Hitting the museums in Germany

We traveled to Germany, May 7-June 2, ’04. We had seen much of the country’s natural beauty, the Romantic Road and other attractions on a previous trip. This one was planned with art as the main objective.

In FRANKFURT we were booked at the Kaiserhof Hotel, which, despite the grandiose name, is a simple but adequate tourist hotel. Our room cost €170 ($217), including an abbreviated breakfast. The Kaiserhof turned out to be in a convenient location, steps from the railroad station and — great for us — a short walk from the Stadel Museum. Of course, the clerk at the hotel had the usual mantra, “Take a taxi,” but we walked back.

The Stadel Museum is an extensive site with Renaissance as well as early and late-20th-century works. Artists on exhibit include Carpaccio, Perugino, van Eyck, Holbein, Cranach, Corinth, Beckmann, Hodler and on and on.

We were disappointed with the vaunted Weinhaus Bruckenkeller restaurant. We had reservations, but it turned out they were serving a convention and so had few tables left and no choice of menu items.

We also ate at the Stadel Museum’s restaurant, Holbein, which was excellent. Our dinner cost about $90 for two. Reservations are needed.

The Goethe Haus was instructive and well done, with knowledgeable attendants.

We found the Modern Art Museum of low interest — cutting-edge modern art, often contrived and forced — but the building is worth seeing.

We went by express train to COLOGNE, where at the Dom (Cathedral) there is an excellent tour which gives you access to places you cannot see on your own.

We stayed across the street from the Dom at the Dom Hotel. If your luggage is not too cumbersome, you can walk there from the station. I do not remember the room cost, but it was a bargain because the fourth day was free.

Around the corner from the hotel is the Eiser Bakery, where you can get takeout, coffee, fresh cakes and buns and take it to our room — unless you want to spend €17 per person plus a room service charge and tax and tip.

Cologne has some of the best museums in Germany, notably the Ludwig. We went there on two days for a total of 11 hours. It has everything from medieval to modern. Be sure to refer to a guidebook.

The Walloaf-Richards museum is also extensive and first class.

We ate twice at Frueh am Dom, which had typical German food and beer. It was crowded, with a raffish atmosphere and a large outdoor area. Dinner for two cost US$52 including beer. I think they take only cash. Other restaurants were good but not noteworthy.

We went on to BERLIN by train. The ride was comfortable, but it is best to reserve seats.

We visited Kaiser Wilhelm Kirche, which, to demonstrate damage from the war, has not been rebuilt. Next door is a new building, nondenominational and sober looking. The old church, itself, instead of being a commemorative site, houses a gift shop.

(By the way, the cities we saw in Germany were largely rebuilt, replicating what they looked like before the war. This may be an attempt to pretend that nothing ever happened, and if you think about it as a cultural display, it is akin to the imitations of reality found in Disneyland or Las Vegas.)

The Guggenheim Museum in Berlin had an interesting temporary show: Nam June Paik. The Germans who were there, mostly young people, seemed to love it. We went on to a gallery on Pariser Platz to look at Chagall etchings and other works.

The next day we visited Gemaldegalerie, probably the most important museum in Berlin. It has everything up to about 1800. At the Alte Museum, the exhibits were mostly 19th century but there also were some impressionists.

We walked to the Pergamon Museum, a stupendous display of an ancient monument transplanted in pieces from Turkey in the 19th century and reassembled here. Work continues. There are also Greek and Babylonian works and more. Depending on one’s interest, a visit could take a full day.

We went by bus to the Hamburger Bahnhof, obviously a former train station and now a museum of contemporary art with exhibits of Kiefer, Rauschenberg, Lichtenstein and Warhol.

We traveled by train to two other museums, the Brohan and Berggruen, the latter showing Picasso, Giacometti and Klee. The Brohan was formerly a residence and now has Art Nouveau and Art Deco objects and paintings. Both museums are located opposite the Schloss, which was worth a visit (although, while there are differences, all these palaces have a sameness).

If you visit the Reichstag — rebuilt, refurbished and embellished with the glass bubble on top — you can spend time tracing recent history in photographs and also look down into the senate chambers. The view over all of Berlin is grandiose. There are long lines outside, but if you reserve a meal in the restaurant, the Reichstag Kaefer, you can walk right in. We ate lunch there (mediocre) and the price was €47 ($60) for two.

The Kollwitz Museum, in a residential neighborhood, is depressing. However, next door is a gallery with some worthwhile sculpture.

The Jewish Museum has a remarkable building designed by architect Daniel Liebeskind, and the displays have good explanations. The Garden of Exile and the Holocaust Tower are best seen, difficult to describe.

CARL E. GUTMAN
Albuquerque, NM