The Dresden Academy of Fine Arts (

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

''Hochschule für Bildende Künste Dresden''), often abbreviated HfBK Dresden or simply HfBK, is a

vocational university A vocational university or university of applied sciences (UAS), less commonly called a polytechnic university is an institution of higher education and increasingly research that provides applied professional education and grants academic de ...

visual arts The visual arts are art forms such as painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics (art), ceramics, photography, video, image, filmmaking, design, crafts, and architecture. Many artistic disciplines such as performing arts, conceptual a ...

located in

Dresden Dresden (; ; Upper Saxon German, Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; , ) is the capital city of the States of Germany, German state of Saxony and its second most populous city after Leipzig. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, 12th most p ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

. The present institution is the product of a merger between the famous Dresden Art Academy, founded in 1764, the workplace and training ground of a number of influential European artists, and another well-established local art school, Hochschule für Werkkunst Dresden, after

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

History

Buildings

One of three buildings of today’s Dresden Academy of Fine Arts, the former Royal Academy of Arts, built in 1894, is located at a prominent position in town on

Brühl's Terrace Brühl's Terrace () is a historic architectural ensemble in Dresden, Germany. Nicknamed "The Balcony of Europe", the terrace stretches high above the bank of the river Elbe, and is located north of the recently rebuilt Neumarkt Square and the F ...

just next to the Frauenkirche. Since 1991, the building built by Constantin Lipsius on Brühl's Terrace between 1887 and 1894 – the glass dome of which is also known as Lemon Squeezer due to its form – has been heavily renovated and the parts that were destroyed during World War II were reconstructed. The studios for painting/graphic arts/sculpture/other artistic media, the graphic workshops, the rector's office and the exhibition rooms of the Academy, which house the annual graduation exhibitions of the graduates, are located on Brühl's Terrace. On the side of the building facing the

Elbe The Elbe ( ; ; or ''Elv''; Upper Sorbian, Upper and , ) is one of the major rivers of Central Europe. It rises in the Giant Mountains of the northern Czech Republic before traversing much of Bohemia (western half of the Czech Republic), then Ge ...

, the names of

Pheidias Phidias or Pheidias (; , ''Pheidias''; ) was an Ancient Greek sculptor, painter, and architect, active in the 5th century BC. His Statue of Zeus at Olympia was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Phidias also designed the statues o ...

Iktinos Ictinus (; , ''Iktinos'') was an architect active in the mid 5th century BC. Ancient sources identify Ictinus and Callicrates as co-architects of the Parthenon. He co-wrote a book on the project – which is now lost – in collaboration with C ...

Praxiteles Praxiteles (; ) of Athens, the son of Cephisodotus the Elder, was the most renowned of the Attic sculptors of the 4th century BC. He was the first to sculpt the nude female form in a life-size statue. While no indubitably attributable sculpture ...

Polykleitos Polykleitos (; ) was an ancient Greek sculptor, active in the 5th century BCE. Alongside the Athenian sculptors Pheidias, Myron and Praxiteles, he is considered as one of the most important sculptors of classical antiquity. The 4th century B ...

Lysippos Lysippos (; ) was a Greek sculptor of the 4th century BC. Together with Scopas and Praxiteles, he is considered one of the three greatest sculptors of the Classical Greek era, bringing transition into the Hellenistic period. Problems confron ...

Erwin von Steinbach Erwin von Steinbach (c. 1244 – 17 January 1318) was a German architect, and was a central figure in the construction of the Strasbourg Cathedral. Biography According to a tradition which arose in a later age, he was called Erwin von Stei ...

Leonardo da Vinci Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 1452 - 2 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially rested o ...

Michelangelo Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (6March 147518February 1564), known mononymously as Michelangelo, was an Italian sculptor, painter, architect, and poet of the High Renaissance. Born in the Republic of Florence, his work was inspir ...

Raphael Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino (; March 28 or April 6, 1483April 6, 1520), now generally known in English as Raphael ( , ), was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. List of paintings by Raphael, His work is admired for its cl ...

and Dürer are inscribed on the wall and on the other side the motto "''DEM VATERLAND ZU ZIER UND EHR''" - "For the Honour and Adornment of the Fatherland" - is inscribed. Apart from this building, the Academy owns the building for sculpture in Pfotenhauerstrasse, the studios and workshops of which were built in a big open-air exhibition ground in 1910. The workshops and studios for the courses of study of restoration, stage setting and costume design and the technical college degree course for theatre setting and costume design are located at Güntzstrasse in the buildings of the former Academy of Applied Arts.

