Jakob Rosenberg (September 5, 1893 – April 7, 1980) was a German-American art historian and Rembrandt scholar. He was active in Germany until his 1937 emigration to the United States, where he joined the faculty of

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

. In addition to his professorship he was the curator of prints at the

Fogg Museum The Harvard Art Museums are part of Harvard University and comprise three museums: the Fogg Museum (established in 1895), the Busch-Reisinger Museum (established in 1903), and the Arthur M. Sackler Museum (established in 1985), and four research ...

. Rosenberg retired in 1964, but continued his scholarly activities until his 1980 death in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Rosenberg was born in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European Union by population within ci ...

into a family of art dealers, including four brothers, among them Saemy Rosenberg (1893–1971). During the years 1912 to 1914 he first did an internship in the art trade in Munich. After serving in a cavalry unit in

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

he was wounded, captured by the British and sent to Scotland. In 1915 and was sent to Switzerland by prisoner exchange. After the war he studied art history in Bern and Zurich, then in Frankfurt and Munich, where he received his doctorate under

Heinrich Wölfflin Heinrich Wölfflin (; 21 June 1864 – 19 July 1945) was a Swiss art historian, esthetician and educator, whose objective classifying principles ("painterly" vs. "linear" and the like) were influential in the development of formal analysis in ar ...

. He then worked for Max J. Friedlander in the Berlin print cabinet ''

Kupferstichkabinett Berlin The Kupferstichkabinett, or Museum of Prints and Drawings, is a prints museum in Berlin, Germany. It is part of the Berlin State Museums, and is located in the Kulturforum on Potsdamer Platz. It is the largest museum of graphic art in Germany, ...

'', where he also had contact with

Wilhelm von Bode Wilhelm von Bode (10 December 1845 – 1 March 1929) was a German art historian and museum curator. Born Arnold Wilhelm Bode in Calvörde, he was ennobled in 1913. He was the creator and first curator of the Kaiser Friedrich Museum, now c ...

. In 1935 he became a curator there but was dismissed the same year for racial reasons. After a visit to

in 1936, Jakob Rosenberg emigrated to the United States in 1937, where he was admitted to Harvard through

Adolph Goldschmidt Adolph Goldschmidt (15 January 1863 – 5 January 1944) was a Jewish German art historian. He taught at University of Berlin from 1892 to 1903, and University of Halle from 1904 to 1912. Biography He was born on 15 January 1863 in Hamburg, Ge ...

and his friend Paul Sachs. He was first a research fellow and lecturer, then in 1940 associate professor and in 1947 full professor. His 1948 overview work on Rembrandt was reprinted in 1964 and 1968, holding its own as a standard work during the early years of the

Rembrandt Research Project The Rembrandt Research Project (RRP) was an initiative of the Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek (NWO), which is the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research. Its purpose was to organize and categorize research on Remb ...

. He was also director of the Graphic Collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston from 1939. In 1954 he was elected to the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, a ...

. Jakob Rosenberg married Elisabeth Husserl (1882–1981), daughter of

Edmund Husserl , thesis1_title = Beiträge zur Variationsrechnung (Contributions to the Calculus of Variations) , thesis1_url = https://fedora.phaidra.univie.ac.at/fedora/get/o:58535/bdef:Book/view , thesis1_year = 1883 , thesis2_title ...

, in 1922. By 1937 they had two children–Wolfgang and Ruth. Rosenberg died in

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 U.S. census was 118,403, making it the fourth most populous city in the state, behind Boston ...

in 1980.

Publications

* ''Die Handzeichnungen von

Martin Schongauer Martin Schongauer (c. 1450–53, Colmar – 2 February 1491, Breisach), also known as Martin Schön ("Martin beautiful") or Hübsch Martin ("pretty Martin") by his contemporaries, was an Alsatian engraver and painter. He was the most important ...

''. München 1923 (Dissertation). * ''

Jacob van Ruisdael Jacob Isaackszoon van Ruisdael (; 1629 – 10 March 1682) was a Dutch painter, draughtsman, and etcher. He is generally considered the pre-eminent landscape painter of the Dutch Golden Age, a period of great wealth and cultural ach ...

'', Berlin 1928. * with Elfried Bock: ''Die Zeichnungen alter Meister im Kupfertichkabinett. Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. Die Niederländischen Meister'', Frankfurt a. M. 1930. *with Max J. Friedländer: ''Die Gemälde von Lucas Cranach''. Berlin 1932; 2. edition, Basel 1979. *'' Rembrandt. Life and Work'', Cambridge, Mass. 1948. * ''Great Draughtsmen from Pisanello to Picasso''. Cambridge, Mass. 1959. Revised edition 1974. *''Die Zeichnungen Lucas Cranachs d. Ä''. Berlin, 1960. *with Seymour Slive. ''Dutch Art and Architecture, 1600 to 1800''. Baltimore, 1966. *''On Quality in Art: Criteria of Excellence, Past and Present'' (Bollingen series 35). Princeton, 1969.

References

External links

Obituary
in

The Crimson ''The Harvard Crimson'' is the student newspaper of Harvard University and was founded in 1873. Run entirely by Harvard College undergraduates, it served for many years as the only daily newspaper in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Beginning in the f ...

Jakob Rosenberg
in the

Dictionary of Art Historians The ''Dictionary of Art Historians'' (DAH) is an online encyclopedia of topics relating to art historians, art critics and their dictionaries. The mission of the project is to provide free, reliable, English-language information on published art ...

Memorial Minute
" Harvard University, 1983. German art historians Rembrandt scholars Emigrants from Nazi Germany to the United States American art historians 1893 births 1980 deaths People from Berlin {{Germany-art-historian-stub