive, overwhelming character" of the structure remains. The Dehio Handbook describes the effect: "In its formal hardness, unadorned monumentality, the solidity of craftsmanship and materiality, the uniform arrangement of members of the body and its importance in political life," the Haus der Kunst "is a programmatic example of the self-representation of the Hitler regime Of architecture."
Inside the "Hall of Honour", the central hall joining the entrance to the centre and leading to the Nordgalerie. The swastika motif around the skylight has been altered. To the left and right of each side are large stretched exhibition halls, surrounded by a succession of smaller rooms. These surfaces, which make up the central component, reach the full building height. On the south side are the administrative rooms, in the north the former restaurant, today Nordgalerie. Only these parts of the building are two-stories, each with exhibition rooms upstairs. The halls in full height and the exhibition rooms on the upper floor were illuminated by skylights. The total exhibition area is 5,040 m². The exhibition rooms on the ground floor can be divided or assigned as desired, so that several exhibitions can take place at the same time. The building had from the beginning of several elevators, a complex heating and air conditioning and an air-raid shelter, which has been used since 2011 for exhibitions. 
Inside, the floors are covered with Solnhofen slaked lime whilst the door sills and baseboards are made of Jura marble. In the hall of honor are floors, staircases and coverings from a red marble from Saalburg marble and the doors and baseboards from Tegernseer marble. In the eastern end of the northern gallery lies the Golden Bar in the former artist festival room. The wall paintings by Karl Heinz Dallinger were left uncovered until 2004. On gold leaf background, they show maps and partly exotic motifs on the origin of alcoholic beverages and luxury foods. In the basement of the west wing, Club P1 uses the former Bierstüberl. This central hall, originally designated as an "honorary hall", adjoins centrally to the entrance and leads through to the north gallery. To the left and right of each are a large, stretched exhibition hall surrounded by a series of smaller rooms. These surfaces, which make up the central component, reach the full height of the building. On the south side lie the administrative areas, in the north the former restaurant, today Nordgalerie. Only these parts of the building are two-storey, with exhibition rooms on the upper floor. From the beginning, the building had several elevators, a complex heating and air-conditioning system, and an air-raid shelter which has been used for exhibitions since 2011.
Leaning against a wall displaying the history of the building inside is the dedication to the gallery's original sponsors which used to feature much more prominently. The eighteen founders were, according to this memorial plaque:
Hermann Schmitz (IG Farben), August von Finck (Merck, Fink & Co.),
Robert Bosch (Boschwerke), Friedrich Flick (Mitteldeutsche Stahlwerke),
Adolf Haeuser (IG Farben) , August Diehn (Deutsche Kalisyndikat),
Theodor Feise (Kaliwerke Friedrichshall), Fritz Rechberg (family group
of the Textilbranche and many supervisory boards, eg Commerzbank), Jacob
Hasslacher (Vereinigte Stahlwerke), Paul Müller (Dynamit Nobel AG),
Gustav Krupp von Bohlen and Halbach Kruppwerke), Wilhelm von Opel (Adam
Opel AG), Ludwig Roselius (Kaffeehandels Aktiengesellschaft), August
Rosterg (Wintershall AG), Willy Sachs (Fichtel & Sachs), Karl
Friedrich von Siemens (Siemens AG), Ludwig Schuon (BASF) Philipp
Reemtsma (Reemtsma). They brought together three of the original
five million Reichsmark, another 400,000 marks the city of Munich.
The construction industry and the Reichsbahn. A large number of
small and medium-sized donations of money and money increased the total
sum of the funds raised by supporters to just over 10 million. As
construction costs finally rose to 12 million marks, donations were not
enough. Therefore, an interest-free loan from the Deutsche Gesellschaft
für Öffentliche Öffentliche was collected, despite the fact that its
conditions were not met.
Hitler descending from the rear of the building
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Hitler arriving at the start of Große Deutsche Kunstausstellung. The
systematic organisation of exhibitions under the Nazis required meticulous planning.
The Haus’s staff, numbering 120 by 1938, included curators like Karl
Kolb, who enforced ideological conformity. Artists submitted works
through a jury process, with 12,000 applications in 1939, only 1,100
accepted. The rejection rate, peaking at 70% in 1940, reflected the
regime’s control, with banned artists like Otto Mueller facing
professional ruin. The Haus’s budget, 2 million Reichsmarks annually,
covered logistics, with 500,000 Reichsmarks allocated for acquisitions
in 1941. Exhibitions were staged with theatrical precision, using
spotlights and velvet drapes to elevate approved art. The Große Deutsche Kunstausstellung, inaugurated on July 18, 1937, showcased 590 works by 300 artists, selected by a panel including Heinrich Hoffmann and Adolf Ziegler. The exhibition, part of a three-day festival, featured a parade with 6,000 participants and 50 floats, celebrating Germanic heritage from Arminius to the Third Reich. Sculptures by Arno Breker, such as "Der Rächer," unveiled on July 18, 1937, depicted idealised Aryan figures with exaggerated musculature, while paintings by Adolf Wissel, including "Die Ernte" from July 1938, glorified rural life with meticulous realism. Attendance reached 600,000 by November 30, 1937, but only 120 works sold, generating 400,000 Reichsmarks, prompting Hitler to acquire 200 pieces for state collections. The event’s propaganda was intensified by its juxtaposition with the Entartete Kunst exhibition, opened on July 19, 1937, in the Hofgarten, displaying 650 confiscated modernist works. Artists like Max Beckmann, with seventy works, and Emil Nolde, with 1,052, were derided, their art labelled as “cultural Bolshevik” or “racially alien.” Over two million visitors attended by November 1937, drawn by the chaotic display and derogatory captions like “insult to German womanhood.”
Annual exhibitions from 1938 to 1944 reinforced Nazi cultural narratives, with each event tightly controlled by the Reich Chamber of Visual Art, established on September 22, 1933, under Goebbels. The 1938 exhibition, opened on July 10, featured 1,200 works, including Sepp Hilz’s "Bäuerliche Venus," which idealised traditional femininity, and Hermann Gradl’s landscapes, evoking pastoral purity. Attendance was 400,000 by October 1938, but sales remained low at 300,000 Reichsmarks, with Hitler purchasing 150 works. The 1939 exhibition, opened on July 16, included 1,100 works, with 200 reflecting militaristic themes post the September 1, 1939, invasion of Poland. Franz Eichhorst’s "Krieg und Kunst," unveiled on July 16, 1939, depicted soldiers as cultural guardians, aligning art with the regime’s war aims. By 1940, the exhibition, opened on July 7, showcased 1,000 works, with 300 war-themed pieces, including Hans Schmitz-Wiedenbrück’s "Arbeiter und Soldat," glorifying labour and military unity. The Reich Chamber’s criteria excluded 112 artists by July 1937, targeting Jews and political dissidents, with 9,073 applicants vetted by 1940, only 2,700 approved. .gif)
The Haus also functioned as a repository for looted art, with 1,500 works from occupied territories catalogued by December 1942 for Hitler’s planned Führermuseum in Linz. The By January 1942, 2,000 artworks, including 700 French paintings, were stored, with 150 catalogued for Hitler’s personal collection. The Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg, established on July 1, 1940, coordinated looting, with 1,200 items from Belgium added by August 1942. Kajetan Mühlmann, an ϟϟ officer, secured 400 Polish artworks by March 1941, whilst Göring acquired 600 Dutch pieces by June 1942. These were stored in the Haus’s reinforced vaults, constructed in 1933. Protected by 2-metre-thick concrete, they ended up preserving 90% of stored art despite bombings, with 200 displayed in a July 1943 exhibition. This event, opened on July 4, featured 1,000 works, with 250 war-themed, but attendance dropped to 200,000 by September 1943 due to war fatigue.The decline in quality, noted by critics like Bruno Werner in 1943, reflected the loss of 200 artists to military service by July 1942. The final 1944 exhibition, opened on July 2, included 800 works, with 300 destroyed in bombings by December 1944.
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The
artists’ index, comprising 9,073 applicants, revealed the scale of
participation, with only 30% accepted for exhibition due to stringent
ideological and racial criteria. Painters like Georg Obenauer, with five
works in 1943, and Alois Wünsche-Mitterecker, a Waffen-ϟϟ member, were
marked with an “E” for approved status. Women artists, such as Fridel
Dethleffs-Edelmann, faced additional barriers, with only 1,361 female
applicants recorded. The Reich’s art market, dominated by Nazi
purchases, saw Hitler spend 6.8 million Reichsmarks from 1937 to 1943.
The Haus’s exhibitions, while attracting 600,000 visitors annually until
1943, were commercial failures, with private sales accounting for less
than 10% of transactions. The regime’s cultural policy, rooted in Paul
Schultze-Naumburg’s 1928 book Kunst und Rasse, equated modernist art
with racial impurity, justifying the confiscation of 16,558 works by
1941, many burned in a Berlin fire on March 20, 1939.
