120 The Color Research & Theory Collection ◼ the psychologists Müller, Kirschmann, Weissenborn, Krüger and Bühler ◼ the color card manufacturers Baumann and Prase ◼ the architects Semper, Taut and the Luckhardt brothers ◼ the garden artists Pückler and Petzold ◼ the artists and “Bauhaus” teachers Kandinsky, Klee and Scheper and ◼ the “Brücke” artists Kirchner, Heckel and Schmidt-Rottluff. After the Second World War, too, color experts from Central Germany made extraordinary contributions. Among them were the color metrician Richter, the systematist Adam, the printing technician Hickethier, the color psychologist Frieling, the artists and teachers of vocational training Zeugner and Arnold, the art teachers Streller, Rausendorf and Zitzmann, and the physicians Heller, E. Marrè and M. Marrè. In 2001, a first exhibition to illustrate a cross-section of contents, connections and lines of development was held, and a series of personalities were presented whose lives and works in Central Germany were closely connected with the theory of color. The same subject was addressed in the special issue “Light and Color” of the Scientific Journal of TUD. The work of Manfred Adam received special recognition on the centenary of his birth. Adam, as a former assistant to Ostwald, continued the latter’s work in Großbothen as head of color research, in addition to reestablishing and advancing Ostwald’s colorimetric system (Adam 1989/Bendin 2001). Other anniversaries in the ensuing years gave rise to a special examination of the life and work of Wilhelm Ostwald (150th birthday in 2003), Manfred Richter (centenary of his birth in 2005) and Otto Prase (50th anniversary of his death in 2006). The exhibitions “Interface Color” (Schnittstelle Farbe) and “Resonances − Color as a System” (Resonanzen - Farbe als System”), curated by Eckhard Bendin, the initiator of the Color Forum, provided the initial spark for the development of a collection in which these matters − integrated into the collection concept of the Office for Academic Heritage of TUD − could be preserved and pursued further. The former of the two exhibitions was held in 2003 in the main auditorium (HSZ) of TUD during the 175th anniversary celebrations of the University. The latter, as a commemoration of Ostwald’s 150th birthday in the same year, took place in the town hall gallery in Grimma (Bendin 2003, pp. 50–59). On the one hand, there was growing public interest in this still largely unknown concentration of historical developments. On the other, it was crucial to satisfy the interest in teaching and research as sustainably as possible, also in relation to institutions. The 6th Color Forum on 28th October 2005 was already dedicated exclusively to this issue after the fundamental decisions taken at the Institute of Foundations of Design and Architectural Delineation of the Faculty of Architecture and at the Office for Academic Heritage in October 2004. The collection initiative was a logical consequence of the Dresden Color Forum, itself the result of a metamorphosis that received fresh input from conference to conference and exhibition to exhibition. The development concept put forward saw the most essential tasks of the innovative Color Research &Theory Collection in preserving and bringing together the surviving contemporary, factual, and personal evidence of historical developments in the multidisciplinary field of color theory in science, education, culture and art in Central Germany. At the same time, it sought to prepare them for teaching and research and to enable their sustainable usage. Regional and local focal points were established for the documentation and scholarly reappraisal of achievements, events, and overarching contexts. Examples of these focal points were the special scientific, pedagogical and artistic lines of development such as the circles of influence around Goethe, Fechner, Hering, Wundt, Ostwald and Baumann/Prase and their successors, as well as local centers such as Jena/Weimar, Leipzig/Großbothen, Dresden and Aue (Bendin 2008). Collection experts from various universities were also involved in the discussion of the development concept.
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