Video timeline: 00:00 Intro 00:37 Geography and basics 01:35 Must-sees: Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne, Munich, Dresden 02:36 Seasons and weather: What to wear? Which festivals to visit? 04:08 Transportation and traffic 07:05 Accommodations 07:34 How safe is Germany? 08:00 Money 08:27 Particularities 09:40 Food and Beverages 10:21 Little language guide
Meissen Porcelain Manufactory (German, active 1710 – present), Model by Johann Gottlieb Kirchner (German, 1706 – 1768)
Johann Gottlieb Kirchner produced the model for this life-size porcelain sculpture of a fox-looking a little guiltily around the chicken it is about to devour-as part of an extraordinary commission from Augustus the Strong, elector of Saxony and king of Poland, who envisioned a life-size porcelain menagerie for his Japanese Palace in Dresden. The Meissen Porcelain Manufactory had been operating for only twenty years when Augustus commissioned this series of porcelain animals to be rendered “in their natural sizes and colors.” The production of porcelain models of this size had never been attempted before in Europe.
Dresden, city, capital of Saxony Land (state), eastern Germany. Dresden is the traditional capital of Saxony and the third largest city in eastern Germany after Berlin and Leipzig. It lies in the broad basin of the Elbe River between Meissen and Pirna, 19 miles (30 km) north of the Czech border and 100 miles (160 km) south of Berlin. Sheltering hills north and south of the Elbe valley contribute to the mild climate enjoyed by Dresden. Numerous parks and cultural monuments exist along the Elbe’s course, particularly a steel bridge (1891–93), a cable railway (1898–1901), and a funicular (1894–95). The Elbe valley around the city was designated a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2004, but the construction of a four-lane bridge across the river caused UNESCO to revoke the designation in 2009. Pop. (2021 est.) 555,351.
Dresden originated as the Slav village of Drezdzany, meaning “Forest Dwellers on the Plain,” on the Elbe’s north bank. First mentioned in 1216, the town on the south bank was founded at a ford by Margrave Dietrich of Meissen as a German colony. The Slav settlement on the north bank, although older, was known as New Town and the later German town on the south bank as Old Town.
The Military History Museum in Dresden, Saxony is one of very few museums in Germany that has German war equipment from both World Wars. Some of the most famous large items in the museum include a V2 flying bomb and Germany’s first submarine. The museum aims to explain how the military, armies and war influenced politics and society, and vice versa.
Building on the Morgan’s tradition of presenting to the American public distinguished works from outstanding institutions abroad, Van Eyck to Mondrian: 300 Years of Collecting in Dresden focuses on the exceptional drawing collection of the Kupferstich-Kabinett, Dresden.
Established by Augustus II the Strong, Elector of Saxony, in 1720, the museum is one of the oldest and finest depositories of works on paper in the world. The exhibition celebrates pivotal moments and key traditions in the history of European draftsmanship. Most remarkably, it will feature Jan van Eyck’s Portrait of an Elderly Man (ca. 1435–40)—an exceptionally rare drawing by the great Netherlandish Renaissance painter, which has never before traveled to the United States.
The Kupferstich-Kabinett’s strength in Northern Renaissance and Baroque drawings will be further showcased through works by Lucas Cranach the Elder, Hans Holbein the Younger, Rembrandt, and Rubens, while the museum’s rich holdings of Southern European works will be represented by Correggio, Bronzino, Sofonisba Anguissola, and others.
Among works produced in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, highlights include studies by Caspar David Friedrich, Goya, Käthe Kollwitz, Gustav Klimt, Otto Dix, and Piet Mondrian.
Which German state is the favorite among tourists? We will show you the top 3 federal states of the total 16! Each of them has a unique character: from the coast in Schleswig-Holstein and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania to the Alps in Bavaria. And in between them there is a great selection of highlights: Saxony with Dresden, the Baroque city, North Rhine-Westphalia with the Cologne Cathedral, and of course the capital, Berlin.
FEATURES | Peter Blake interviewed by Martin Gayford; Harry Pearson on art at the Olympics; Alexander Röstel goes in search of Bernardo Bellotto in Dresden; Rebecca Ann Hughes on troublesome tourists in Italy; Christina J. Faraday on ‘speaking pictures’ in Renaissance England
REVIEWS | Kristina Wilson on American folk art in Boston; Jennifer Mass scrutinises Guernica online; Xavier F. Salomon on Kraków’s royal tapestries; Tom Stammers on Marie Antoinette’s dairy; Daniel Trilling on the Benin Bronzes; Francesca Wade on Clive Bell; Alexander Marr on baroque swagger; and Damian Thompson on John Pawson’s cookbook
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