The 1941
exhibition, opened on July 6, featured 900 works, with 400 glorifying
the Eastern Front, including Wilhelm Sauter’s "Sturmtrupp," depicting ϟϟ
soldiers. Attendance fell to 250,000 by September 1941, as war
priorities shifted public focus. The 1942 exhibition, opened on July 5, had included 950 works,
with 300 reflecting Operation Barbarossa’s impact, such as Ernst
Karchow’s "Panzer voran." The Haus also functioned as a repository for looted art, with 1,500 works from occupied territories catalogued by December 1942 for Hitler’s planned Führermuseum in Linz. The By January 1942, 2,000 artworks, including 700 French paintings, were stored, with 150 catalogued for Hitler’s personal collection. The Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg, established on July 1, 1940, coordinated looting, with 1,200 items from Belgium added by August 1942. Kajetan Mühlmann, an ϟϟ officer, secured 400 Polish artworks by March 1941, whilst Göring acquired 600 Dutch pieces by June 1942. These were stored in the Haus’s reinforced vaults, constructed in 1933. Protected by 2-metre-thick concrete, they ended up preserving 90% of stored art despite bombings, with 200 displayed in a July 1943 exhibition. This event, opened on July 4, featured 1,000 works, with 250 war-themed, but attendance dropped to 200,000 by September 1943 due to war fatigue.The decline in quality, noted by critics like Bruno Werner in 1943, reflected the loss of 200 artists to military service by July 1942. The final 1944 exhibition, opened on July 2, included 800 works, with 300 destroyed in bombings by December 1944.
Then and now, with Hitler giving his speech at the opening, in which he expressed his great satisfaction that he, and not his political opponents, had erected the building:
In 1931, the National Socialist takeover was still so far off in the distant future that there was no way of foreseeing the construction of a new exhibition palace for the Third Reich. In fact, for a while it did seem as though the “men of November” would provide an edifice for the exhibition of art in Munich that would have had as little to do with German art as it, conversely, reflected the Bolshevist affairs and circumstances of their time. Many of you perhaps still recall the plans for that building that was intended for the old Botanical Garden that has now been given such a beautiful design. A building quite difficult to define. An edifice that could just as easily have been a Saxon thread factory as the market hall of a mid-sized city—or perhaps a train station, or then again even an indoor swimming pool. I need not press upon you how I suffered at the thought back then that the first misfortune would be followed by yet another. And that therefore, in this case in particular, I was truly glad, really happy about the faint-hearted lack of determination on the part of my political opponents at the time. In it lay the only chance of ultimately saving the erection of a palace for art exhibitions in Munich to become the first great undertaking of the Third Reich.
Josef Wilk's Porträt Prof. Troost showing the Haus der Deutschen Kunst in the background, now at the Deutsches Historisches Museum- my students from the Bavarian International School are seen behind looking at Adolf Wissel's Kahlenberger Bauernfamilie (Farm Family From Kahlenberg) which had been included in the Großen Deutschen Kunstausstellung of 1939 in room 33 at the Haus der Deutschen Kunst. Described by 'Monuments Man' Lincoln Kirstein as "a kind of Bavarian Grant Wood, but more careful, smug, and laudatory"
in the article shown in the GIF on the right in a 1945 article entitled
‘Art in the Third Reich,’ on the face of it the subject of this work is
the depiction of an Aryan family in which blond children with light
skin and blue eyes represent the ideal of the Aryan race. The boy
represents the future of the Aryan race. The father's role is to protect
his family and prepare his son for the future and therefore is
portrayed as the head of the family, supervising and protecting his
children. 
The mother must procreate to guarantee the descendants of her family and the future of the herrenvölk,
to take care and protect them, but also to guarantee the tasks destined
for the family. The lack of a grandfather may represent one died during
the Great War. Therefore, this painting aims to spread the Nazi
ideologies (the Aryan race, the soldier). In his BBC documentary on
German art during the time it was ruled under two dictatorships however,
British art historian Andrew Graham-Dixon described this painting,
which Hitler himself bought for 12,000 Reichsmarks for what he felt
represented the Nazi 'Blut und Boden' ideology revolving around race and
homeland, as a Trojan horse- none of the participants make any eye
contact but instead are shown in deep melancholy and unease with a doll
lying on the floor in the bottom corner serving as, in Graham-Dixon's
words, "a surrogate corpse"; a painting of great distress and sadness as
opposed to Nazi-supported heroism.
All that said, when I asked the man responsible for the authorative German Art Gallery and who probably has the largest private collection of Nazi-era art in the world, he emailed "Oh, the story about Wissel, I think it’s completely fantasy, wishful thinking. As far as I know, from his bio, he was interested in a career, under Nazi’s or not. He participated already in the Goslar exhibition, one of the first Nazi art exhibitions, with gave the direction for real Aryan art." He went on to argue that, above all, had he intended his work to call into question the Nazi regime, he would have proclaimed that to the occupying Americans instead of keeping quiet about it for the rest of his life and then directed me to Irith Dublon-Knebel's piece A Dual Life which fully refutes such claims.
The war left the building almost undamaged. During the American occupation, the building was used as an officer's casino with an entertainment programme. According to an anecdote, a basketball field was created in the building so that during the reopening as a museum, markings were still visible on the floor. In the summer of 1946 it was the first after the war to house a special exhibition of individual works from the Alte Pinakothek and the Internationale Jugendbuchausstellung. Today there are plans for a £68 million refurbishment of the museum which includes the removal of a line of trees that were planted after war specifically to obscure the building's façade. Historian Magnus Brechtken, vice-director of the Munich Institute for Contemporary History, damns the project as he describes how this example of “racial ideology in stone” has evolved since it was built through changes such as replacing the exterior steps and planting the trees to reflect Germany's “coming to terms with the past”: “Every architectural answer in 2017 must take fully into account the whole process after 1945 and the wider area around the building. The answer must reflect the society of 2017, not emulate 1937.”
Excerpt from Nazi propaganda film of the summer 1939 German Art Festival in Munchen. On October 15 and 16 1939, the Große Deutsche Kunstausstellung inside the Haus der Deutschen Kunst was complemented by the monumental Tag der deutschen Kunst celebration of "2,000 years of Germanic culture" where luxuriously and pretentiously draped floats (one of them carrying a five metre tall golden Nazi Reichsadler) and thousands of actors in historical costumes paraded down Prinzregentenstraße for hours in the presence of Hitler, Göring, Goebbels, Himmler, Speer, Ley, Heydrich, and many other other high-ranking Nazis, with minor events taking place in the Englischer Garten nearby. The
Day of German Art celebration on October 14, 1933, marking the setting
of the cornerstone, opened modestly with a press reception followed by
several concerts. The more impressive events began the following day
with formations of SA and ϟϟ paramilitary units marching past the House location. After greeting
attending dignitaries, Hitler delivered a speech positioning himself as
the redeemer of German culture. He also aimed to solidify Munich's
artistic standing by declaring the city as the Capital of German Art.
Yet the carefully choreographed ceremony took an embarrassing turn when
Hitler's ceremonial hammer broke as he struck the cornerstone. If Hitler
hoped the celebration's climatic parade a few hours later would end the
festival on a high note, he was probably disappointed.
The
parade, titled Glory Ages of German Culture (Glanzzeiten Deutscher
Kultur), consisted of nineteen pseudo-historical floats suggesting a sense of
historical and cultural continuity between previous 'golden ages' and
the new era of cultural rejuvenation heralded by the Nazi Party. The
parade marked a 'turning point' heralding the 'dawn of a new, better
time'. The staging of parades had been common since the
nineteenth century when they and other mass public spectacles emerged as
popular activities often associated with nationalist movements. Since
much of the Nazi rise to power occurred through marches, intimidation
and violence in the streets, it likely seemed fitting that the party
marked its political ascendancy with massed public displays.Although existing accounts are cursory and differ on some details, it is possible to piece together the parade's basic content from the official programme. Despite a rhetoric of historical continuity and cultural renewal, successive floats did not present a chronology culminating in a Nazi artistic 'revival', while the intended symbolism of some floats seemed obscure. The initial group was pretty straightforward: a large eagle, an established icon of Germany, accompanied emerged by a group of twenty-six men carrying Nazi regalia. The next four groupings celebrated Greece. A float featuring an ionic column paid homage to classical architecture; an 'ancient' mural for painting; and a reproduction of a Hercules public torso for sculpture. A statue of Athena rounded out this classical tribute. The next two groupings celebrated the gothic and Bavarian rococo periods. While maintaining a chronological order, it was curious that the float symbolising the rococo period presented as a more narrow tribute to Bavarian, rather than German, achievements. The eighth float, roughly the parade's midpoint, centred on a scale model of the House of German Art surrounded by representatives of the craft guilds. The overall effect up until this point was to suggest a historical trajectory with the Nazi art gallery symbolising a revival of past cultural greatness.
Hubert Lanzinger's 1938 "Der Bannerträger" on the wall along the staircase showing Hitler as a medæival knight, a painting which had corresponded exactly to the ideological requirements of National Socialism and was a frequently reproduced work of art. Heinrich Hoffmann, Hitler’s official photographer and an exhibition judge, had the image made into a postcard around 1938. It had been discovered by American personnel in the Führerbau and moved to Munich's Central Collecting Point in the Verwaltungsbau, where American Army Air Force Captain Gordon Waverly Gilkey seized it in 1946, an American soldier having first pierced the painting with a bayonet before the work having been transferred to the American Army Art Collection where it remains to
this day.
On the right is Harry Christlieb's "Elch". The central painting in front is Ferdinand Schebek's "Leoparden" on the right of which is Carl von Dombrowski's "Brunfthirsch" from the 1940 Große Deutsche Kunstausstellung.[K]nowledge of the whereabouts, the full contents, and the provenance of this collection, the largest surviving remnant of Nazi visual arts culture, has eluded researchers for seventy years. Exhibited under its original title Führerbildnis [Portrait of the Führer) at the 1937 Große Deutsche Kunstausstellung, Der Bannerträger is one of the most frequently exhibited pieces in the Army Art Collection held at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. However, until the opening of the exhibition Kunst und Propaganda im Streit der Nationen, 1930-1945 [Art and Propaganda in the Conflict of Nations) at the Deutsches Historisches Museum in January 2007, Lanzinger's painting had not been reunited with works of art from the other branches of the German War Art Collection or with the NS-Reichsbesitz objects' since its seizure by Gilkey. Of additional interest is the fact that Der Bannerträger was one of only a handful of contemporary paintings selected for the Linzer Sammlung [Linz Collection), artworks associated with Adolf Hitler's personal collecting activity.
