Alte Nationalgalerie

In the location's words:

The Alte Nationalgalerie on Berlin’s Museum Island is the main building of the Nationalgalerie, whose collection is now also housed in the Neue Nationalgalerie, the Hamburger Bahnhof, the Friedrichswerdersche Kirche, the Museum Berggruen, and the Scharf-Gerstenberg Collection.

The idea of creating a “sanctuary for art and science” in the heart of Berlin—between the City Palace, the Cathedral, and the University—can be traced back to Frederick William IV. The basic architectural concept of today’s Alte Nationalgalerie—a temple-like structure with a high plinth and classical styling—also originated with the king himself. The plans were later brought to fruition by Friedrich August Stüler, a student of Schinkel, who had previously designed theNeues Museum. After Stüler’s death, Johann Heinrich Strack, also a student of Schinkel, completed the museum.

The impetus for building a National Gallery was the bequest by the banker and consul Joachim Heinrich Wilhelm Wagener, who had bequeathed his collection—featuring works by Caspar David Friedrich, Karl Friedrich Schinkel, the Düsseldorf School of Painting, and Belgian history painting to the Prussian state in his will and who died in 1861. Wagener wished to present the collection to the public “in a suitable venue” and to develop it into a National Gallery. Just one year later, Stüler was commissioned to design a suitable building. On March 22, 1876—Emperor Wilhelm I’s birthday—the National Gallery was ceremoniously opened as the third museum on Spree Island.

During World War II, the building was hit by bombs several times and severely damaged. The collection itself had been gradually evacuated at the start of the war and moved, among other places, to the Berlin anti-aircraft towers at the Zoo and in Friedrichshain, and later also to the salt and potash mines in Merkers and Grasleben.

After the war ended, the building was quickly restored to a provisional state of use and partially reopened as early as 1949. A year later, following the reopening of the first exhibition floor, the second floor was also made accessible to visitors again.

During the division of Germany, the 19th-century paintings that had remained in or returned to the western part of the city were housed in other buildings—from 1968 onward in the newly constructed Neue Nationalgalerie and, starting in 1986, also at Charlottenburg Palace as the “Galerie der Romantik.”

After the fall of the Berlin Wall, the expanded collections were reunited and reorganized: The Old National Gallery showcases the 19th and early 20th centuries, while the New National Gallery focuses on the 20th century.

In 1992, the architectural firm HG Merz Berlin was commissioned to reconstruct and modernize the technical facilities of the Old National Gallery. It was closed from 1998 to 2001; on December 2, 2001, 125 years after its inauguration, it was ceremonially reopened.