page_title: Glaspalast (Munich)
section_title: Fire
hierarchical_section_title: Glaspalast (Munich) / Fire
context_page_description: The Glaspalast was a glass and iron exhibition building located in the Old botanical garden - Munich in Munich modeled after The Crystal Palace in London. The Glaspalast opened for the Erste Allgemeine Deutsche Industrieausstellung on July 15, 1854.
context_section_description: The building was destroyed in a fire on June 6, 1931, a fate shared with the other crystal palaces. The cause of the fire was later determined to be arson. The fire in the Glaspalast irretrievably destroyed more than 3,000 artworks including more than 110 paintings from the early 19th century including many paintings by Caspar David Friedrich, Moritz von Schwind, Karl Blechen, and Philipp Otto Runge. A further 1,000 works by contemporary artists at that time were heavily damaged and only 80 artworks were recovered unharmed.
  The daily newspaper "Neues Wiener Tagblatt" reported on the following day, June 7, 1931 in a telegram: The fire of the Munich Glass Palace, S. 4:
  The fire of the Glass Palace is one of the biggest destructive disasters to Europe's art. In Germany since the Thirty Years' War were never at one time so many works of art destroyed as by this fire. Only 80 of the 2820 exhibited works of painting, graphics and sculpture were rescued. The damage is estimated to be between 25 and 30 million Marks. [...] A special tragicomedy was the fact that the pictures rejected by the jury were stored in an adjacent shed not affected by the fire. About the cause of the fire only assumptions are known. Provisional Rumor of a discontented artistic revenge, but which cannot be confirmed. The initial investigations show that the fire may have broken out in the carpentry shop, where work continued on the day. 20 firefighters were injured in the rescue work. General Zimmermann, who risked his life to save treasures from the 75 completely burned halls, had first to be forcibly restrained by police. A meeting at the Ministry of Culture, which ended in the afternoon, has decided to immediately initiate a relief by a public appeal to the German people on the occasion of national calamity ...
caption: Winter Landscape with Church (1807-08). This oil painting by Caspar David Friedrich was among the works destroyed in the fire.
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