Gregory Maertz (19) Nostalgia for the Future
From the Große Deutsche Kunstausstellung 1939. On the left is Ottmar Obermaier's statue "Jung-Deutschland"and beside it is Fritz Klimsch's famous reclining "Galatea".
Thirteen of Obermaier's works had been exhibited in the Great German Art Exhibitions, two of which were bought by Hitler. His ‘Schreitendes Mädchen’ (Striding Girl) which had been exhibited in the 1939 Große Deutsche Kunstausstellung can still be seen on the grounds of Munich's Nordbad. Klimsch, who had been a co-founder of the Berlin Secession in 1898, benefited enormously from Nazi patronage, receiving RM 300,000 from Göbbels's Reich Propaganda Ministry for the monument to Mozart in Salzburg. Klimsch signed the June 1938 letter confirming the commission, “Mit deutschen Gruss und heil Hitler!" He had twenty-one works exhibited in the Great German Art Exhibitions, and modeled busts of Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick and Hitler, amongst various Nazi clients. He also created sculptures for the gardens of Göbbels and Ribbentrop at the Reich Propaganda Ministry and Foreign Ministry, respectively. Klimsch had modernist roots but adapted his work to suit the new regime. He received the highly prestigious Eagle Plaque of the Reich award in 1940 and was declared an “irreplaceable artist” during the war," becoming one of only twelve visual artists to be featured on the list. After the war Klimsch and his family settled in Salzburg but was deported in 1946 by the local burgermeister, Richard Hildmann, for being a German citizen. Klimsch was never a member of the Nazi Party, but being honoured by the Nazi regime made him a controversial post-war figure, and led to his expulsion from the academy of the arts in 1955. However, shortly before his death in 1960 Klimsch received the Federal Cross of Merit from Hans Filbinger, the Minister President of Baden-Württemberg, on his 90th birthday.
On the right image is Fritz Behn's "Leopard" and Walter Hauschild's "Diana mit Hund".
Behn had enjoyed a special relationship with Mussolini, and was described as "philofascist like-minded artist" and "uncritical admirer of the Duce" of whom Behn was repeatedly invited to audiences in the summer of 1934. According to Wolfgang Schieder in his book Mythos Mussolini, Behn depicted Mussolini with the "highest possible admiration" as "a large, noble animal, loaded with energy and strength" in the manufacture of a martial porphyry bust that came into being after his visit to Rome. Behn published a book in 1934 in which he described himself as an anti-Semite, stating how he hoped from Mussolini "a precise answer" to the "Jewish question", "because the Jews also seem to be gathering there [in Italy]." In 1942 Baldur von Schirach commissioned Behn with a bust of the Nazi composer Richard Strauss which is now owned by the State of Austria, and in 1943 and 1944 he acquired further commissions for music busts: Knappertsbusch , Wilhelm Furtwängler and Edwin Fischer. In 1943, Behn, together with Asmus Jessen , Erich Klahn and Hans Heitmann, he received the first and last Emanuel Geibel Prize from the City of Lübeck which had required Nazi approval. That same year Hitler awarded him the Goethe Medal for Art and Science.
Thirteen of Obermaier's works had been exhibited in the Great German Art Exhibitions, two of which were bought by Hitler. His ‘Schreitendes Mädchen’ (Striding Girl) which had been exhibited in the 1939 Große Deutsche Kunstausstellung can still be seen on the grounds of Munich's Nordbad. Klimsch, who had been a co-founder of the Berlin Secession in 1898, benefited enormously from Nazi patronage, receiving RM 300,000 from Göbbels's Reich Propaganda Ministry for the monument to Mozart in Salzburg. Klimsch signed the June 1938 letter confirming the commission, “Mit deutschen Gruss und heil Hitler!" He had twenty-one works exhibited in the Great German Art Exhibitions, and modeled busts of Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick and Hitler, amongst various Nazi clients. He also created sculptures for the gardens of Göbbels and Ribbentrop at the Reich Propaganda Ministry and Foreign Ministry, respectively. Klimsch had modernist roots but adapted his work to suit the new regime. He received the highly prestigious Eagle Plaque of the Reich award in 1940 and was declared an “irreplaceable artist” during the war," becoming one of only twelve visual artists to be featured on the list. After the war Klimsch and his family settled in Salzburg but was deported in 1946 by the local burgermeister, Richard Hildmann, for being a German citizen. Klimsch was never a member of the Nazi Party, but being honoured by the Nazi regime made him a controversial post-war figure, and led to his expulsion from the academy of the arts in 1955. However, shortly before his death in 1960 Klimsch received the Federal Cross of Merit from Hans Filbinger, the Minister President of Baden-Württemberg, on his 90th birthday.
On the right image is Fritz Behn's "Leopard" and Walter Hauschild's "Diana mit Hund".
Behn had enjoyed a special relationship with Mussolini, and was described as "philofascist like-minded artist" and "uncritical admirer of the Duce" of whom Behn was repeatedly invited to audiences in the summer of 1934. According to Wolfgang Schieder in his book Mythos Mussolini, Behn depicted Mussolini with the "highest possible admiration" as "a large, noble animal, loaded with energy and strength" in the manufacture of a martial porphyry bust that came into being after his visit to Rome. Behn published a book in 1934 in which he described himself as an anti-Semite, stating how he hoped from Mussolini "a precise answer" to the "Jewish question", "because the Jews also seem to be gathering there [in Italy]." In 1942 Baldur von Schirach commissioned Behn with a bust of the Nazi composer Richard Strauss which is now owned by the State of Austria, and in 1943 and 1944 he acquired further commissions for music busts: Knappertsbusch , Wilhelm Furtwängler and Edwin Fischer. In 1943, Behn, together with Asmus Jessen , Erich Klahn and Hans Heitmann, he received the first and last Emanuel Geibel Prize from the City of Lübeck which had required Nazi approval. That same year Hitler awarded him the Goethe Medal for Art and Science.
From the Große Deutsche Kunstausstellung 1940: Michael Kiefer's "Die Wacht"in the centre which Hitler himself bought, showing two sea-eagles in flight over a tempestuous sea with Heligoland in the background, leaving the viewer in no doubt about the martial intent of the German Luftwaffe, flanked by Friedrich Lange's "Jugendlicher Athlet"and Fritz Klimsch's "Der Kämpfer." 
The image on the right shows Andreas Rauch's "Adler" with Harry Christlieb's "Junge Elche" beside it.
The image on the right shows Andreas Rauch's "Adler" with Harry Christlieb's "Junge Elche" beside it.
In the words of Peter Adam, “The cult of heroic death became a major obsession in the arts. Painting, sculpture, film, and literature constantly glorified death and the deeper meaning of sacrifice". The favourite theme of Nazi artists, together with idealized depictions of peasant life, was the war. They portrayed it as an epic struggle yet almost entirely without suffering. One critic wrote in 1938 of the canvases by Nazi artist Franz Eichhorst: "The beauty and singularity of these frescoes is the almost total absence of blood and screams ... [and] the ... readiness to fight and to be sacrificed. ...". In a similar spirit Nazi animal painters like Michael Kiefer celebrated the predations of eagles and lions. This impulse toward a hygienic death, divorced from sorrow or physical decay, seems to join many features of Nazi society from the animal protection laws to the gas chambers. The entire society was engaged in a perpetual homage to death.
Boria Sax (170) Animals in the Third Reich: Pets, Scapegoats, and the Holocaust
Below is the Porträt des Führers by Fritz Erler, 1939, bought for RM 25,000 by Edoardo Dino Alfieri, the Italian Minister of Culture and Propaganda, recently rediscovered after having been thought to have been destroyed in 1945, and the interior today. On the right showing the
In fact, Erler was actually criticised in a May 1940 letter from the Ministry of Home Affairs for his depiction of Hitler's hands. In it, Minster Adolf Wagner expressed how on the occasion of his March 14, 1940 visit to the Bernheim House, he had been "horrified by Prof. Erler's portrait of the Führer because he had no idea of his hands. In the past few days he had sent relevant literature and pictures from which the artists could study the hands of the Fiihrer in a rich way. The artists make it too easy for themselves today. Today, one usually works out a much too short preliminary study of the object. The Minister of State intends to summarise the studies mentioned above and send them to the Munich artists so that they have the opportunity to take a closer look at the hands of the Fiihrer."
Hitler would make a reappearance in Maurizio Cattelan's Him at the Haus der Kunst in 2003 as seen on the right.
Now a publicly accessible online archive of the images displayed reveals the full extent of the Nazi aesthetic -- and includes details about who bought which work of art.
Joseph Goebbels's speech at the opening of the 1941 art exhibition at the Haus der Kunst
A painting by Fritz Erler confirms both the central function of art in the new regime and the constant identification of artists with the desires of Hitler. Erler's “Portrait of the Führer", painted in about 1939, shows Hitler booted, in uniform, and facing the spectator. He stands erect, on the top of some building, in front of a gigantic statue brandishing the eagle and the sword that protect the Reich, its dark silhouette looming over the city.Below Hitler can be seen two vast public buildings: the one on the right is Munich's Maximilianeum; the other, in a severe neoclassical style, is a building commissioned by the new regime and completed two years earlier, the House of German Art. "Our buildings are rising in order to increase our authority," Hitler declared in 1937, in line with his belief expressed in the earliest days of the regime that German art constituted “the proudest defence of the German people.” The instruments lying at his feet, designed for chiseling stone, are reminders of his function as the builder of the Third Reich, but also as the sculptor of the German people. Erler's painting shows that in 1939 Hitler's authority was still claimed to be based on symbols of the body of the people that he himself had built up with art, drawing on forms from the past. This image certainly realized the Führer's dream: in it he saw himself as the man who had restored not only the signs of the Reich's sovereignty but also its authority, rendering it unshakeable by founding it on the supreme authority of artistic tradition.
Michaud, Lloyd (14-15) The Cult of Art in Nazi Germany
Hitler would make a reappearance in Maurizio Cattelan's Him at the Haus der Kunst in 2003 as seen on the right.
Now a publicly accessible online archive of the images displayed reveals the full extent of the Nazi aesthetic -- and includes details about who bought which work of art.
Joseph Goebbels's speech at the opening of the 1941 art exhibition at the Haus der Kunst
Footage and Documentaries relating to Art and its importance to Hitler and the Third Reich:
German Art- In the Shadow of HitlerHitler's Art War- Provocative and engaging lecture by Godfrey Barker
At the Prince Carl-Palais, the official residence of the Bavarian Prime Minister; here German president Paul von Hindenburg and Prime Minister Heinrich Held leave the palace, 12 August 1925. Named after Prince Carl, the brother of King Ludwig I who handed it over to on November 14, 1825, who had the palace extended considerably by Jean Baptiste Métivier. After his death, the palace became the seat of the Austro-Hungarian Embassy in 1876, and remained so until 1919. Bavaria had repeatedly asked for the re-establishment of an Austrian embassy in Munich in the immediate post-war years, but Vienna did not respond to this request out of consideration for the interests of the German government and the Allies. In 1924 the palace was designated the official residence of the Bavarian Prime Minister. After the Nazis abolished the Bavarian state government, it was used as the official residence of Reich Governor von Epp. In 1937 the palace was extensively converted into a guest house by Fritz Gablonsky. The occasion was an upcoming visit from Mussolini. The palace was extended considerably to the west; the north wing of Métiviers, which was torn down due to the simultaneous widening of Von-der-Tann-Strasse, was replaced by a new one based on plans by Fritz Gablonsky, which were modelled on the south wing.
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Hitler at the opening of the House of German Art with the the Prinz-Carl-Palais in the background, where Mussolini stayed in 1938 during the Munich Conference. Mussolini came here for the last time on September 18, 1943 after being rescued four days earlier in a remarkable coup de main at the Gran Sasso where il Duce had been interned at a mountain hotel, and brought to Germany.
Mussolini was brought to the Prince Carl Palace in Munich, from where he addressed the Italian people in a radio address that evening. During Hitler’s years of triumph in 1937 and 1938, Mussolini had always set up quarters at the Prince Carl Palace. But his speech now lacked the enthusiasm of earlier years. Mussolini cared about only one thing, his mistress Clara Petacci. He would not rest until Hitler finally had ϟϟ Obergruppenführer Sepp Dietrich bring her from Italy.
The Complete Hitler (2820)
Surrounded by destruction in 1948. On the right is the ruined shell at the end of the war and today, restored with the Nazi eagle removed. Today the Prinz-Carl-Palais is reserved for the Bavarian Prime Minister; despite the 87 million Deutschmarks to restore, even state ministers are unable to hold events in the house.
In front of the former site of the 'Exhibition of Degenerate Art' at the Hofgartenarkaden which was organised by the Nazis and opened in the Hofgarten arcades on July 19 1937, ending in November of that year. The day before had been opened the "First Great German Art Exhibition" allowing the regime's conception of art to be compared with what it deemed 'degenerate.' The Munich exhibition was followed by a travelling exhibition under the same title to other twelve cities, displaying some other exhibits until 1941. The Munich exhibition was organised by Adolf Ziegler, who also led the previous seizures from collections and museums such as the Wallraf-Richartz Museum in Cologne, the Folkwang Museum in Essen, the Kunsthalle in Hamburg, the Landesmuseum in Hanover and the new division of the National Gallery in Berlin for use in the show, of which 600 were then actually shown. They represented the maligned art styles of Expressionism, Dadaism, Surrealism and New Objectivity. To achieve a "chaotic" effect, the works were hung in the showrooms in a deliberately disadvantageous perspective and provided with abusive slogans on the walls. The exhibition, according to official figures, saw 2,009,899 visitors and was at that time one of the most visited exhibitions of modern art.
Hitler defamed the "modern art" that was "degenerate" and announced in his speech for the opening of the Great German Art Exhibition on July 18, 1937 that
Hitler defamed the "modern art" that was "degenerate" and announced in his speech for the opening of the Great German Art Exhibition on July 18, 1937 that
From now on we will wage a relentless cleansing war against the last elements of our cultural degradation. But if among them there is one who still believes he is destined for higher things, then he has four years to prove this probation, but these four years are sufficient for us to come to a final judgment. But now - and I want to assure you here - all the mutually supportive and thus holding cliques of babblers, amateurs and art swindlers will be dug up and eliminated. These prehistoric prehistoric culture-Stone Age and art stutterers may return to the caves of their ancestors for our sake, to apply their primitive international scribbles.
Donald Kuspit, discussing the ‘Entarte (sic) Kunst’ exhibition of 1937, has suggested that Hitler ‘had a vested interest in repression’ and a corresponding wish to exalt clear and unified images over those requiring debate and textual exegesis, and which therefore introduced the possibility of uncertainty. Hitler’s own words on this exhibition reveal a wish to erect a barrier between image and text: ‘Works of art that cannot be understood but need a swollen set of instructions to prove their right to exist...will no longer openly reach the German nation.’ When ‘art’ becomes propaganda, then image and text are not required to explain each other, but instead to participate in a mutual objectification.
Quinn (63) The Swastika: Constructing the Symbol
According to William Shirer, the exhibition was an humiliating failure:
In another part of the city in a ramshackle gallery that had to be reached through a narrow stairway was an exhibition of ”degenerate art” which Dr. Goebbels had organised to show the people what Hitler was rescuing them from. It contained a splendid selection of modern paintings – Kokoschka, Chagall and expressionist and impressionist works. The day I visited it, after panting through the sprawling House of German Art, it was crammed, with a long line forming down the creaking stairs and out into the street. In fact, the crowds besieging it became so great that Dr. Goebbels, incensed and embarrassed, soon closed it.
In a mere two weeks between 600 and 700 works from around Germany were seized, dispatched to Munich and hung. The show opened on 19 July 1937 with some 650 works by 112 'art stutterers' from thirty-two public museums on display. It included examples from all the major schools of German painting and sculpture- Expressionism, Verism, Abstraction, Bauhaus, Dada, New Objectivity- and all the major artists. Although he had inspected the collection beforehand, Hitler did not deign to put in a public appearance once the exhibition opened. But he inaugurated it vicariously the day before in a raging speech. '...The end of madness in German art and, with it, the cultural destruction of our people has begun,' he proclaimed. 'From this moment we shall conduct a merciless war against the remnants of our cultural disintegration.' On he sputtered, reviling 'the cliques of chatterboxes, dilettantes and art swindlers.'
Sculptures from M. Moll, O. Braun, E. Hoffmann & R. Belling
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| The so-called 'Dada Wall' |
Like enemy prisoners being thrown to the lions in the Colosseum, the victims were to be seen and mocked by the crowd before being consumed. The show was deigned to demonstrate that Modernist art was not simply ugly, indecent and deranged but that it also directly assaulted traditional social mores by disparaging motherhood, military heroism, religion and whatever was healthy, clean and chaste. Hitler's criteria- post 1910 German works- were generally followed, though stretched to include such adoptive Germans as Chagall and Jawlensky, and two non-Germans., Mondrian and Munch. The work by the good Nordic Munch caused such ideological indigestion that after a few days the room where it hung was closed. The paintings, presented in a way to heighten ridicule, were not so much displayed as plastered helter-skelter on the walls, though this may have resulted partly from the haste with which the show was assembled. To leave no doubt about their iniquity, the works were labelled with such propagandistic slogans as 'madness becomes a method', 'nature as seen by sick minds' and 'a insult to German womanhood.' Ensuring that no one could have the slightest doubt about the iniquity of the works, it is said that actors were sent to the exhibit to make raucous fun of what they saw.
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| Moll's 'Tänzerin' and Baum's 'Stehendes Mädchen' |
It was the biggest blockbuster show of all time. Hitler ordered that entry should be without charge and encouraged the public to attend. And attend it did. One million people went in the first six weeks alone and more than two million in the remaining six months in Munich. Another million or so saw the exhibition when it travelled to twelve other cities between February 1938 and April 1941. By all accounts spectators went to bury, not to praise. 'It became increasingly obvious to me that most people had come to see the exhibition with the intention of disliking everything,' it was later commented. Some non-Nazis, some non-Germans also applauded. A Boston art critic commented, 'There are probably plenty of people- art lovers- in Boston, who will side with Hitler in this particular purge.' The Fuehrer was enormously pleased with the popular response. It appeared to prove his point that Modernism was an elitist phenomenon that had lost meaning for the great mass of the public. It further seemed to support his belief in 'the people as the judge of art.' So gratified was he, in fact, that at his direction a pamphlet with illustrations of the works accompanied by hostile commentary was published and widely circulated. He had achieved his purpose. The event was a stunning demonstration of his power to crush what he opposed. In so doing, he brought to an end the most exciting school of painting and sculpture in modern German history.
