100,000 visitors see “Gottfried Lindauer: The Māori Portraits”

09.03.2015
Alte Nationalgalerie

'Gottfried Lindauer: The Māori Portraits' opened at the Alte Nationalgalerie on 20 November 2014. Over 100,000 visitors have seen the exhibition since then. Udo Kittelmann, director of the Nationalgalerie, said: 'We are delighted by this positive response from the public, especially as Lindauer's  works were virtually unknown outside New Zealand before now and are on view here in Europe for the first time!'

The exhibition at the Alte Nationalgalerie is the first time that the descendants of the sitters in Lindauer's portraits have granted their permission for the works to be shown outside Aotearoa/New Zealand. As images of real people, the paintings have never left New Zealand before because the descendants still actively commemorate their ancestors and believe strongly in keeping ancestry, history, and identity alive over the generations.

Gottfried Lindauer was born in 1839 in Pilsen (now Czech Republic). He was one of the few painters of the late 19th century to devote his art almost exclusively to representing an indigenous population, the Māori in New Zealand, in a series of portraits and genre paintings.

The exhibition is still on display and runs until 12 April 2015. Over the Easter holidays (3.-6.4.2015) the Alte Nationalgalerie will be open each day from 11:00 - 18:00.

The exhibition is presented by the Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, in association with the Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki.