History of the Dr Hermann Klumpp collection

The Quedlinburg-born Hermann Klumpp (1902–1987) was already a law graduate when he began to pursue his passion for art, studying architecture at the Bauhaus in Dessau from 1929 to 1932. It was there that he wrote his study on abstract painting, “Abstraktion in der Malerei”, examining the visual concepts of Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky and Lyonel Feininger.

The collector's intellectual closeness to Feininger as an artist corresponded to his emotional closeness to his family. After the closure of the Bauhaus in Dessau (1932) and before the Feiningers emigrated to the United States (1937), they placed significant pieces of their work, which they were forced to leave behind, in the hands of their friend. These works, denounced as “degenerate”, were saved from destruction by Klumpp in the remote town of Quedlinburg.

After the death of Julia Feininger (1970) and once the question of the collection's ownership had been agreed upon with the artist’s heirs, the decision was made to open the collection to the public. As a result, the Lyonel Feininger Gallery was founded, and has managed the world’s largest individual collection of Feininger's prints since 1986.