(163-165) Hitler and the Power of Aesthetics
The Deutsches Historisches Museum in Berlin has a miniature recreation of the exhibition's layout. The
1938 law that allowed the Nazis to seize thousands of other Modernist
artworks deemed “degenerate” because Hitler viewed them as un-German or
Jewish in nature remains on the books to this day.
In a Rediscovered Trove of Art, a Triumph Over the Nazis’ Will
The former heaquarters of the Reichsstatthalter, or Reich Governor of Bavaria, at Prinzregentenstraße 5. The Reichsstatthalter had the task of ensuring that the policy guidelines drawn up by Hitler were observed, and had the following powers: appointment and dismissal of the chairman of the state government; dissolution and arrangement of the new election of the state parliament; drafting and promulgation of state laws; appointment and dismissal of key state officials and judges; and the right to pardon. The position was held by Franz Ritter von Epp who had been born in Munich in 1868 and embarked on a career as an officer, in which he was directly involved in the suppression of the Boxer Rebellion in China in 1900 and in the genocide of the Herero and Nama in German South West Africa in 1904. As battalion commander of the Royal Bavarian Infantry Body Regiment, he returned highly decorated from the Great War and his awarding of the Bavarian Militär-Max-Joseph-Ordens allowed him the title Ritter von Epp. In Ohrdruff he had founded a volunteer corps made up of Bavarian volunteers whose involvement in the bloody suppression of the Munich Soviet Republic in April and May 1919 earned Epp the status of "Liberator of Munich". From 1933 Hitler used his renown to bring Bavaria into line with Berlin by appointing Epp Reich Commissioner and later Gauleiter of Bavaria - a de facto office without power. The Nazis also made him Reichsleiter of the Colonial Political Office, Leader of the Reich Colonial Association and Landesjägermaster in Bavaria. Nevertheless Epp's aversion to Nazi arbitrariness and injustice grew although, despite contacts with the resistance, he was never able to bring himself to join them until the end. When he died on January 1st, 1947 at the age of 78, Ritter von Epp-Platz in Munich was again renamed Promenadenplatz.
Luftgaukommando
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At 250 metres in length, this building at Prinzregentenstraße 24 still bears visible signs of its former military use. The site of the
former Luftgaukommando, it was constructed
between 1937 and 1938 and served as the regional headquarters for the
Luftwaffe’s Air District Command VII. Designed
according to plans by German Bestelmeyer who, as "Reich Cultural Senator,"
taught at the Technical University of Munich, today's Technical
University, the building’s
monumental design was intended to project the
regime’s power. Its facade, adorned with concrete steel helmets above
the top row of windows, and two stone eagles flanking the main entrance,
symbolised the Luftwaffe’s authority. The structure’s exterior wall
along Oettingenstraße features window grilles with swastika motifs, a
detail that has sparked significant controversy in the post-war period
due to its overt association with Nazi ideology. From
1938-40 the eastern part of the building was occupied by the Air Force
Command. In the course of the rearmament of the German air force,
fifteen air district commands were set up in Germany. The Luftwaffe was
divided into air fleets, to which the air district commands were
subordinate as departments with specific tasks. The Luftgaukommando VII
in Munich organised air traffic and the aerial warfare industry in
southern Bavaria. From 1938 until April
1945, the building functioned as the administrative centre for the
Luftwaffe, overseeing air armament, air defence coordination, and the
planning of air warfare, including the deployment of the Legion Condor
in Spain from 1936 to 1939. This gigantic building shows the importance and the
expansion of this air armament.
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The
Luftgaukommando’s construction necessitated significant alterations to
the surrounding area. In March 1937, the Hubertusbrunnen, a fountain
designed by Adolf Hildebrand in the form of a covered
temple and erected between 1903 and 1907, was
demolished to accommodate the building’s footprint. Inside was the actual fountain and the statue of a deer.
According to the legend, Hubertus found a stag located in the well house
carrying a cross between its antlers. It was originally located in
front of the Bavarian National Museum but removed in 1937 and in 1954 re-established at its current location. Its removal, completed by April 1937, was part
of a broader reconfiguration of Prinzregentenstraße to align with Hitler’s vision of the avenue as a symbol of Nazi power. The fountain
was later relocated to the eastern end of the Nymphenburg Canal in 1954.
The Luftgaukommando’s construction also involved the Organisation Todt,
which oversaw infrastructure projects using forced labour. Between
January and March 1944, the command planned the development of taxiways,
shatterproof aircraft boxes, and small hangars to bolster air defences,
with construction carried out by various firms employing prisoners of
war and forced labourers. .gif)
The topping-out ceremony on May 12, 1937 and today. From 1940, the entire building served as the command post of the Air District Headquarters, which was engaged in the comprehensive development of air defence and the live experiments on concentration camp prisoners.
Here, not only were the air armament and the air war planned and the
air defences coordinated, but later the defusing of unexploded ordnance
was organised. This dangerous, often fatal, job was done by prisoners
from the Dachau concentration camp who had previously been trained in
bomb searching and blasting. In July 1944, an hundred Dachau concentration camp prisoners were assembled at the roll call area for this external detail. It was only when they arrived at the south-east of Theresienwiese in their new accommodation in the gymnasium of the Stielerschule at Stielerstraße 6, did they find out about their new job as a "bomb search squad", also known as the "Dachau Hundreds". Because of the high death rate- they faced mortality rates estimated at 40%- they later called themselves the "Himmelfahrtskommando". For this work, which was deadly for many, they were promised a possible reduction in imprisonment or release. Divided into groups of six, they were transported to Romanstrasse, to the reporting point for duds. With a Wehrmacht firework technician as head of operations and an ϟϟ guard to guard them, they were taken from there to their operations in the city area, where they had to uncover bombs without prior knowledge and often had to defuse them themselves. Up to fifteen concentration camp inmates died in this way every day in detonations caused by removing the detonator or by the expiration of long-term detonators. Those killed were each replaced by new concentration camp prisoners from the Dachau concentration camp in operations which lasted until the end of the war by which time to improve its defences against the Allies, in the first quarter of 1944 the Luftgau
Command VII planned the construction of two taxiways and alternative roads, shatterproof aircraft boxes and small hangars. This expansion work was carried out by various companies under the construction management of the Organisation Todt (OT) which again involved prisoners of war and forced labourers as workers. Many of these 350 forced labourers had been deported from Athens followed by six hundred Jewish concentration camp prisoners from September to November 1944. Another camp surrounded by barbed wire was probably set up in 1942 for around an hundred Soviet prisoners of war. This would be swelled further by French prisoners of war, Belgian civilian workers, Italian Wehrmacht volunteers, a group of Hungarian soldiers and, from January 1945, around 300 members of the British army from India who had been captured in North Africa. In January 1945, Polish and Russian prisoners were killed when a dud exploded, and others followed to be replaced by the transfer of other prisoners from Dachau. There were shootings of inmates, and abuse was common until April 26, 1945 when this external detail was dissolved and the prisoners taken to the Dachau concentration camp. It wasn't until 1973 that the Central Office of the State Justice Administration in Ludwigsburg began investigating such crimes only for the Munich I Regional Court to to summarily discontinue the proceedings against the commando leader responsible, Adolf Höfer.
Command VII planned the construction of two taxiways and alternative roads, shatterproof aircraft boxes and small hangars. This expansion work was carried out by various companies under the construction management of the Organisation Todt (OT) which again involved prisoners of war and forced labourers as workers. Many of these 350 forced labourers had been deported from Athens followed by six hundred Jewish concentration camp prisoners from September to November 1944. Another camp surrounded by barbed wire was probably set up in 1942 for around an hundred Soviet prisoners of war. This would be swelled further by French prisoners of war, Belgian civilian workers, Italian Wehrmacht volunteers, a group of Hungarian soldiers and, from January 1945, around 300 members of the British army from India who had been captured in North Africa. In January 1945, Polish and Russian prisoners were killed when a dud exploded, and others followed to be replaced by the transfer of other prisoners from Dachau. There were shootings of inmates, and abuse was common until April 26, 1945 when this external detail was dissolved and the prisoners taken to the Dachau concentration camp. It wasn't until 1973 that the Central Office of the State Justice Administration in Ludwigsburg began investigating such crimes only for the Munich I Regional Court to to summarily discontinue the proceedings against the commando leader responsible, Adolf Höfer.
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The
building’s design, with its heavy limestone facade and symmetrical
layout, was intended to convey unassailable strength, its symbols
serving as both decoration and propaganda. The Luftgaukommando’s imagery
was a calculated effort to align Prinzregentenstraße with the Nazi
vision of a monumental, ideologically charged boulevard, distinct from
the middle-class character it held under Luitpold, Prince Regent, from
1891 to 1912. Here I'm parked in front of the main entrance still flanked by the two stone eagles sculpted by Josef Wackerle
and installed in April 1938. Their design, with sharp, angular lines,
mirrored the aggressive aesthetic of Nazi iconography, emphasising the
Luftwaffe’s dominance in aerial warfare. Though defaced in September 1945, they retained
their imposing form, with one partially restored in November 1952 for
structural reasons. Above the metal door itself are swords that form a circle reflecting the so-called Black Sun, the circular sun wheel of twelve sig-runes seen at Wewelsburg castle. Goodrick-Clarke describes how this symbol has become widespread among neo-Nazi youth in Germany and abroad as a more esoteric sign than the common swastika:
A circle of initiates within the SS bear the Black Sun as a secret insignia forThule. It is the sol nigra of alchemy .... The Greek mysteries already recognised a secret sun besides the golden disk of Atlantis. This was the star Antaresin the sign of Scorpio .... The deep purple colour of the Black Sun is not with-out illumination, but the pervasive splendor which illuminates the initiate. According to ancient Germanic tradition, God is omnipotent and invisible. Light perceptible to the human eye is material, a shadow of the invisible, spiritual light and fire, a tiny spark of which still glows in the Age of the Wolfaround Thule and awaits rekindling .... The Black Sun is the sign of invisible divinity which stands above the material golden glow of daylight, once the golden sun of the Atlanteans was usurped by the servants of Mammon and Freemasonry. The deep purple disk represents the accomplishment of divinewill and law against the presumptive power of gold, together with its mastersand slaves .... Charged with secret knowledge, this symbol was seen on the military aircraft of the SS shortly before the end of the Second World War. The Black Sun illuminates a Reich and will never set.Black Sun (169)
Inside the Nazi eagle still greets visitors, albeit sans swastika. The
building’s interior also contained symbolic elements, including a large
mural in the main hall, completed in June 1938, depicting a stylised
Luftwaffe eagle clutching a swastika, surrounded by clouds and aircraft.