Institution

Predecessors

In 1764, the “Allgemeine Kunst-Academie der Malerey, Bildhauer-Kunst, Kupferstecher- und Baukunst” (General Academy of Arts for Painting, Sculpture, Copperplate Engraving and Architecture) was founded by order of the Prince-Elector Frederick Christian. From 1768 to 1786 it was located in the

Fürstenberg Palace Fürstenberg (also Fuerstenberg and Furstenberg) may refer to: Historical states * Fürstenberg-Baar, county (1441–1559) * Fürstenberg-Blumberg, county (1559–1614) * Fürstenberg-Donaueschingen, county (1617–1698) * Fürstenberg-Fürs ...

. Its first director was the Frenchmen Charles Hutin. After the death of Hutin in 1776,

Johann Eleazar Zeissig Johann Eleazar Zeissig, also known as Schenau (7 November 1737 – 23 August 1806), was a German genre, portrait and porcelain painter, and engraver; director of the Royal Academy of Arts in Dresden. Life Schenau was born in 1737, the son of ...

, referred to as Schenau, became alternating director of the Academy together with

Giovanni Battista Casanova Giovanni Battista Casanova (; 2 November 1730 – 8 December 1795) was an Italian painter and printmaker of the Neoclassic period. He was a brother of Giacomo Casanova and Francesco Giuseppe Casanova and was born in Venice. He studied pa ...

. The Academy was the successor institution of the first “Zeichen- und Malerschule” (School for Drawing and Painters) founded in 1680. It was one of the oldest academies of art in the German-speaking area. In 1950 the Akademie der Bildenden Künste Dresden (Dresden Academy of Fine Arts) was merged with the Staatliche Hochschule für Werkkunst (Public Academy of Applied Art) – the successor of the Königlich Sächsische Kunstgewerbeschule (Royal Saxon School of Applied Art)– into today's "Hochschule für Bildende Künste Dresden” (Dresden Academy of Fine Arts).

Features

The Academy is provided with presentation space in the octagon below the glass dome referred to as “Lemon Squeezer” that is a landmark in the town, and in the two big adjacent exhibition rooms as well as the former library and the “Galerie Brühlsche Terrasse” (Brühl’s Terrace Gallery) which may be used by students from all degree courses and co-operation partners of the Academy.

Degree courses

The degree course of Bildende Kunst (Fine Art) consists of 10 semesters and leads to the

Diplom A ''Diplom'' (, from ) is an academic degree in the German-speaking countries Germany, Austria, and Switzerland and a similarly named degree in some other European countries including Albania, Bulgaria, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia ...

degree. The degree course Kunsttechnologie, Konservierung und Restaurierung von Kunst- und Kulturgut (Art Technology, Preservation and Restoration of Artistic and Cultural Assets) is one of the oldest courses on university level in Germany. The Laboratory Theatre in the Güntzstrasse completed in April 2000 houses a rehearsal and experimental stage room.

Notable alumni and former faculty

Former faculty members

One of its most illustrious teachers was

Bernardo Bellotto Bernardo Bellotto (c. 1721/2 or 30 January 172117 November 1780), was an Italians, Italian urban Landscape art, landscape Painting, painter or ''vedutista'', and printmaker in etching famous for his Veduta, ''vedute'' of European cities – Dr ...

