The Kommern Open Air Museum (german: LVR-Freilichtmuseum Kommern) and Rhenish State Museum for Folk Art () in Kommern/

Eifel The Eifel (; lb, Äifel, ) is a low mountain range in western Germany and eastern Belgium. It occupies parts of southwestern North Rhine-Westphalia, northwestern Rhineland-Palatinate and the southern area of the German-speaking Community of ...

is one of the largest

open air museum An open-air museum (or open air museum) is a museum that exhibits collections of buildings and artifacts out-of-doors. It is also frequently known as a museum of buildings or a folk museum. Definition Open air is “the unconfined atmosphere� ...

s in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

, covering an area of over 95

hectare The hectare (; SI symbol: ha) is a non-SI metric unit of area equal to a square with 100-metre sides (1 hm2), or 10,000 m2, and is primarily used in the measurement of land. There are 100 hectares in one square kilometre. An acre is a ...

s and displaying around 67 historic buildings from the

Prussia Prussia, , Old Prussian: ''Prūsa'' or ''Prūsija'' was a German state on the southeast coast of the Baltic Sea. It formed the German Empire under Prussian rule when it united the German states in 1871. It was ''de facto'' dissolved by an em ...

Rhine Province The Rhine Province (german: Rheinprovinz), also known as Rhenish Prussia () or synonymous with the Rhineland (), was the westernmost province of the Kingdom of Prussia and the Free State of Prussia, within the German Reich, from 1822 to 1946. It ...

. It is operated by the

Rhineland The Rhineland (german: Rheinland; french: Rhénanie; nl, Rijnland; ksh, Rhingland; Latinised name: ''Rhenania'') is a loosely defined area of Western Germany along the Rhine, chiefly its middle section. Term Historically, the Rhinelands ...

Regional Association (, LVR).

History

The planning for an open-air museum in the Rhineland dates back to the 1950s. Approximately 30 cities, towns and villages between Aachen, Cologne and the Ruhr area, including Duisburg, Krefeld, Rheydt and Kommern (today part of

Mechernich Mechernich (, ksh, Meischernisch) is a town in the district of Euskirchen in the south of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located in the "Naturpark Nordeifel" in the Eifel hills, approx. 15 km south-west of Euskirchen a ...

, but still independent at that time) applied for the privilege. The selection of Kommern on 28 March 1958 in a run-off election against Krefeld is said to have been thanks to the work of Kommern's Norbert Leduc. The museum was opened on 20 July 1961. Its leaders have been Adelhart Zippelius (to 1981), Dieter Pesch (1981 to 2007) and Josef Mangold (2008 to present).

Museum

Around 67 buildings, including

farmyard A barnyard or farmyard is an enclosed or open yard adjoining a barn,Oxford English Dictionary Second Edition on CD-ROM (v. 4.0) © Oxford University Press 2009. Barn. n. and, typically, related farm buildings, including a farmhouse. Enclosed ...

wind mill A windmill is a structure that converts wind power into rotational energy using vanes called sails or blades, specifically to mill grain (gristmills), but the term is also extended to windpumps, wind turbines, and other applications, in some par ...

s, workshops, village community buildings like schools, bakehouses, dancing halls and chapels, all of which originated on the territory of the former Prussian Rhine Province and its predecessors, have been gathered together in four groups. Arable fields, vegetable gardens and orchards complete the picture. The exhibits come predominantly from the Westerwald/ Middle Rhine region, from the

mountains and Voreifel foothills, from the

Lower Rhine The Lower Rhine (german: Niederrhein; kilometres 660 to 1,033 of the river Rhine) flows from Bonn, Germany, to the North Sea at Hook of Holland, Netherlands (including the Nederrijn or "Nether Rhine" within the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta); al ...

and from the Bergisches Land. They portray everyday life from the 15th century. Under construction is another group of buildings, the Rhineland Marketplace (), which illustrate the rural and small-town life of the Rhineland, both at home and work, from the 1950s to the 1980s. With that the Kommern Open Air Museum will also become a museum of everyday culture of life in the 20th century. In addition the museum has permanent and changing exhibitions in its role as the Rhenish State Museum for Folk Culture (). The Kommern Open Air Museum has an annual programme with around 70 special events. Major events are the ('Annual Market in the Year Dot'), which takes place from Easter Saturday to

White Sunday White Sunday, (in the Samoan language ''Lotu Tamaiti'', literally "Children's Service"), is a national holiday in Samoa falling on the second Sunday of October, with the Monday following a public holiday. It is also celebrated in American Samoa ...

, the ('Time Window'), which looks back 50 years to the Rhineland and the wider world, ('After the Harvest') on the third or fourth weekend in September and ('Advent for All Senses') in the first week of Advent. A focal point for the museum is its living history programme. Under the motto ('History in Action'), actors meet the visitors in the first person as historically identifiable people or as everyday folk from a particular time and social situation and "draw" the museum guests into the past.

Permanent exhibitions

('We Rhinelanders') In this exhibition the history of the Rhineland and the live of the Rhinelanders is portrayed from the time of the French occupation in 1794 to the start of the economic miracle after 1950. The visitor walks through a historical avenue in an exhibition hall with more than 50 replica buildings from the Rhineland, in which scenarios about Rhenish history are presented. In addition, there are several changing exhibitions.

Photography ban

There is a ''de facto'' ban on photography in the museum. Private photography is permitted in principle, but any publication of photos and videos, even on non-commercial platforms, is forbidden.http://www.kommern.lvr.de/de/den_besuch_planen/praktische_infos/fotografieren/Detailseite.html Internetangebot des Museums, retrieved 15 May 2015.

Literature

* LVR-Freilichtmuseum Kommern. Rheinisches Landesmuseum für Volkskunde. Museum guide, revised by Michael H. Faber. Auf der Grundlage des vorherigen Museumsführers by Joachim Hähnel, revised by Michael Faber and Manuela Schütze, Cologne, 2000. (= Führer und Schriften des LVR-Freilichtmuseums Kommern - Rheinischen Landesmuseums für Volkskunde No. 62)

Gallery

KOMKUECH.jpg, Kitchen of the 1616 house from

Kessenich Kessenich () is a village in the Belgian province Limburg. It is a section of the municipality of Kinrooi, lying in the eastern end of the municipality. Geography Kessenich is the end of the ''Grensmaas'', the part of the Meuse who forms a natur ...

Mill (2), Freilichtmuseum Kommern, 1978.jpg, A smock mill from Cantrup KOMMUEHL.jpg, View inside the mill KOMSCHMI.jpg, Smithy from Bornich

References

External links

Homepage des Freilichtmuseums Kommern
retrieved 3 April 2013
Ausstellung: Wir Rheinländer

Ausstellung: Schöne neue Welt – Rheinländer erobern Amerika
{{coord, 50, 36, 40.86, N, 6, 37, 46.74, E, region:DE-NW_type:landmark, display=title Open-air museums in Germany Museums in North Rhine-Westphalia Museums in the Eifel Buildings and structures in Euskirchen (district) Farm museums in Germany