This mural, measuring ten metres by five metres, was painted by Hans Tichy
and intended to glorify the air force’s technological prowess. Bronze
plaques at the entrance, installed in August 1938, bore inscriptions
honouring Hermann Göring, the Luftwaffe’s commander, with phrases such
as “Strength through Unity” and the dates of the building’s
construction. These plaques, each 1.2 metres wide, were removed in
October 1945 by American occupation forces but left visible marks on the
stonework.
Prominent among the external decorations were Stahlhelme positioned above the top row of windows, symbolising military strength and directly referencing the Luftwaffe’s role in air defence. Positioned ten metres above street level, they were visible
from a distance, their uniformity evoking martial discipline and authority. The
concrete helmets, 1.5 metres in diameter, were spaced evenly across the
upper facade, with 12 on the central building and 4 on the western
wing. Each weighed approximately 200 kilogrammes and were cast
with a polished finish to reflect sunlight, enhancing their visual
impact. Their placement above the windows created a rhythmic pattern,
reinforcing the militaristic aesthetic. The
building’s frieze, running 200 metres along the top edge, featured
carved oak leaves, a traditional German symbol of strength, interspersed
with Luftwaffe insignia, including stylised propellers. These carvings,
completed in May 1938, were designed by Franz Mikorey and measured 0.5
metres in height.
The window grilles along the Oettingenstraße side of the building featured wrought-iron swastikas, each approximately 1 metre in height, integrated into the latticework. These swastikas, visible from the street, were a deliberate assertion of Nazi ideology, embedded into the building’s public facade. By March 1937, during the demolition of the Hubertusbrunnen fountain to make way for the Luftgaukommando’s construction, additional swastika motifs were incorporated into temporary barriers. These swastika grilles, numbering eighteen along the outer wall, remained intact until public complaints in July 1970 led to partial removal, though some were overlooked and persisted into the 1980s. mural, with its bold colours and sharp lines, was designed to inspire awe, its central eagle clutching a swastika measuring 1.8 metres across. The oak leaf frieze, with its 72 carvings, was spaced to create a continuous visual narrative, blending tradition with militarism. The swastika grilles, though reduced in number by August 1970, were originally installed to dominate the street-level view, their repetitive pattern reinforcing ideological control.
At night the grills are actually lit up from within the building even though the German Strafgesetzbuch in § 86a outlaws "use of symbols of unconstitutional organisations" as used on this government building.
Since February 1952, the building has housed the Bavarian Ministry of Economic Affairs, Infrastructure, Transport and Technology. Today
the former dining area serves as a library. The historic rooms have
been left largely in its original state. Today it houses the Bavarian
Ministry of Economic Affairs Since
the 1950s, the building has housed the Bavarian Ministry of Economic
Affairs, Infrastructure, Transport, and Technology. The retention of
Nazi-era symbols, particularly the swastika grilles and stone eagles,
has provoked ongoing debate. In 2017, historian Winfried Nerdinger
proposed transforming Prinzregentenstraße into a historical learning
path to contextualise its Nazi-era buildings, including the
Luftgaukommando. This suggestion emerged amid discussions about the Haus
der Kunst, another Nazi-era structure on the same street, where plans
to remove trees shielding its facade were contested by Nerdinger on
March 8, 2017, arguing that such alterations would erase historical
memory. The
controversy over the building’s symbols intensified in a February 10,
2023, debate hosted by the Bavarian Ministry of Culture, where proposals
to cover the grilles with panels were rejected due to cost estimates of
€1.2 million. Instead, a compromise added QR codes linking to
historical information in September 2023. Critics, including Munich’s
mayor Dieter Reiter, argued on April 5, 2024, that such measures are
insufficient, as the symbols remain visible. Across the street is the Bayerisches Nationalmuseum
According to Jonathan Petropoulos in The Faustian Bargain - The Art World in Nazi Germany "many Jewish galleries, like the renowned Bernheimer firm in Munich, were taken over by Aryan trustees. As the confiscated works mounted up, [museum director Ernst] Buchner cooperated with the Gestapo by making rooms available in the Bavarian National Museum."
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The apartment’s layout included a large reception hall, a dining room, and a study, which Hitler used for both personal and political purposes. The household at Prinzregentenplatz 16 was managed by the Reichert family, who'd previously served Hitler at his earlier residence on Thierschstraße 41. They relocated to the new apartment on October 5, 1929, overseeing domestic operations, including cleaning and maintenance. In 1925 Hitler brought his widowed half-sister Angela Raubal from Austria to serve as housekeeper until 1931, maintaining the residence’s operations during his frequent absences and for his rented villa The Berghof. She brought along her two daughters, Geli and Friedl. Hitler became very close to his niece Geli, and she moved into his apartment in 1929, when she was twenty. Their relationship is shrouded in mystery but was widely rumoured to be romantic. On September 18, 1931 she died of a gunshot wound in the apartment; the coroner proclaimed her death a suicide. Hitler was on his way to Erlangen to give a speech, but he returned immediately to Munich on hearing the news. By the time he arrived her body had been removed.
He took her death very hard and went into a depression. Hitler
did not attend the funeral in Vienna but instead
retreated to the home of his publisher Müller at the Tegernsee, spending
several days there with only his court photographer Heinrich
Hoffmann allowed to accompany him. Many feared the
shock of Geli’s unexpected death might lead him to commit suicide, too.
On the anniversary of his niece’s death on September 18, 1932, Hitler
secretly visited her grave in Vienna. Goebbels noted in his diary:
“Führer gone to Vienna for private visit. Nobody knows about it so that
there won’t be any crowds.” News of Hitler’s presence in Vienna leaked,
however, and led to many political rumours. On Hitler’s orders, Raubal’s
room remained untouched. Before the war, he spent every Christmas Eve
there in sentimental reflection.He mourned
her for years, maintaining her rooms exactly as they had been. Hitler
continued to live in the apartment until 1934, when he became Führer and
Reichskanzler of Germany. After that, Hitler kept the apartment, but
spent most of his time either in Berlin or in his Berghof residence. There
is a considerable speculation on the nature of Hitler's relationship
with Raubal. Nicholls (139) describes how "gossips could only guess" as
to whether they actually made love; Machtan in The Hidden Hitler (162)
states how "[o]ne can only speculate ... but it is unlikely that he
became intimate with her"; the thesis of Machtan's book is that Hitler
was homosexual. Christa Schroeder, one of Hitler's personal secretaries,
was convinced that Geli and Hitler did not have sexual relations, one
of Geli's friends and daughter of Hitler's photographer Heinrich
Hoffmann, Henrietta von Schirach, was also confident that the two did
not have sexual relations. On the other hand, psychoanalyst Walter C.
Langer argued that Hitler's sexual relationship with Geli was
coprophagic or coprophiliac, ultimately based on his masochism. Toland
states, rather paradoxically, that the "discreet love affair" between
Hitler and Geli was "most likely never consummated." Other historians, like Kershaw, simply decline to take a position on the ground that the matter is simply too speculative. .gif)
Hitler at the entrance to the apartment in 1937 and the site today. Already the residence served as a venue for significant political and diplomatic engagements. On September 25, 1937, Hitler hosted Mussolini at Prinzregentenplatz 16. During their
hour-long summit conference, the German and Italian leaders agreed to
continue supporting Franco in Spain, to seek better relations
with Imperial Japan, and to oppose Franco-British policies that
prevented their joint expansion of power and territorial acquisitions—a
great strengthening of the Axis Pact of 1935 and the Anti-Comintern Pact of 1936. Mussolini’s visit included a tour of the apartment, where Hitler showcased his personal art collection, including works by German painters such as Hans Thoma, which were selected to align with Nazi cultural policies. The meeting, documented in German Foreign Office records, marked a critical step towards the Anschluss, formalised in March 1938. Another notable event occurred on September 30, 1938, when Hitler
hosted Chamberlain at the apartment following
the signing of the four-power Munich Pact, but before the signing of the
Anglo-German Declaration that led Chamberlain to declare that he had
brought “peace for our time” home with honour from Germany. As for
Hitler, he later boasted to his intimates: “I saw our enemies at
Munich—they are little worms!” Because of the document signed in
Hitler’s apartment, Chamberlain mistakenly thought they’d guaranteed
European peace for a generation. Nazi Germany occupied the German
Sudetenland—taken from the Czechs—the next day. .gif)
In 1939, an air raid shelter was constructed in the building’s basement, featuring a 4.75-ton steel ceiling and an oak-panelled “Führer room” designed for Hitler’s personal use. This shelter, built by the construction firm Hochtief AG, was intended to protect occupants during Allied bombing raids, which intensified after 1941. Eva Braun, Hitler’s companion, frequently visited the apartment, entering discreetly via a rear entrance to maintain secrecy about their relationship. Her presence was noted in personal correspondence from Heinrich Hoffmann, Hitler’s photographer, who documented her visits between 1932 and 1939. The apartment’s furnishings, including a large mahogany desk and a collection of 18th-century German engravings, were meticulously catalogued by Gerdy Troost in 1930, reflecting Hitler’s preference for traditional Germanic aesthetics. The Nazi Party’s financial records indicate that maintenance costs for the apartment, including staff salaries and utilities, amounted to approximately 12,000 Reichsmarks annually by 1935, funded through party revenues and royalties from Mein Kampf, which sold over 1.5 million copies by 1939.