, a painter of town scapes of Dresden. At the beginning of the 19th century, painters such as

Anton Graff Anton Graff (18 November 1736 – 22 June 1813) was a Swiss portrait artist. Among his famous subjects were Friedrich Schiller, Christoph Willibald Gluck, Heinrich von Kleist, Frederick the Great, Friederike Sophie Seyler, Johann Gottfried Herde ...

and Adrian Zingg made the Dresden Academy one of the most important art schools in Europe. The engraver Johann Friedrich Wilhem Müller, author of a famous engraving of the

Sistine Madonna The ''Sistine Madonna'', also called the ''Madonna di San Sisto'', is an oil painting by the Italian artist Raphael. The painting was commissioned in 1512 by Pope Julius II for the church of San Sisto, Piacenza, and probably executed ''c.'' 15 ...

after Raphael, was a professor at the Akademie from 1814 to 1816. Ernst Rietschel,

Gottfried Semper Gottfried Semper (; 29 November 1803 – 15 May 1879) was a German architect, art critic, and professor of architecture who designed and built the Semper Opera House in Dresden between 1838 and 1841. In 1849 he took part in the May Uprising in ...

and

Ludwig Richter Adrian Ludwig Richter (September 28, 1803June 19, 1884) was a German painter and etcher, who was strongly influenced by Erhard and Daniel Chodowiecki, Chodowiecki. He was a representative of both Romanticism and Biedermeier styles. He was th ...

consolidated the reputation of the academy, which experienced a further zenith around the turn of the century. Many other eminent artists and scholars closely associated with the history of the Academy include

Eugen Bracht Eugen Felix Prosper Bracht (3 June 1842 – 5 November 1921) was a German landscape painter. Biography Bracht was born in Morges, Waadt (near Lake Geneva in Switzerland) of German parents. His family later moved to Darmstadt, Germany, where ...

Giovanni Casanova Giovanni Battista Casanova (; 2 November 1730 – 8 December 1795) was an Italian painter and printmaker of the Neoclassicism, Neoclassic period. He was a brother of Giacomo Casanova and Francesco Giuseppe Casanova and was born in Venice. He ...

Caspar David Friedrich Caspar David Friedrich (; 5 September 1774 – 7 May 1840) was a German Romanticism, German Romantic Landscape painting, landscape painter, generally considered the most important German artist of his generation, whose often symbolic, and anti ...

Oskar Kokoschka Oskar Kokoschka (1 March 1886 – 22 February 1980) was an Austrian artist, poet, playwright and teacher, best known for his intense expressionistic portraits and landscapes, as well as his theories on vision that influenced the Viennese Expre ...

, and

Otto Dix Wilhelm Heinrich Otto Dix (; 2 December 1891 – 25 July 1969) was a German painter and Printmaking, printmaker, noted for his ruthless and harshly realistic depictions of German society during the Weimar Republic and the brutality of war. Alon ...

, who taught at the Dresden Academy and shaped its profile.The Saatchi Gallery : London Contemporary Art Gallery http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/artcolleges/ArtCollege/ac_id/880 Other former artist professors are: *

Karl Albiker Karl Albiker (16 September 1878 – 26 February 1961) was a German sculptor, lithographer and teacher of fine arts. Albiker studied with Auguste Rodin in Paris. From 1919 to 1945 he was a professor at the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts. His monum ...

Johan Christian Dahl Johan Christian Claussen Dahl (24 February 178814 October 1857), often known as or , was a Danish- Norwegian artist who is considered the first great romantic painter in Norway, the founder of the "golden age" of Norwegian painting. He is often ...

* Constantin Lipsius * Richard Müller * Georg Hermann Nicolai * Moritz Retzsch *

Paul Wallot Johann Paul Wallot (26 June 1841 Oppenheim am Rhein – 10 August 1912 Bad Schwalbach) was a German architect of Huguenot descent, best known for designing the Reichstag building in Berlin, erected between 1884 and 1894. He also built the adjacen ...

famous artist presidents: * Johannes Heisig (1989–91)

Alumni

Carl Gustav Carus Carl Gustav Carus (3 January 1789 – 28 July 1869) was a German physiologist and painter, born in Leipzig, who played various roles during the Romanticism, Romantic era. A friend of the writer Johann Wolfgang Goethe, he was a many-sided man: a ...

, (1789–1869), German physiologist and painter *

(1891–1969), German painter and printmaker * Conrad Felixmüller (1897–1977), German painter and printmaker * Fedor Flinzer (1832–1911), German author, educator, and illustrator * Hilde Goldschmidt (1897-1980), German painter and printmaker * Tatyana Grosman (1904–1982), Russian American printmaker, and publisher *

George Grosz George Grosz (; ; born Georg Ehrenfried Groß; July 26, 1893 – July 6, 1959) was a German artist known especially for his caricatural drawings and paintings of Berlin life in the 1920s. He was a prominent member of the Berlin Dada and New Obj ...

