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Julius Konietzko

Julius August Konietzko (1886-1952)

Philippe Bourgoin

Julius August Konietzko (1886-1952) was born on August 6, 1886, in Insterburg, East Prussia, which is now Tcherniakovsk, Kaliningrad. The penultimate child in a large family, his father was a master tanner, and his mother was the daughter of a master baker. Due to financial difficulties his father was facing, Julius Konietzko was entrusted to the care of his childless uncle in Stolp (now Slupsk, Pomerania, in Poland). He went to school there, as well as in Steglitz (Berlin), and later in Neustrelitz (Mecklenburg), where he attended the Realschule, a secondary school equivalent to an American high school.

Julius August Konietzko (1886-1952), photographed in Hamburg, 1951. © Museum am Rothenbaum. Kulturen und Künste der Welt, Hamburg.

His adoptive father was able to awaken a love of nature in the adolescent, as well as an interest in science, art, crafts and painting. It was during this period, in 1905, that he made the acquaintance of the famous physician, anthropologist, explorer, archaeologist and ethnographer Felix von Luschan, the curator of the departments of Africa and Oceania at the Königliches Museum für Völkerkunde in Berlin at the time. This meeting turned out to be a decisive one for Konietzko and marked the beginning of his passions for ethnology and medicine. In 1907 and 1908, he performed his military service in Schneidemühl (now Pita, in Poland), but it was cut short by a serious horseback riding accident. After having given up on earlier ambitions, Konietzko began a commercial apprenticeship in 1908, working at the import-export firm of P.J. de Freytas in Hamburg. At the same time, he sold household goods and began learning about foreign cultures in the antique shops in the port and on the Reeperbahn, as well as in the exhibition spaces of the J.F.G. Umlauff Company that had a presence near the port beginning in 1859. Its founder, Johann Friedrich Gustav Umlauff (1833-1889) displayed natural history specimens and sold imported curiosities there. Konietzko also frequented the Musée d’Histoire Coloniale (Colonial History Museum) and the eating establishment of famed restaurateur August Emil Theodor Haase (1867-1934).

August Emil Theodor Haase (1867-1934) in front of his Museum, 34, Erichstrasse, 1928. © Bundesarchiv Bild 146-1998-012-12A, Berlin. Photo Herbert Hoffmann.

In Germany, well before the country entered the colonial era, anthropology was booming and no other nation had a comparable number of ethnographic museums. While the agenda of these institutions was invariably to contrast the Naturvölker (“natural people”) of Africa, the Americas and Oceania, with the Kulturvölker (“cultured people”) of Europe and Asia, the study of the latter was flourishing. Konietzko saw a future mapped out for him in the fields of ethnology and folk art.

Oceanic Objects. Hamburg, circa 1910. Photograph by Julius Konietzko, black and white positive, 12 × 16,5 cm, mounted on cardboard, 16 × 24,5 cm.© Néprajzi Múzeum, Budapest. Inv. NM F 331121

At that time, he was living in a boarding house on Wandsbeker Chaussee, where he converted the attic into an ethnographic showroom space. It was during this period that he met Ernst Wache, a hunter working for Hagenbeck Zoo, who had brought back a varied collection from Ethiopia. Konietzko catalogued it, exhibited it in the attic of his boarding house, and sold it in 1910 to Karl Weule (1864-1926), director of the Museum of Ethnology in Leipzig. Konietzko was very active, well-liked, and considered a trustworthy person, so he was quickly able to establish business relationships with a number of ethnology museums, notably those in Berlin, Hamburg, Lübeck, and Frankfurt, and shortly thereafter, those in Basel and Dresden as well.

Carl Otto Czeschka at his work table in front of his collection, Hamburg, 1928. © Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg.