The residence hosted personal events that highlighted Hitler’s social circle. On April 4, 1932, Hitler held a celebratory dinner in the apartment for the wedding of Baldur von Schirach, head of the Hitler Youth, and Henriette Hoffmann, daughter of Heinrich Hoffmann. The event, attended by 12 guests, was noted in von Schirach’s memoirs as a rare instance of Hitler engaging in private social gatherings. The apartment’s dining room, adorned with a chandelier and heavy oak furniture, was described by Hoffmann as a setting that projected both power and restraint, aligning with Nazi propaganda efforts to portray Hitler as a cultured figure. In August 1939, Hitler met with Nazi scientist Jürgen Voller in the apartment to discuss advancements in the V-1 rocket programme, according to declassified Wehrmacht reports. These meetings, though infrequent, reinforced the apartment’s dual role as both a private retreat and a space for strategic discussions. The Nazi Party’s growing membership, reaching 150,000 by October 1929, provided the financial and political capital to sustain such a prominent residence, as noted by Volker Ullrich in his biography of Hitler.
After the war, the Free State of Bavaria assumed ownership of Prinzregentenplatz 16 in 1945, as Hitler’s private property was confiscated under Allied denazification policies. Since 1949, the building has housed various police authorities, including the Munich Police Inspectorate 22 whose service area includes the districts Bogenhausen, Denning, Daglfing, Englschalking, Johanneskirchen, Oberföhring, Steinhausen, Zamdorf and Haidhausen North on a total area of 25.4 square kilometres, preventing its transformation into a site of pilgrimage for neo-Nazis. The air raid shelter remains in the basement but is inaccessible to the public, as confirmed by Munich municipal records. The apartment itself is used for police seminars and administrative purposes, with no public access permitted except for authorised historians. A 2016 report by the Bavarian State Ministry of the Interior noted that the building’s exterior retains its original Art Nouveau features, including five balconies and floral ornaments, though the interior has been extensively remodelled. The Munich City Council’s decision to repurpose the building was driven by a desire to neutralise its historical significance, ensuring it serves a practical function rather than a symbolic one. The residence’s role in Nazi history, while significant, is documented primarily through archival records, photographs, and firsthand accounts from figures like Hoffmann and Miller, which provide a detailed picture of its use and condition during Hitler’s occupancy.
The writer and historian Edgar Feuchtwanger grew up perhaps 100 yards from Adolf Hitler during the Nazi era, before escaping Germany.
Other Munich Pages
Odeonsplatz
Over the side door a Nazi eagle remains, missing only its swastika whilst at the other end a wreath is shorn of its offending symbol as well. This is within a wing at the southeast corner added by German Bestelmeyer in 1937. Bestelmeyer served as a professor at the Technical University, and from 1934 until his death in 1942 he was President of the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts. He had been an outspoken advocate of traditionalist, völkisch architecture. He was a member of the Munich School to which Paul Troost also belonged. In 1928, with Paul Schultze-Naumburg, Paul Schmitthenner and others, he founded "The Block", a group of architects in opposition to the modernist group The Ring. He was singled out for praise in 1931 by Schultze-Naumburg and in 1934, after the Nazis came to power, wrote an article in which he endorsed Alexander von Senger's criticism of Le Corbusier, described 1920s architecture as having become "soulless", and rejected flat roofs as unsuited to the climate in Germany. He was a member of both the Werkbund and the antisemitic Militant League for German Culture. He became a Reich Cultural Senator in 1935. He brought von Senger to the Bavarian Academy and designed buildings such as the Luftwaffe office building on the across the screen seen above, which were much praised at the time. However, he also designed a number of mostly Protestant churches, some of which met with official approval, and Hitler chose his design for the Mangfall Bridge, a girder bridge on two massive concrete pylons carrying one of the new autobahns, which was influential in its simple modernity and size. Bestelmeyer died in 1942 at the resort of Bad Wiessee. 
On Hitler's orders, his body was brought back to Munich and after lying in state in the Academy of Fine Arts, transferred for the state funeral to the light-court of the University of Munich which he had designed, with 300 members of the Hitler Youth in attendance.
On Hitler's orders, his body was brought back to Munich and after lying in state in the Academy of Fine Arts, transferred for the state funeral to the light-court of the University of Munich which he had designed, with 300 members of the Hitler Youth in attendance.
Inside lying in storage is the guillotine with which the Scholl siblings were executed.
Hans and Sophie Scholl together with Christoph Probst were tried before the People’s Court on February 22. Graf, Schmorell, and Huber followed a few months later. (Schmorell had tried to flee to Switzerland, but had been hindered by deep snow. A former girlfriend, Gisela Schertling, allegedly betrayed him after recognizing him in a Munich air raid shelter.) The sentence for all was death by guillotine. When Hans put his head on the block, he shouted: “Long live freedom!” Sophie said to her parents, who had come to say good-bye from Ulm: “This will make waves.” But as courageous as her remarks were at the time, they were not prescient.Kater (129) Hitler Youth
Standing in front of Munich's Angel of Peace (Friedensengel) at the other end of Prinzregentenstrasse during the Day of German Art and today and as it appeared after the war below to men of the American 14th Armoured Division. It's really not an angel in the Christian sense, but a genius of peace depicted as the striding Greek goddess of victory Nike. Nor does she symbolise the ancient goddess of peace Eirene and so its symbolism is therefore more about emphasising victorious war as a prerequisite for peace and prosperity rather than a more banal statement. The monument was built to commemorate the peaceful quarter century since the Franco-German war and has the portraits of William I, Frederick III, Wilhelm II, the Bavarian rulers Ludwig II, Otto and Luitpold, the Imperial Chancellor Otto von Bismarck and the generals Helmuth von Moltke, Albrecht von Roon, Ludwig von der Tann, Jakob von Hartmann and Siegmund von Pranckh. Inside its hall are gold mosaics which depict the allegories of war and peace, victory and blessing for the culture. The foundation stone was laid on May 10, 1896; the unveiling was on July 16, 1899, the 28th anniversary of the entry of the victorious Bavarian troops into Munich. .gif)
The golden figure at the top is based on a statue of the Greek goddess of victory Nike found in Pompeii in 1822.
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The golden figure at the top is based on a statue of the Greek goddess of victory Nike found in Pompeii in 1822. Whilst it was seen as an omen that lightning struck the Angel of Peace in 1934 within the first year of Nazi rule, it was ironic that the monument remained unscathed in the hail of bombs during the war when the figure had to be camouflaged for air raid protection reasons. When it fell from the column in 1981, it was taken away so that the significant damages could be repaired. Two years later its leg and both wings were replaced with the position of the wing now steeper compared to its original state. In the basin there are four water-spouting dolphin riders, the six originals of which were originally designed by Wilhelm von Rümann for the Fortuna fountain on the terrace of Herrenchiemsee Palace. They ended up being badly damaged during the war and when the complex was rebuilt in 1968, restoration was initially dispensed with for cost reasons. It wasn't until the restoration of the Herrenchiemsee Fortuna fountain in 1990–1994 that the original six casts were restored, and four new bronze casts were created.
It was here on November 7, 1918 that 60,000 men marched from the Theresienwiese in order to proclaim the revolution under the leadership of Kurt Eisner. This so-called peace demonstration marked the beginning of the revolution. The MSPD and USPD had organised the demonstration on the Theresienwiese as most of the participants continued on to the Angel of Peace. A smaller group around Kurt Eisner went to the barracks, where they encountered no significant resistance. Workers' and soldiers' councils formed in the Mathäserbräu. After the state parliament building was occupied at 10 p.m., Kurt Eisner proclaimed the republic in front of the councils. As a result, King Ludwig III fled to his castle Wildenwart in Chiemgau that same night and the cabinet resigned. Just beyond is Hitler's Residence at Prinzregentenplatz 16
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Hitler's private residence at Prinzregentenplatz 16 in 1937 and standing in front today. This served as his primary home from October 1929 as
his reputation and fame grew outside of Munich and Bavaria as the head
of a party which won twelve seats after the previous year's
parliamentary election, until January 1933, when he assumed the role of Chancellor of Germany. The apartment, located on the second floor of a multi-storey building in the Bogenhausen district, spanned approximately 397.55 square metres and comprised nine rooms, including two bathrooms, two kitchens, a spacious hallway, and a cloakroom. The property was initially rented by Hitler for 4,176 Reichsmarks annually, with funds provided by the Nazi Party which in October 1930 purchased the entire building, securing it as Hitler's private property until his death on April 30, 1945. The building’s location in the prestigious Prinzregentenstraße, named after Prince Regent Luitpold of Bavaria, reflected the area’s status as an elite residential district, incorporated into Munich’s city limits in 1892. The apartment was decorated by Gerdy Troost, widow of
architect Paul Ludwig Troost, a member of the Nazi Party and
architectural advisor of Hitler who incorporated contemporary, Nazi-approved furniture and non-degenerate art, aligning with the regime’s aesthetic ideals. Hitler filled the apartment with works
of art he had collected, particularly nineteenth century German
paintings as well as German Old Masters. Hugo Bruckmann, a prominent Nazi benefactor and publisher, provided financial support for the acquisition and furnishing of the property, ensuring its grandeur matched Hitler’s rising political stature..gif)
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The apartment’s layout included a large reception hall, a dining room, and a study, which Hitler used for both personal and political purposes. The household at Prinzregentenplatz 16 was managed by the Reichert family, who'd previously served Hitler at his earlier residence on Thierschstraße 41. They relocated to the new apartment on October 5, 1929, overseeing domestic operations, including cleaning and maintenance. In 1925 Hitler brought his widowed half-sister Angela Raubal from Austria to serve as housekeeper until 1931, maintaining the residence’s operations during his frequent absences and for his rented villa The Berghof. She brought along her two daughters, Geli and Friedl. Hitler became very close to his niece Geli, and she moved into his apartment in 1929, when she was twenty. Their relationship is shrouded in mystery but was widely rumoured to be romantic. On September 18, 1931 she died of a gunshot wound in the apartment; the coroner proclaimed her death a suicide. Hitler was on his way to Erlangen to give a speech, but he returned immediately to Munich on hearing the news. By the time he arrived her body had been removed.
