Painting, Sculpture and Architecture

History of the work

On the central part of the Kunstmuseum's facade, three figures stand between paired Ionic columns on the upper floor. According to their title they stand for Painting, Sculpture and Architecture; Wikimedia Commons groups them as three marble statues with allegories of the fine arts. The city gives Carrara marble as the material and 1895 as the year. Anyone looking up today, however, sees copies: according to the art guide of the Society for the History of Swiss Art, the figures were replaced by casts in 2005.

The building is almost two decades older than the figures. Eugen Stettler built it in 1876–1878 using forms from Roman antiquity and the Renaissance, and the collection moved in in 1879. Wikipedia describes the building as the city's counterpart to the Federal Palace. The facade also bears two round medallions by Raphael Christen showing Zeus and Minerva. Extensions followed: in the 1930s an annex by Karl Indermühle and Otto Rudolf Salvisberg, of which Cuno Amiet's sgraffito 'Apfelernte' (Apple Harvest) survives, and in the early 1980s a new building by Atelier 5.

Karl Alfred Lanz (1847–1907) came from La Chaux-de-Fonds and first served an engraving apprenticeship in Biel. In 1872 he went to study in Munich, and he held a grant at the Paris École des Beaux-Arts in 1875–1877, after which he stayed on in Paris. He made his name with the monument to General Dufour in Geneva in 1884; others followed, including the Pestalozzi monument in Yverdon and the Iselin monument in Basel. The Historical Dictionary of Switzerland counts him among the most successful Swiss sculptors of his time. In Bern, besides the figures on the Kunstmuseum, he made architectural sculpture for the Federal Palace and the statue of Science on the university's main building.

On the way from Hodlerstrasse to the entrance, look up: the figures stand exactly above the central axis of Stettler's building.

Researched and summarised by Bärn Kit. Sources: Kultur Stadt Bern, Kunst im öffentlichen Raum (offene Daten) · GSK-Kunstführer im KGS-Inventar: Kunstmuseum Bern (KGS 634) · Bauinventar Stadt Bern: Hodlerstrasse 8–12 · Wikipedia (de): Kunstmuseum Bern · HLS: Lanz, Karl Alfred (Dieter Ulrich) · Wikipedia (de): Karl Alfred Lanz · SIKART: Karl Alfred Lanz · Bauinventar Stadt Bern: Hochschulstrasse 4 · Wikimedia Commons: Bern Kunstmuseum 2