In 1909, at the home of architect Emil Hoppe (1876-1957), he met the painter and illustrator Carl Otto Czeschka (1878–1960), who had arrived in Hamburg in 1907 with the ceramist Richard Lucksch (1872–1936) and the sculptor Anton Kling (1881–1963). He also frequented art historian Rosa Schapire’s (1874-1954) social circle, and she was close to the Die Brücke artists’ group. Czeschka built up an important collection of ethnographic objects, mainly acquired from his friend Konietzko. Czeschka became the godfather of the latter’s two sons, Wolf (1920-1993) and Boris (1925-2020). Konietzko’s clients and friends also included German Expressionist artists from the Die Brücke group who were passionate about primitive art, such as Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (1880-1938), Karl Schmidt-Rottluff (1884-1976), Emil Nolde (1867-1956), who spent several months in the Pacific Islands in 1913 as part of an ethnographic expedition, and Max Pechstein (1881-1955), who spent four months (1913-1914) in the Palau Islands (Micronesia). Konietzko was acquainted with painters Karl Hofer (1878-1955) and Rolf Nesch (1893-1975), and sculptor Friedrich Wield (1880-1940) as well. He undertook his first trip to Lapland from February 15 to April 5, 1911 with the support of Georg Thilenius (1868-1937), director of the Museum für Völkerkunde in Hamburg (now MARKK) at the time. Thilenius also sent a letter of recommendation on Konietzko’s behalf to the German Imperial Consulate in Helsinki. This was Konietzko’s first opportunity to keep a journal. He then visited the Skolt Sami from January 13 to April 10, 1912. This second trip was clearly very challenging. The objects he collected were sent to Basel, Berlin, Dresden, Leipzig, and Hamburg. The next trip began on May 1 of the same year. Konietzko traveled to Spain and Portugal this time, collecting not only for institutions but also for himself. His expeditions were so successful that he was able to rent his own apartment at 79 Wandsbeker Chaussee and register as a “self-employed dealer” on September 2, 1912. In the meanwhile, he had become engaged to Henni Marie Anna Klüver (1892–1977), the daughter of a schoolteacher from Hamburg, whom he married on April 5, 1913. Complementing her general curiosity for ethnology and zoology, Anna Konietzko had particular interests in photography, women’s work, and traditional medicine. Konietzko obtained his supplies of Oceanic material from military personnel, merchants, and ship owners that operated in the Melanesian German territories, which is to say the Bismarck Archipelago and German New Guinea. Konietzko established relationships with leading German dealers and collectors such as Ernst Heinrich (1896-1972) in Stuttgart and Ludwig Bretschneider (1909-1987) in Munich as well. He traded with museums, which were willing at the time to engage in exchanges or sales to supplement or complete their collections. He was a pioneer in the use of photography to offer objects to his customers, and after a few years of doing so, he began offering his merchandise through catalogs. For example, Konietzko sold 1261 objects from Cameroon, which became a protectorate in 1884, to museums in Leipzig, Berlin, Cologne, Munich, Dresden, Bremen, Frankfurt, Hanover, Hamburg, Göttingen, Marburg, and Osnabrück. These objects were most likely collected during expeditions led by Christian Ludwig August von Krogh (1863-1924), an officer stationed in the territory between 1905 and 1908. In 1912 and 1913, he visited Ireland and the Aran Islands three times and then went to Scotland and the Hebrides. The group of pieces he brought back from the Aran Islands is among the most important collections in the Hamburg Museum’s Eurasia department. His collecting method called for obtaining a local guide to accompany him, and that enabled him to gather not only general information, but also valuable insight into the cultural context in which everyday objects and tools, amulets, children’s toys, traditional costumes, and musical instruments were used. His admiration for the adventure novels set in the Wild West by the famous German writer Karl May (1842-1912) may have inspired Konietzko to travel to Sudan at the end of October 1913. The initial funding was once again provided by the Hamburg and Leipzig museums. The journey was very arduous, with detours through the Dinka and Shilluk regions that involved long horseback rides and hikes. In addition to vivid descriptions of his stay and the people he met, his diary contains notes on the climate, villages, and other ethnological details he observed.

Julius Konietzko in Sudan, 1913. © Kegel-Konietzko & Dorn.

Julius Konietzko and what is probably his wife, Anna Klüver, pose with traditional Southern Sami objects in Dåtnejaevrie – Tunnsjøen, on January 20, 1916. © Museum am Rothenbaum (MARKK), Hamburg.