He took her death very hard and went into a depression. Hitler
did not attend the funeral in Vienna but instead
retreated to the home of his publisher Müller at the Tegernsee, spending
several days there with only his court photographer Heinrich
Hoffmann allowed to accompany him. Many feared the
shock of Geli’s unexpected death might lead him to commit suicide, too.
On the anniversary of his niece’s death on September 18, 1932, Hitler
secretly visited her grave in Vienna. Goebbels noted in his diary:
“Führer gone to Vienna for private visit. Nobody knows about it so that
there won’t be any crowds.” News of Hitler’s presence in Vienna leaked,
however, and led to many political rumours. On Hitler’s orders, Raubal’s
room remained untouched. Before the war, he spent every Christmas Eve
there in sentimental reflection.He mourned
her for years, maintaining her rooms exactly as they had been. Hitler
continued to live in the apartment until 1934, when he became Führer and
Reichskanzler of Germany. After that, Hitler kept the apartment, but
spent most of his time either in Berlin or in his Berghof residence. There
is a considerable speculation on the nature of Hitler's relationship
with Raubal. Nicholls (139) describes how "gossips could only guess" as
to whether they actually made love; Machtan in The Hidden Hitler (162)
states how "[o]ne can only speculate ... but it is unlikely that he
became intimate with her"; the thesis of Machtan's book is that Hitler
was homosexual. Christa Schroeder, one of Hitler's personal secretaries,
was convinced that Geli and Hitler did not have sexual relations, one
of Geli's friends and daughter of Hitler's photographer Heinrich
Hoffmann, Henrietta von Schirach, was also confident that the two did
not have sexual relations. On the other hand, psychoanalyst Walter C.
Langer argued that Hitler's sexual relationship with Geli was
coprophagic or coprophiliac, ultimately based on his masochism. Toland
states, rather paradoxically, that the "discreet love affair" between
Hitler and Geli was "most likely never consummated." Other historians, like Kershaw, simply decline to take a position on the ground that the matter is simply too speculative. .gif)
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In 1939, an air raid shelter was constructed in the building’s basement, featuring a 4.75-ton steel ceiling and an oak-panelled “Führer room” designed for Hitler’s personal use. This shelter, built by the construction firm Hochtief AG, was intended to protect occupants during Allied bombing raids, which intensified after 1941. Eva Braun, Hitler’s companion, frequently visited the apartment, entering discreetly via a rear entrance to maintain secrecy about their relationship. Her presence was noted in personal correspondence from Heinrich Hoffmann, Hitler’s photographer, who documented her visits between 1932 and 1939. The apartment’s furnishings, including a large mahogany desk and a collection of 18th-century German engravings, were meticulously catalogued by Gerdy Troost in 1930, reflecting Hitler’s preference for traditional Germanic aesthetics. The Nazi Party’s financial records indicate that maintenance costs for the apartment, including staff salaries and utilities, amounted to approximately 12,000 Reichsmarks annually by 1935, funded through party revenues and royalties from Mein Kampf, which sold over 1.5 million copies by 1939.The residence hosted personal events that highlighted Hitler’s social circle. On April 4, 1932, Hitler held a celebratory dinner in the apartment for the wedding of Baldur von Schirach, head of the Hitler Youth, and Henriette Hoffmann, daughter of Heinrich Hoffmann. The event, attended by 12 guests, was noted in von Schirach’s memoirs as a rare instance of Hitler engaging in private social gatherings. The apartment’s dining room, adorned with a chandelier and heavy oak furniture, was described by Hoffmann as a setting that projected both power and restraint, aligning with Nazi propaganda efforts to portray Hitler as a cultured figure. In August 1939, Hitler met with Nazi scientist Jürgen Voller in the apartment to discuss advancements in the V-1 rocket programme, according to declassified Wehrmacht reports. These meetings, though infrequent, reinforced the apartment’s dual role as both a private retreat and a space for strategic discussions. The Nazi Party’s growing membership, reaching 150,000 by October 1929, provided the financial and political capital to sustain such a prominent residence, as noted by Volker Ullrich in his biography of Hitler.
Hitler looking out from the balcony and the same view today. When
Hitler visited Munich after the seizure of power, the
Prinzregentenplatz was besieged by a cheering crowd. In the late summer
of 1937 he therefore gave the instruction to build a barrier opposite
the house Prinzregentenstraße 16 so that the people could no longer
"surround" him. The chains were used less and less in the following
years, because the private refuge in Munich since the beginning of the
thirties has lost importance - the Obersalzberg was now in the focus of
the Führer.
The war completely ended his private stays in the state capital. At the
end of August 1942, the house at Prinzregentenplatz 16 was not hit in
an air raid but was slightly damaged.
As the war progressed, Hitler’s time at Prinzregentenplatz 16 diminished, with his focus shifting to the Berghof in Obersalzberg and military headquarters like the Wolf’s Lair. By 1943, he rarely visited Munich, and the apartment was primarily maintained by staff. On April 30, 1945, the same day Hitler committed suicide in Berlin, American forces occupied the apartment, finding it largely intact. Vogue photographer Lee Miller, accompanied by David Scherman, documented the residence, famously photographing herself bathing in Hitler’s bathtub. Her diary, published in Vogue’s September 1945 issue, described the apartment as “ordinary” yet functional, with operational electricity, hot water, and an electric refrigerator. Items marked with Hitler’s initials, including linens and silverware, were noted, and many were taken by American soldiers as souvenirs. The U.S. Army’s 42nd Infantry Division inventoried the apartment’s contents, reporting the removal of approximately 80% of its furnishings by May 1, 1945. The building survived wartime bombing raids, unlike much of Munich, which suffered extensive damage from 71 air raids between 1942 and 1945, resulting in over 6,000 civilian deaths.
After the war, the Free State of Bavaria assumed ownership of Prinzregentenplatz 16 in 1945, as Hitler’s private property was confiscated under Allied denazification policies. Since 1949, the building has housed various police authorities, including the Munich Police Inspectorate 22 whose service area includes the districts Bogenhausen, Denning, Daglfing, Englschalking, Johanneskirchen, Oberföhring, Steinhausen, Zamdorf and Haidhausen North on a total area of 25.4 square kilometres, preventing its transformation into a site of pilgrimage for neo-Nazis. The air raid shelter remains in the basement but is inaccessible to the public, as confirmed by Munich municipal records. The apartment itself is used for police seminars and administrative purposes, with no public access permitted except for authorised historians. A 2016 report by the Bavarian State Ministry of the Interior noted that the building’s exterior retains its original Art Nouveau features, including five balconies and floral ornaments, though the interior has been extensively remodelled. The Munich City Council’s decision to repurpose the building was driven by a desire to neutralise its historical significance, ensuring it serves a practical function rather than a symbolic one. The residence’s role in Nazi history, while significant, is documented primarily through archival records, photographs, and firsthand accounts from figures like Hoffmann and Miller, which provide a detailed picture of its use and condition during Hitler’s occupancy.
Kunstbunker Tumulka
Down
the road on Prinzregentenstrasse 97, this was built in 1944 as a set of
flats surrounded by bunkers, one of which serves as the venue for contemporary art exhibitions.
Model of the apartment complex. In this May 1945 photo on the right one can see both Hitler's residence in the top centre and the apartment at the bottom-left.
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The Wagner memorial on Prinzregentenplatz on the 50th anniversary of Wagner's death on February 11, 1933. The marble monument itself was inaugurated exactly one day before the composer's hundredth birthday. Created by sculptor Heinrich Waderé based on the famous portrait of Tischbein by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe allowing the slight composer to assume a more favourable, sedentary pose. It was seen as a kind of "reparation" of the city of Munich to the artist, who had to leave the city in 1865 under pressure from the population. Richard Wagner Year 1933 began with a violent debate after Thomas Mann had given a lecture on the composer, in which he spoke out against his one-sided heroic glorification and argued for a differentiated interpretation of his works. The violent protest of the Richard-Wagner-Stadt München promptly followed. Mann did not return to Germany; on the day he left Munich members of the Bayerische Volkspartei were represented at the monument- on the left is Culture Minister Dr. Franz Goldenberger as the main speaker and Oberbürgermeister Karl Scharnagl (in the foreground wearing glasses).
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Other Munich Pages
Odeonsplatz
