Germany Guide
Saxony
Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz and Museum Gunzenhauser
Opening time: Tues– Fri noon–7pm, Sat & Sun 11am–7pm
Price: €7 or €12 combination ticket
The Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz on Theaterplatz displays art that spans from German Romantics such as Caspar David Friedrich to Expressionists of the Die Brücke group, notably a large collection of local son Karl Schmidt-Rottluff. However, newest and finest of the city's quota of galleries is Museum Gunzenhauser on Zwickauer Strasse. Its classic Modernist collection picks up the baton from its sister museum with more Expressionism – neo-primitive works of Die Brücke and Der Blaue Reiter artists such as Kirchner and Russian-born Alexej von Jawlensky, who edges from the colour blocks of Gaugin towards the boundary of abstraction – and with its first floor showing abstract works. All is a prelude to the world's largest collection of Otto Dix, leading light of the anti-Expressionist New Objectivity movement, who was seared by his experiences in the trenches of World War I and whose cynical and often comically grotesque images of 1920s Germany fell foul of the Nazis. He never lost that bite – outwardly tamer, later works are bitter allegories of suffering.