The Deutsches Optisches Museum Jena is a science and technology museum displaying optical instruments from eight centuries. It gives a technical and cultural-historical survey of the development of optical instruments. The development of the city

Jena Jena () is a German city and the second largest city in Thuringia. Together with the nearby cities of Erfurt and Weimar, it forms the central metropolitan area of Thuringia with approximately 500,000 inhabitants, while the city itself has a po ...

to the centre of the optical industries since the mid-19th-century is integrated in the exhibition, connected with the lifeworks of

Ernst Abbe Ernst Karl Abbe HonFRMS (23 January 1840 – 14 January 1905) was a German physicist, optical scientist, entrepreneur, and social reformer. Together with Otto Schott and Carl Zeiss, he developed numerous optical instruments. He was also a c ...

Carl Zeiss Carl Zeiss (; 11 September 1816 – 3 December 1888) was a German scientific instrument maker, optician and businessman. In 1846 he founded his workshop, which is still in business as Carl Zeiss AG. Zeiss gathered a group of gifted practica ...

and Otto Schott. In cooperation with the art club Jena non-optical themes are offered in special exhibitions. Before the opening of the Zeiss Museum of Optics in

Oberkochen Oberkochen is a municipality (officially a town, despite its size) in the Ostalbkreis, in Baden-Württemberg, in Germany, central Europe. Name The name "Oberkochen" consists of the two German words "ober", meaning "above" or "upper", and "Ko ...

in 2014, the Deutsches Optisches Museum Jena was the only museum of its kind in

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

History

Besides the production of microscopes, Carl Zeiss took over repairing optical instruments of other manufacturers. He did this to pursue the rivalries development. At the turn from 19th to the 20th century, the staff of the Carl Zeiss company began to collect optical instruments. In June 1922, the

Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung The Carl-Zeiss- Stiftung (Carl Zeiss Foundation), legally located in Heidenheim an der Brenz and Jena, Germany, and with its administrative Headquarter in Stuttgart, is the sole shareholder of the two companies Carl Zeiss AG and Schott AG. It w ...

established the Optical Museum; the exhibition was located in the neighbouring Volkshaus (community hall). Johannes Schreiter and Hans Schlag designed a building for the 1917 founded "college of ophthalmology". The reinforced concrete construction was carried out during 1923/24 by the company

Dyckerhoff & Widmann (DYWIDAG) Dyckerhoff & Widmann AG (Dywidag) was a construction company based in Munich, Germany (formerly based in Karlsruhe, Wiesbaden and Berlin, Germany). History The company was founded under the name ''Lang & Co.'' in 1865 by the German cement pioneer ...

from Nuremberg. In October 1924, the exhibition was moved into the new building at no. 12 Carl-Zeiss-Platz in which it is still housed today. The collections were reserved for a selected group of people for purposes of research and not open to the public. During the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

in 1941/42, the exhibition was relocated to underground production facilities around Jena. The Optical Museum was preserved from the

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...

occupation's dismantling programme 1946. The first permanent exhibition was launched 1965 in the Griesbach Garden House. In 1976/77, the exhibition was returned to the building at no. 12 Carl-Zeiss-Platz. On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the death of Carl Zeiss in December 1988, the historical Zeiss-Workshop (circa 1860) was opened as part of the Optical Museum in the neighboured Volkshaus. Accompanied with the opening, the museum was renamed as the "Zeiss-Museum" but the name was changed back in 1991. In June 1992, the Optical Museum was taken into the trusteeship of the newly established Ernst-Abbe-Foundation. The historical Zeiss-Workshop was moved in 2002 from the Volkshaus to the Optical Museum. The Carl Zeiss Foundation, the Ernst Abbe Foundation, Carl Zeiss AG, the city of Jena and the Friedrich Schiller University in Jena joined forces to establish the Deutsches Optisches Museum Foundation on 9 September 2016. The Foundation has been tasked with expanding the existing Optical Museum and turning it into the Deutsches Optisches Museum.

Show-Rooms

The present exhibition covers an area of 1200 m² at three floors:

Ground

* History of

glasses Glasses, also known as eyeglasses or spectacles, are vision eyewear, with lenses (clear or tinted) mounted in a frame that holds them in front of a person's eyes, typically utilizing a bridge over the nose and hinged arms (known as temples ...

* Historical development of microscopy *

Telescope A telescope is a device used to observe distant objects by their emission, absorption, or reflection of electromagnetic radiation. Originally meaning only an optical instrument using lenses, curved mirrors, or a combination of both to observ ...

s and their masters *

History of photography The history of photography began in remote antiquity with the discovery of two critical principles: camera obscura image projection and the observation that some substances are visibly altered by exposure to light. There are no artifacts or de ...

* World of images:

camera obscura A camera obscura (; ) is a darkened room with a small hole or lens at one side through which an image is projected onto a wall or table opposite the hole. ''Camera obscura'' can also refer to analogous constructions such as a box or tent in w ...

peep show A peep show or peepshow is a presentation of a live sex show or pornographic film which is viewed through a viewing slot. Several historical media provided voyeuristic entertainment through hidden erotic imagery. Before the development of the c ...

s and

magic lantern The magic lantern, also known by its Latin name , is an early type of image projector that used pictures—paintings, prints, or photographs—on transparent plates (usually made of glass), one or more lenses, and a light source. Because a si ...

s *

Ophthalmological Ophthalmology ( ) is a surgical subspecialty within medicine that deals with the diagnosis and treatment of eye disorders. An ophthalmologist is a physician who undergoes subspecialty training in medical and surgical eye care. Following a medic ...

instruments * Carl Zeiss: life and work * Ernst Abbe * Otto Schott

Basement

* Historical Zeiss-Workshop 1860 *

Holograph An autograph or holograph is a manuscript or document written in its author's or composer's hand. The meaning of autograph as a document penned entirely by the author of its content, as opposed to a typeset document or one written by a copyist o ...

-collection *

Color Color (American English) or colour (British English) is the visual perceptual property deriving from the spectrum of light interacting with the photoreceptor cells of the eyes. Color categories and physical specifications of color are assoc ...

s * Milestones of optics (optical lab for classes)

Upper floor

* Planetarium equipment * Special exhibition * Lecture hall

External links

* {{Authority control Jena Museums in Thuringia Glass museums and galleries Science museums in Germany Photography museums and galleries in Germany Photographic technology museums Museums established in 1922 1922 establishments in Germany