www.braunschweig2010.de Culture Capital _ Questions and Answers

	Questions and Answers
	3.	How can you outline the culture of the Region?
	How can you outline the culture of the Region? Braunschweig and the Region benefit from the unique potential inherent in the availability of existing institutions and the presence of treasures of art. Our major task is to highlight the facets of cultural identity scintillating between tradition and modern time, between highly advanced civilization and pop, to show how these facets combine and how they contrast, and to facilitate true comprehension thereof. Beyond local characteristics we will define and incorporate the common cultural identity of the Region in a regional "Charter of Culture". The arts scene covers everything from the first public foundation of a museum on the European continent in 1754, the Kunst- und Naturalienkabinett, later to be known as Herzog-Anton-Ulrich Museum, to the translucent high-tech building of the Wolfsburg Museum of Modern Art, designed by Hamburg architects Schweger & Partner. Whereas the Herzog-Anton-Ulrich Museum houses superb paintings by Giorgione, Rubens, Rembrandt and Vermeer van Delft originating from the collections of the Welf dukes, Wolfsburg's Museum of Modern Art organizes excellent exhibitions of contemporary art. The most spectacular and most recent museum under construction in Germany, the Wolfsburg science centre "Phaeno" by Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid, and the envisaged project of a "museum of knowledge" of the Braunschweigische Landesmuseum will be places offering top-class experimental analyses of nature, technology and art. Next to these international highlights, the Region has been shaped by contemporary civilization and culture: the Museum of Photography in North Germany is evidence of Braunschweig's reputation as former centre of the German photographic industry (Voigtländer and Rollei); many art societies, municipal art galleries and off-spaces offer a forum for the presentation of what is going on in the international scene of contemporary art. Culture and history have been firmly anchored, on a local and regional basis, in the museums of the communities, the Districts and the Federal State, thus adding to the national and international aura of our Region. Last but not least, our Region has spectacular projects of art in urban spaces: the bronze Lion Monument on Braunschweig's Burgplatz, the first out-door sculpture north of the Alps, contrasted with one of the most successful projects of contemporary art, the Lichtparcours 2000, which - reflecting the history of the City of Braunschweig - attracted tourists from all over Germany and will be continued in 2004. The dynamic cultural scene is rounded off by experimental and avant-garde festivals such as Braunschweig's Night of Culture, Wolfsburg's International Summer Festival or Gifhorn's "Feuer und Wasser Live" night event, the Festival of Theatre Forms, the Film Festival, the Figure-Theatre Festival and many other events. Memorable events have left their impression also on Braunschweig's and the Region's scenes of theatre and writing: in 1592 Germany's first theatre company was established at Wolfenbüttel. The renowned State Theatre of Braunschweig, too, has a long tradition as a house staging plays, operas, ballets, and productions for children and young people. Here, the world-famous first performances of Lessing's Emilia Galotti (in 1772) and Goethe's Faust (in 1829) caused quite a public stir. Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729-1781), an outstanding poet and writer of the period of Enlightenment, worked and lived as a librarian at Wolfenbüttel from 1771 to his death; he was the central figure of the Braunschweig circle of poets and scholars which had formed around the Collegium Carolinum during the second half of the 18th century. To this day, his person and his work have not lost any of their lasting import - neither his biography, which is modern in terms of its ruptures, nor the ring parable of "Nathan the Wise", which is still superbly topical. Wolfenbüttel is, besides being the cradle of German theatre, the birth place of the first regularly published newspaper. Founded in 1609, the weekly "Aviso" showed all the characteristics of a modern newspaper: topicality, periodicity, universality and publicity. The unparalleled collection of bibliophile treasures, manuscripts, ancient globes and maps preserved at Wolfenbüttel's Herzog-August Library, founded in 1572 by Duke Julius as his private library at the castle, used to rank as the largest collection of books of the Occident and "Eighth Wonder of the World". Today, it is a modern research library with about 800,000 volumes - a treasure trove of the history of European thought between Humanism and Enlightenment. Music, too, is held in high esteem in Braunschweig and the Region. Creative musical activities have been dominated by one outstanding name: Louis Spohr (1784-1859), composer, violin virtuoso, conductor and violin teacher. Born in Braunschweig, he was appointed "Braunschweigischer Kammermusicus", chamber musician, by Duke Karl Wilhelm Ferdinand in 1799; he was one of the trend-setting composers of instrumental music, opera and oratory. Another major personality is Michael Praetorius (1571-1621), a musician who, a conductor from 1594 to his death, organized the musical scene at the court of Wolfenbüttel. He left an immensely large life's work, e.g. the nine-volume "Musae Sioniae" with over 1200 songs. Today, mainly his spiritual songs are remembered, among them the famous "Es ist ein Ros entsprungen". And there is a third name that goes with the music history of our Region: August Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleben (1798-1874), born in the village of Fallersleben some 30 km north-east of Braunschweig. He wrote over 500 songs, among them the popular nursery rhyme "Ein Männlein steht im Walde" and the best-known of all German songs, our national anthem, originally written as anthem in 1841 to go with Joseph Haydn's melody "Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser" and on 11 August 1922 declared the German National Anthem by Friedrich Ebert, then President of the German Reich. Today, Braunschweig's and the Region's music scene has a great variety of facets: the world's most renowned ensembles and soloists come together here during the annual Classix Festival, with churches, concert halls and open places being transformed into concert stages. Braunschweig and the Region have been shaped by the unique testimonies of the history of European architecture as well as the testimonies of Christian Faith: The wealth of the City of Braunschweig, owed to trade and the crafts, materialized in more than twenty parish churches and cathedrals, monasteries and chapels with all their lavish décor. Dankwarderode Castle houses a unique collection of medieval art, including most precious reliquaries. The Romanesque Cathedral of St. Blasius was erected between 1173 and 1195 as a three-nave pier basilica on a cross-shaped ground plan, a powerful massive structure. The main church of Wolfenbüttel, Beatae Mariae Virginis, built between 1608 and 1624, is believed to be the first protestant church constructed after the Reformation, with Gothic and Renaissance elements nicely merging into one. Last but not least, the Imperial Palace of Goslar demonstrates the importance of the Region during the Middle Ages as it was the seat of the emperors of the Holy Roman Empire in North Germany.