THE COLLECTION
Propyläen-Verlag, Berlin
Starr Figura, German Expressionism: The Graphic Impulse, New York, The Museum of Modern Art, 2011
Established in 1919 as a luxury imprint of publisher Ullstein, Berlin, headed by Emil Herz, with a focus on literature, history, and art. In 1921 renowned literary scholar, art historian, and art collector Julius Elias was appointed director of Propyläen's art program, commissioning bibliophile editions of prints, portfolios, and illustrated books by leading artists of the day, such as Lovis Corinth, Vasily Kandinsky, Max Liebermann, Emil Orlik, Max Pechstein, Max Slevogt, and Hugo Steiner-Prag (who was also primarily responsible for Propyläen's book designs). Between 1924 and 1933 published Alfred Flechtheim's cosmopolitan art and culture magazine Der Querschnitt (The cross section). In 1923 Elias initiated the major sixteen-volume art history Propyläen Kunstgeschichte (1923–29), recruiting leading art historians such as Wilhelm von Bode, Carl Einstein, Max J. Friedländer, and Eckart von Sydow to contribute. (A further eight volumes were published later.) Was also very active as a literary publisher; one of its most notable successes was Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front (1929). In 1934 the Nazis expropriated Ullstein; it was renamed Deutscher Verlag in 1937, and the Jewish employees were forced to leave and ideologically undesirable contributors were expunged. Ullstein (reestablished in Berlin in 1959) and Propyläen still exist today.
Selected Bibliography
Fleckner, Uwe. Carl Einstein und sein Jahrhundert, pp. 159–66. Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 2006.
Schwab-Felisch, Hans. "Bücher über Ullstein." In Hundert Jahre Ullstein, 1877–1977, edited by Joachim Freyburg and Hans Wallenberg, pp. 179–216. vol. 1. Berlin: Ullstein, 1977.
Iris Schmeisser
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