Augustinertag

Yesterday was Augustiner Day. That is what the curators of Freiburg's Augustinermuseum call the annual fundraising day.

The former premises of the Medieval monastery of the Ordo Canonicorum Regularium Sancti Augustini, secularized in 1806 under Napoleon's rule, served as stables for the Napoleon cavalry, the municipal theater, and later became the Augustinermuseum.

At the beginning of the new century, Freiburg's city council - considering the art treasures that could not be displayed due to lack of space - voted to transform the existing premises into a museum of renown. They also decided to add new buildings but preserve the original structures of the monastery, even making them more apparent.

Work started in 2004, comprising three phases in the construction, ensuring a continuous operation of the museum. The final stage was planned to finish in 2020, the year of the 900th anniversary of the city.

It happened in the spring of this year that part of the wooden structure was found to be infested by molds and fungi. To remedy the situation, more money is needed, but above all, the grand opening of the new Augustinermuseum will not be celebrated before 2021.

Opening of the Augustinertag at the Feierling-Biergarten.
Lord Mayor Martin Horn at the mike.

This year's fundraising day started at the Feierling beer garden. On the occasion, the museum's management offered special guided tours limited in the number of participants based on a first-come, first-served or the early bird gets the worm.

Red Baron was lucky to get a ticket for the exhibition Black Forest Stories, a tour through a gallery of exclusive oil paintings guided by the director of the Augustinermuseum himself.

Black Forest Stories

At the entrance to the exhibition, there is a typical romantic scene as seen with the eyes of tourists.

Hermann Dischler 1909: Winter in the Black Forest

Winter paintings by Hermann Dischler, known as the snow painter, look so authentic. The artist projected black-and-white slides onto his canvas, making his paintings so realistic that they may serve as historical pictures.

Heinrich Hoffmann not dated: Spinning Room in the Black Forest/td>

The painting shows Black Forest women in a spinning room. One of them is wearing the stereotypical Bollenhut, where red Bollen mean unmarried, whereas the black Bollen signify that the woman - in the middle - is married.

Franz Grässel 1885: On the Way Home

Why black? Life for the farmers of the Black Forest was painstaking, but even more so for the women in particular when they served as packhorses.

Fritz Reiss not dated: Marriage of Convenience in the Black Forest

In the 19th century and beyond, arranged marriages instead were the rule than the exception. So it is all right for the elderly woman wearing the red Bollenhut to marry a younger guy as long as the money is right.

Curt Liebich 1903/04: Black Forest Mill

Men conveniently used hydropower to ease their manual labor in those times long passed when precipitations and snow water were still abundant in the Black Forest.

Michael Dilger 1820: Interior of a Glass-Blowing Workshop in the Black Forest

Glass blowing was a significant activity in the Black Forest, for the wood was near to produce charcoal necessary to reach the high temperatures needed for melting glass. The consequence was that at the beginning of the 19th century, no forests were left in the Black Forest. Thanks to a rigorous program of reforestation by the Baden government, the erosion of the mountains was avoided.

Georg Michael Zimmermann 1902: The Höllental Railway near the Ravenna Bridge

Red Baron loves steam trains. Admire the engine pulling the train up the Höllental. Here the frame maker tried to extend the motive cutting it into the wooden frame.

Hermann Dischler 1904: Winter Morning in the Black Forest

Another snow picture by Dischler, a scene we possibly will no longer enjoy in the future.

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