Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Altes Museum
Am Lustgarten • Tues, Wed & Fri-Sun 10am-6pm, Thurs 10am-8pm • €10, €18 with all other Museum Island museums on a
Bereichskarte (see p.23) W smb.museum • S-Hackescher Markt
At the head of the Lustgarten, the Altes Museum is - along with the Konzerthaus Berlin
(see p.48) - one of Berlin's most striking Neoclassical buildings and perhaps Schinkel's
most impressive surviving work, with an 87m-high facade fronted by an eighteen-column
Ionic colonnade. Opened as a home for the royal collection of paintings in 1830, it is
now host to the Collection of Classical Antiquities : small sculpture and pottery from the
city's famed Greek and Roman collections. Greek Gods dominate the ground floor, but
the upper floor contains a colossal range of Greek, Roman and Etruscan Art - urns,
shields, sarcophagi, friezes - all chronologically and thematically arranged. Many are
small works that lack the power and drama of the huge pieces on view at the Pergamon,
but can captivate nonetheless: he Praying Boy , a lithe and delicate bronze sculpture from
Rhodes, dating back to 300 BC, is the collection's pride and joy. Look, too, for the vase
of Euphronios, decorated with an intimate painting of athletes in preparation - the series
of Greek vases here is considered to be among the finest in the world.
2
Neues Museum
Bodestr. 1-3 • Mon-Wed & Fri-Sun 10am-6pm, Thurs 10am-8pm • €14, €18 with all other Museum Island museums on a Bereichskarte
(see p.23) • W smb.museum • S-Hackescher Markt
he Neues Museum opened in 1855 to house the imperial Egyptian collection.
Bombed out in the war, the building was slowly rebuilt and renovated under British
architect David Chipperfield, who took great pains to preserve as many original
features as possible, including fluted stone columns and battered faux-Egyptian ceiling
frescoes. Entire wings had been destroyed in the war, including the central staircase,
but rather than imitating every detail, plain concrete, bare brick and huge wooden
rafters have been used for repairs, creating both a sense of history and an effective
contrast to the original sections. Finally reopened in 2009, the building now houses
Berlin's Egyptian Collection and its Museum for Pre- and Early History.
he most prized exhibit of the Egyptian Collection is the 3300-year-old Bust of
Queen Nefertiti , a treasure that has become a symbol for the city as a cultural capital.
here's no questioning its beauty - the queen has perfect bone structure and gracefully
sculpted lips - and the history of the piece is equally interesting. Created around
1350 BC, the bust probably never left the studio in Akhetatenin in which it was
created, acting as a model for other portraits of the queen (its use as a model explains
why the left eye was never drawn in). When the studio was deserted, the bust was left
there, to be discovered some three thousand years later in 1912 and then o cially
unveiled in Berlin in 1924; this also marked the beginning of an ongoing diplomatic
struggle by the Egyptian authorities to have it returned to Egypt.
Elsewhere in the collection, atmospheric lighting is used to particularly good effect on
the Expressionistic, almost Futuristic, Berlin Green Head of the Ptolemaic period. Don't
miss the interesting pieces from the Schliemann excavations of Troy, though the best
pieces (some represented here as replicas) remain in Russia, carted away as spoils of
war; delicate negotiations for their return continue.
A bit of a comedown after all the Egyptian excitement below is the Museum for
Pre- and Early History in the attic, with a rather underwhelming collection of
archeological discoveries from the Berlin area.
Alte Nationalgalerie
Bodestr. 1-3 • Tues, Wed & Fri-Sun 10am-6pm, Thurs 10am-8pm • €10, €18 with all other Museum Island museums on a Bereichskarte
(see p.23) • W smb.museum • S-Hackescher Markt
Tucked just behind the Neues Museum is the Alte Nationalgalerie , a slightly
exaggerated example of post-Schinkel Neoclassicism that contains the nineteenth-
century section of Berlin's state art collection. he main body of the museum, built in
 
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