Gottbegnadeten list

The Gottbegnadeten-Liste ("God-gifted list" or "Important Artist Exempt List") was a 36-page list of artists considered crucial to Nazi culture. The list was assembled in September 1944 by Joseph Goebbels, the head of the Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, and Germany's supreme leader Adolf Hitler.

Friedrich Kayßler, one of the "irreplaceable actors" on the list

History

The list exempted the designated artists from military mobilisation during the final stages of World War II. Each listed artist received a letter from the Nazi Propaganda Ministry which certified his or her status. A total of 1,041 names of artists, architects, music conductors, singers, writers and filmmakers appeared on the list. Of that number, 24 were named as especially indispensable; they thus became the equivalent of National Socialism's "national treasures".

Goebbels included about 640 motion picture actors, writers and directors on an extended version of the list. They were to be protected as part of his propaganda film efforts, which persisted through the end of the war (and culminating in the expensive final UFA production Kolberg, released in January 1945).

Many of the cultural figures appearing on the list are no longer widely remembered but there are exceptions, including a number of renowned classical musicians such as the composers Richard Strauss, Hans Pfitzner, Carl Orff and Norbert Schultze, the orchestral conductors Wilhelm Furtwängler and Herbert von Karajan, and the Wagnerian baritone Rudolf Bockelmann. The only foreigner (Ausländer) on the list was Dutch actor Johannes Heesters.[1]

Special listed artists

Architects

Visual artists
Sculptor Arno Breker
  • sculptor Arno Breker (1900–1991), named as "Reichskultursenator" (Reich Culture Senator)
  • sculptor Fritz Klimsch (1870–1960)
  • sculptor Georg Kolbe (1877–1947)
  • sculptor Josef Thorak (1889–1952)
  • painter and illustrator Hermann Gradl (1883–1964)
  • history painter Arthur Kampf (1864–1950)
  • painter Willy Kriegel (1901–1966)
  • painter Werner Peiner (1897–1984)

Authors

Composers
Actor Heinrich Schroth
Carl Orff, aquatint etching
1918 portrait of Strauss by Max Liebermann

Actors

Singers

Further listed artists on the "Führerliste"

There was also an extended list, the so-called "Führerliste" that included "God-gifted artists" who were not to be drafted but worked as "Künstler im Kriegseinsatz" (artists in the war effort).

Authors

Composers
Conductor and composer Ottmar Gerster

Conductors
Herbert von Karajan conducting in 1941

Instrumentalists
Composer and pianist Walter Gieseking

Theater and opera
Actor Heinrich George

Fine Arts
Painter Ludwig Dettmann

Special film-list initiated by Goebbels

See also

References
  1. Klee, Ernst (2007). Das Kulturlexikon zum Dritten Reich: Wer war was vor und nach 1945 (in German). Frankfurt am Main: Fischer. p. 227. ISBN 978-3-10-039326-5.
  2. Roncigli, Audrey (2009). Le cas Furtwängler. Paris: Imago. p. 171.
  • Maximilian Haas: Die Gottbegnadeten-Liste (BArch R 55/20252a) in: Juri Giannini, Maximilian Haas und Erwin Strouhal (Hrsg.): Eine Institution zwischen Repräsentation und Macht. Die Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst Wien im Kulturleben des Nationalsozialismus. Mille Tre Verlag, Vienna 2014, pp. 239–276. ISBN 978-3-900198-36-7.
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