“Cornelia Gurlitt: the Journey of the Heart. Kaunas and Vilnius accents 1915–1917”

1. M. Žilinskas Art Gallery, Nepriklausomybės St. 12, Kaunas

Opening on 4th of February at 5 p. m.

The exhibition “Cornelia Gurlitt: the Journey of the Heart. Kaunas and Vilnius accents 1915–1917”

Lithographs and drawings by Cornelia Gurlitt (1890–1919) reveal the drama of an artist, who served as the sister of mercy at Vilnius’ German military hospital during the years of WWI. Her life and work are presented in the background of Vilnius views, captured by Generalfeldmarshall Hermann von Eichhorn army‘s photographers, as well as through the thoughts of her contemporaries.

The exhibition is based on the collection of sixteen drawings and lithographs by Cornelia Gurlitt, donated to the Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum by Dr. Hubert Portz, owner of Kunsthaus Desiree Art Gallery in Germany as well as on 7 additional works from private collections. The biggest part of the works is created in Vilnius, „the Eastern front“, in 1917, where Cornelia Gurlitt served as a sister of mercy, starting from 1915. Cornelia Gurlitt, who died so young, was only seldom mentioned in the media during WWI and after; she has only recently been discovered.

Cornelia Gurlitt was already known as talented artist in Germany, in 1914, where she held two exhibitions. Artist met the love of her life, art critic and editor Paul Fechter in WWI years, in Vilnius. Love became one of the reasons, making her talent to blossom. “What she produced in the way of drawings, lithographs and paintings was among the most powerfully expressive art of those years and above all, was hardly paralleled in the achievements of the female artists of the era“, wrote Paul Fechter in his art history book, in 1949.

Cornelia Gurlitt was a person of her time: she embraced expressionism not only as a means of artistic expression but also as an existential philosophy; this worldview was fully in line with the German expressionism; the person/creator perceives her loneliness and separation, her inability to solve social problems. Cornelia’s anxiety and inner contradictions are transformed into works characterised by twisted, roughly stylised forms, and broken lines. The artist exposes in this manner not only her work but her inner state too.

Thanks to Dr Hubert Portz’s diligent research, through Cornelia’s eyes we can see wartime Vilnius and the Kaiser’s 10^th Army under the command of Generalfeldmarschall Hermann von Eichhorn, which was in charge of the Oberost province from the end of 1915. In his article Affairs of the Heart (printed in the catalogue of the exhibition) Dr Portz published excerpts from letters of the painter conveying the reality of Vilnius of that period. In 2010 the collection of authentic digitalised photos of the Kaiser’s Army and the sights of Vilnius was donated to the museum by Rolf Dyckerhoff from Wiesbaden (Germany), great-great-grandson of Hermann von Eichhorn         .

In the end of 2014 Bern Museum (Switzerland) published the list of the art works of the collection, inherited from Cornelius Gurlitt, the nephew of Cornelia Gurlitt and the son her brother Hilderbrand Gurlitt, who was one of infamous Nazi looted art collectors. It became clear that in his secret collection Hilderbrand Gurlitt saved 138 his sister‘s artworks, dated from 1914 to 1919. The arrangements are being made to present these art works in Vilnius in the near future.

Curator of the exhibition: Ieva Šadzevičienė

Organizers of the exhibition: Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum, Patron of the Exhibition Dr. Hubert Portz.

Partners: Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany in Vilnius, Embassy of the Republic of Lithuania to Germany, ValiunasEllex

Illustrations © Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum

Exhibition works: 04 02 2016–10 04 2016