(1893–1959), German painter and caricaturist * Eberhard Havekost (born 1967), German painter and stonemason * Friedrich Heyser (1857–1921), German painter * Kurt Hilscher (1904–1980), German commercial illustrator * Ludwig von Hofmann (1861–1945), German painter, graphic artist and designer * Wilhelm von Kügelgen (1802–1867), German painter and writer * Elfriede Lohse-Wächtler (1899–1940), German painter and graphic artist *

Yana Milev Yana Milev is a German cultural theorist, sociologist, ethnographer, and curator. Life Yana Milev was born in Leipzig, East Germany, the first child of the Bulgarian physician and anthropologist Gancho Milev, who had immigrated to the GDR i ...

, German philosopher, sociologist, and ethnographer * Otto Mueller (1874–1930), German painter and printmaker *

Rolf Nesch Rolf (Emil Rudolf) Nesch (January 7, 1893 – October 27, 1975) was a German-born Norwegian expressionist artist, especially noted for his printmaking. Career Nesch was born at Esslingen am Neckar in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. He was the son ...

(1893–1975), Norwegian printmaker, painter and sculptor * Bencho Obreshkov (1899–1970), Bulgarian painter *

Julius Platzmann Karl Julius Platzmann (born 31 January 1832 in Leipzig; died 6 September 1902 in Leipzig) was a German botanist, artist and bibliophile who published exact facsimile editions of rare early missionary grammars of indigenous languages of the Americ ...

(1832-1902), German botanist, artist and bibliophile * Hermann Prell (1854–1922), German history painter and sculptor * Sandra Rauch (born 1967), German artist * Thomas Reichstein (born 1960), German sculptor *

Adrian Ludwig Richter Adrian Ludwig Richter (September 28, 1803June 19, 1884) was a German painter and etcher, who was strongly influenced by Erhard and Chodowiecki. He was a representative of both Romanticism and Biedermeier styles. He was the most popular, a ...

(1803–1884), German painter and etcher *

Gerhard Richter Gerhard Richter (; born 9 February 1932) is a German visual artist. Richter has produced Abstract art, abstract as well as photorealistic paintings, photographs and Glass art, glass pieces. He is widely regarded as one of the most important con ...

(born 1932), German painter and photographer * Osmar Schindler (1869–1927), German painter *

Cornelia Schleime Cornelia Schleime (born July 4, 1953) is a German painter, performer, filmmaker and author. Born in East Berlin under the East Germany, GDR, she studied painting and graphic arts at the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts before becoming a member of the C ...

(born 1953), German painter, performer, filmmaker and author * Sascha Schneider (1870–1927), German painter and sculptor *

Kurt Schwitters Kurt Hermann Eduard Karl Julius Schwitters (20 June 1887 – 8 January 1948) was a German artist. He was born in Hanover, Germany, but lived in exile from 1937. Schwitters worked in several genres and media, including Dadaism, Constructivism (a ...

, (1887–1948) German painter * Lasar Segall (1891–1957), Brazilian painter, engraver and sculptor * Karl August Senff (1770–1838), Baltic German painter, engraver and art teacher * Hans Unger (1872–1936), German painter *

Otto Kaule Otto is a masculine German given name and a surname. It originates as an Old High German short form (variants '' Audo'', '' Odo'', '' Udo'') of Germanic names beginning in ''aud-'', an element meaning "wealth, prosperity". The name is recorded fr ...

(1870–1948), German painter

Locations

The Dresden Academy of Fine Arts is located at three places along the Elbe river: * Brühlsche Terrasse 1, Dresden-Altstadt * Güntzstraße 34, Dresden * Pfotenhauerstrasse 81/83, Dresden-Johannstadt Each year in early June the graduation ceremonies and annual exhibitions are held at the locations on the Brühl Terrace and at Pfotenhauerstrasse.

References

{{Authority control Education in Dresden 1764 establishments in the Holy Roman Empire Educational institutions established in 1764 Universities and colleges established in the 18th century Universities and colleges in Saxony