When World War I broke out, a second trip to Egypt and Sudan had to be canceled. Between 1914 and 1916, Konietzko and his wife traveled to Sweden and Norway four times instead. During his trips to Sweden in particular, he personally hunted the animals the zoological institutes had ordered and prepared them for transport. The ethnological, zoological, and botanical collections he assembled were transferred to museums in Hamburg, Leipzig, Berlin, Munich, and Basel. In addition to his diaries, two illustrated catalogs on the culture of the Sami and farmers of northern Jämtland, compiled by Anna Konietzko, have survived, along with various inventories and photographic archives. Thilenius remained committed to enriching his museum’s collections in spite of the war. On May 1, 1917, Konietzko was hired as a research assistant, and Thilenius sent the couple to the Balkans as members of the Mazedonischen Landeskundlichen Kommission (Malako) (Macedonian Regional Studies Commission) to collect ethnographic material, accompanied by the German army. From May of 1917 to September of 1918, Konietzko made four trips to this region. In the meantime, his mission was expanded to include collecting items for a future Reichs-Kriegsmuseum (Imperial War Museum). In his diary and two notebooks, he mentions meeting the so-called Kriegsmalern (war painters) Willy Exner (1888–1947) and Richard Gessner (1894–1989). He worked mainly with Gessner, who was assigned to his unit as a draftsman. Some of the approximately 1,600 objects collected by Konietzko during this period have been preserved. The end of the war only briefly interrupted his travels. From January 2 to February 25, 1920, he traveled to Finland, this time without his wife, as the birth of their first son was imminent. Julius and Anna Konietzko also undertook extensive collecting expeditions in northern Germany, Mecklenburg, Schleswig-Holstein, and, in particular, the Hallig Islands. In the first few years after World War I, Konietzko forged connections with the world of film. Drawing on his field experience, he worked as a consultant, stuntman, and sled driver, providing costumes, weapons, and equipment from his extensive collections. This activity not only had an impact on his circle of friends and his relationships with museums, but even more importantly, on his wife, from whom he divorced on February 27, 1924, after meeting Lore Lessing (1901-1980), the ex-wife of the war painter Richard Gessner, with whom he had worked in Macedonia. Both a painter and the daughter of a dealer, Lore Lessing was one of the first women to study at the Düsseldorf Academy of Fine Arts, from 1919 to 1922. Konietzko married her on May 6, 1924. As a painter, she offered Konietzko new perspectives but, above all, a new vision of art. Julius and Lore made the company known beyond Germany’s borders. From 1924 to 1926, the couple traveled to Spain and Italy on behalf of the Hamburg Museum. They then made several trips to the Halligen Islands and, more specifically, to Öland (Northern Frisia in northern Germany). Konietzko was so deeply attached to the culture of the Halligen Islands that he devoted a series of essays to it. On this last trip, they took their son Boris with them. Then it was Italy again. The collections were then deposited in museums in Basel, Frankfurt, Hamburg, and Leipzig. On June 12, 1926, Julius and Lore Konietzko traveled to Ireland. Their main destination was once again the Aran Islands. The trip ended on August 14, 1926. A year later, on August 23, 1927, the couple embarked from Antwerp on their first trip to India to collect objects for the museums in Hamburg, Leipzig, and Dresden. Their journey took them across the Mediterranean, through the Suez Canal and the Red Sea, via Colombo and Madras, to Calcutta, where they arrived on September 23. They visited Dhaka, Chittagong, the Lushai Mountains, Mogh, Baroda, Kashmir, and Tibet. The last trip Julius and Lore Konietzko took together, commissioned by the Hamburg Museum, took them to Sardinia between January and March of 1931. He also took advantage of his stay there to take photographs. In Nuoro, accompanied by his friend and colleague Federico Faraone (1892-1960), the latter introduced him to Sebastiano Guiso (1891-1955), a photographer renowned throughout the island. Konietzko acquired many original photographs from him, which are of great documentary value, as the photographer destroyed his entire archive a few years before his death. These collections provide a comprehensive historical overview of the Sardinian material culture of the first half of the 20^th century, and attest to the German interest in the island’s ethnography. Julius and Lore Konietzko separated in 1933. However, they continued their business activities under the Konietzko name until their marriage was dissolved in July of 1935. Having obtained her business degree, Lore Konietzko then worked independently, married Dr. Georg A. Kegel (1898-1974), and opened her own gallery called Lore Kegel Exotische Kunst. During the Third Reich (1933-1945), she was excluded from the Reichskulturkammer (Reich Chamber of Culture) and deprived of her livelihood because of her Jewish identity. She was barred from practicing her profession, and her inventory confiscated. She was forced to leave Hamburg and went into hiding in Neustadt, near Coburg. It was only after the war that she reopened and resumed her business. Her son Boris joined her in 1957.

Page from an art and antiques magazine listing Hamburg antique dealers, including Umlauff and Konietzko. © “Kunst- und Antiquitäten-Rundschau”, 42. Jahrgang, Helf 1. Ulm, 15. Januar 1934

Lore Kegel (1901-1980) in her living room, late 40s. © Kegel-Konietzko & Dorn.

