65185 Wiesbaden
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Located in the state capital, Museum Wiesbaden is the Hessian state museum of art and nature. Divided into two core collection areas – art and natural history – and with more than 7000 square metres of exhibition space at its disposal, the museum boasts a rich programme of permanent collection displays and temporary exhibits. The Natural History Collections’ permanent exhibition, Aesthetics of Nature, features four themed galleries: Form, Colour, Movement, and Time. Pivotal to the displays are the observation and description of the natural world, with the rich diversity of nature’s forms and colours on vivid show in a structured presentation tracing the history of the Earth and evolution. The Art Collection, meanwhile, features artworks dating from the 12th century to the present. Highlights include the collection of Modernist masters (for instance, the most significant holdings in the world of art by Alexej von Jawlensky), the internationally renowned F. W. Neess Collection of Art Nouveau, as well as postwar European and American art.
Museum Wiesbaden has its origins in the initiative of several civic associations in the early 19th century. Its current building was inaugurated in 1915 and has served for over a century as home to permanent and special exhibitions on various art-historical, scientific, and cultural-historical themes.
The Natural History Collections has its roots in the Natural History Society of the Duchy of Nassau and its affiliated museum. An ethnological collection already formed part of the Natural History Collections upon its founding in the 19th century. It was shaped by the personal contacts forged globally by various explorers, merchants, missionaries, and military officers from the Duchy of Nassau and their interdisciplinary interest in nature and humankind’s interaction with the natural environment. The collection is currently being digitized and uploaded onto Museum Wiesbaden’s Online Collection as part of the digitization strategy of the state of Hesse. The concurrent scholarly research into the collection objects themselves and their history – especially regarding acquisition and accession – is being undertaken in tandem with our colleagues in the Network of Hessian Museums and Collections on the Handling and Publication of Holdings from Colonial Contexts, a research project spearheaded by Museum Wiesbaden.