The strict monetary system imposed by the Nazi regime made it impossible for Konietzko to travel. He opened a shop in Hamburg, first on Eilbeker Weg, then on Heuberg, then on Wandsbeker Chaussee (in the Eilbek Town Hall complex) and finally near the central station, in the house where Maria and Dagobert Schacht ran a dance academy, at 59 Holzdamm, which became a veritable museum. It was filled with an eclectic potpourri of rural crafts and applied arts pieces, ethnological collections from all over the world, archaeological and prehistoric objects, natural history specimens, animal skins and skulls, and, of course, sculptures from Asia, Africa, America, and the South Seas. On February 5, 1938, Julius Konietzko married for the third time, and Elfriede Aßmann (1902-1973) became his wife. Unable to remain in the Schacht building, Konietzko moved his business to the Hohe Bleichen district, where two large display windows attracted the attention of passersby. At the same time, he began giving his first lectures, notably on the Hamburg Harbor Concert, a radio program broadcast by the North German Broadcasting Corporation (NDR), the oldest radio broadcaster in the world. Then came World War II. He suffered a major loss in 1943, when his apartment and business were destroyed by fire during a bombing raid. Only a few things could be salvaged, but Konietzko was not ready to admit defeat. Friends provided him with accommodation, and he found a job at the Hamburg City Hall. Meanwhile, as the war continued, soldiers on leave returning from the regions where Konietzko had previously carried out expeditions brought back ethnographic objects. Commercial activity thus continued, and Konietzko was able to secure a new location for his business at 2 Gerhofstrasse. In order to rebuild his collections, he traveled to the Netherlands, occupied by the Germans at the time, at the suggestion of Franz Termer (1894-1968), who had just been appointed director of the Hamburg Museum of Ethnology. The trip took place in March 1944. Konietzko acquired many pieces from the “Dutch East Indies” (Southeast Asia) in Amsterdam. Some of his acquisitions were to be shipped to Hamburg via Delf but never arrived there because the ship sank. The rest were sold to the museum. After the war, Germans were prohibited from owning weapons, so the British occupation forces confiscated Konietzko’s weapons collection. As he was ultimately deemed to pose no political threat, the British did authorize him, on September 5, 1947, to work as a presenter for NWDR (Northwest German Radio and Television). Living in Hamburg, at 32 Johnsallee, Julius and Elfriede Konietzko gathered together a circle of friends and acquaintances every Thursday, including ethnologists, zoologists, navigators, doctors, lawyers, journalists, businessmen, writers, artists, and students, to discuss and exchange ideas over a cup of tea. In the fall of 1951, Julius Konietzko fell ill. He died after a surgery on April 27, 1952. Elfriede continued to run the business until she passed away in 1972. Shortly before his death, Czeschka, who had lost his wife Martha in 1951, married Elfriede. Elfriede Czeschka-Konietzko preserved Czeschka’s apartment-museum and worked actively to have his works included in the Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe (Museum of Arts and Crafts). Six hundred of the ethnographic objects that Konietzko collected are in what was the Hamburg Museum für Völkerkunde, and is the Museum am Rothenbaum (MARKK) today. Many individuals, organizations and institutions were associated with the museum between 1933 and 1952, but none more frequently than Julius Konietzko. Thanks to his foresight, important ethnographic collections were evacuated with the help of the Hamburg Museum of Ethnology before the beginning of the Second World War and thus protected from the bombings. The vast collections that Konietzko assembled for museums have become precious testimonies to the cultural pasts of many peoples, whose importance and value, both tangible and intangible, are inestimable. Bibliography Jürgen Zwernemann (1929-2022): Julius Konietzko. Ein "Sammelreisender" und Händler, Mitteilungen aus dem Museum für Völkerkunde Hamburg, Neue Folge 16, Hamburg, 1986, pp. 17-39. Albert Gouaffo, Bénédicte Savoy, Atlas der Abwesenheit. Kameruns Kulturerbe in Deutschland, Berlin, Reimer, 2023.

Malangan bird frieze. Wood, Turbo petholatus

opercula, and pigments. L.: 113 cm. Ex-coll. Julius Konietzko, Hamburg. Private coll. © Bismarck Archipelago Art, Kevin Conru-5 Continents Editions. Photo Hughes Dubois.

Hareigha mask, Chachat-Baining, Gazelle Peninsula, New-Britain, Papua New-Guinea. H.: 155 cm. Barkcloth, bamboo, vine, leaf. Before 1926. Ex-coll. Julius August Konietzko. © Museum der Kulturen Basel. Photo Omar Lemke. Inv. Vb 6543.

Malangan dance mask, New Ireland. Wood, fiber, trade cloth and pigments. H.: 90 cm. Ex-coll. Museum Umlauff, Hamburg ; Julius Konietzko, Hamburg. © Bismarck Archipelago Art, Kevin Conru-5 Continents Editions. Photo Hughes Dubois.

Malangan figure, New Ireland. Wood, Turbo petholatus

opercula, fiber and pigments. H.: 137 cm. Ex-coll. Julius Konietzko, Hamburg. © Bismarck Archipelago Art, Kevin Conru-5 Continents Editions. Photo Hughes Dubois.

Mask (eharo) Elema, Gulf of Papua, Papua New Guinea. Late 19th-early 20th century. Barkcloth, fiber, cane, paint. H.: 61 cm. Ex-coll. Julius Konietzko, Hamburg. © Bequest of William E. Teel to the MFA, Boston. Inv. 2014.308.