Wilhelm Pinder's Speech in Leipzig 1933
The following is a translation of the speech given by Wilhelm Pinder, Chair at the Art History Institute of the University of Munich during an event held by the National Socialist Teachers Association at the Albert Hall in Leipzig on the eve of the November 1933 election.
German Compatriots!
History has ever been the presence and presence has ever been history. Ever since our heart and reason have told us that nations are living beings, having mission and fate, ever since that time do we feel more vividly than before, that we are responsible for the past and the future of our national community. Whatever the shameful acts may be that have been committed against Germany or by Germany's own fault, these rest like a disgrace upon him who thinks historically — who is alive in history — as if he himself bore the blame and had been present. However, only he who feels thus, is entitled to feel the pride when he thinks of the great things which have taken place in Germany as if he had been present. Then history is presence, knowledge becomes conscience and then also the presence is history. That which we are doing now acts upon the line of life of our nation which runs on even after those who are alive today have passed into oblivion. We feel and know that we are the transitory support-pillars of our German nation.
Thousandfold responsibility rests upon him who has learnt to consider history. He is giving all the honour of his lifework and the entire dignity of his science as a forfeit if he makes his small contribution by saying the "yes" when the Leader calls. But we say yes!
I personally confess that I have waited through all the years ever since we entered the League of Nations — for this moment, which, thanks to God, has now come. A moment in which the outraged sense of justice of a kind, strong, tormented and defamed nation eventually seeks the only possible solution — and in what manner. So peace-loving, so inexpressibly decent, so pure and honourable as the unforgettable speeches of our great Leader have done. All this has originated from a policy which is higher than what has been known as politics up till now. This policy is a product of morality, it is a policy of the heart, based on a religious foundation, on faith. It is something new in history. Only during the time of a Bismarck has something similar occurred, so that one can say: A sound unknown to the world, this world of "politics." And to this world of "politics" belonged a language meant to hide the thoughts; but we hear now the sound coming from the heart of a whole nation, through the Leader, whom it has produced as a concentration of itself in the hour of greatest need. Let this sound be heard. I wish to point out my recent experiences and say: it is not quite so bad as the press wants to make us believe. I have for instance during a stay in England met some real, genuine Englishmen who admired what had happened and who told me: What you have done is right and proper.
If ever a crime has been committed which will bear the damnation of history, it is the deliberate, defamatory misconstruction born from the fear of a world suffering from senile decay which misunderstands, refutes and spits upon intentions which are pure, beautiful, peace- loving even Europophile.
If ever there is a confirmation for the correctness, for the sacred innermost right, in that which we are now doing, then it is the self-betrayal, the personal stripping of lowliness and lunacy by our honesty, it is the misconstruction which we meet everywhere, the not-being- able-to-understand from all those, where it is obvious that they belong to "inwardly inferior world." Our world wants to become new. In fact it is already there, driven by just that power which, as one believed, did not pertain to politics, namely the sound which comes from the heart. In order to render this possible lots of things had to happen, history which finds its replica in art and just in history of which I, as an art-historian, have to think in special.
The very age called dark by the liberalistic epoch, the middle age, was the last healthy epoch of European culture. That which is forcing its way up wants to become a new middle age in the sublimest sense of the world and it will be a title of honour if we are successful in earning it. The middle ages were the last and greatest security which we call style. Style is that which we have lost. Style is beginning to live again, more in Germany than in any other country of the world. Not in creative art — not yet in creative art — style in art can only return after men have style. Style appears to be form and is community and faith. Style in art must come from the style of men. If we are able to complete our re-construction which has commenced with our new movement we will again be free like in the middle ages; art will then serve again, like in the middle ages. Art will then no longer be an egotistic purpose, in the same manner as it was not in the middle ages. Art will then call the artist, i.e. the life of community will set the task and will only suffer such artists to follow its call who confess themselves to it, as in the middle ages. The first signs have appeared. He who does not see that, is blind. He who does not want to see it, is a fool, is dead and lost. Our life is beginning to get style. Art has become a secondary matter, thank God. And that is health.
He who was in Munich on the 9th of November and saw the quiet procession which called back to mind the tragic happening of 10 years ago1, he who has seen that: the Leader and his followers, bareheaded and silent, the old torn flags before the old legionaries, many a leader supporting himself on a stick, no music, only the deep sound of drums, quiet torches throwing their light into the grey November day, the long, long silence, the thousands of raised hands — swearing a silent oath — and bursting into this silence the shots of commemoration — he who has seen that had to say to himself as a man of history: This has not existed since the time of the spiritual drama. That was no longer a theatre, there was no longer a separation between actors and audience, stage and audience. No audience was left, here again was community! And now everything acts together again. That is more than a picture (the "picture" was the last shallow remainder left over from all creative art in the 19th century). This now is style, i.e. inseparable union of the community to produce form, involuntarily created symbol for a thought which thousands feel; cooperation of all in the expression of the individual life, strictly speaking something religious. Just because there was no aesthetic intention but merely a compliance, strict and dignified, with a firm faith, the cold-hearted aesthetician was forced to say: "This is beautiful!"
Beauty can only be achieved if it is not the aim. That is how the statues of Bamberg2 and Naumburg3 were created: to produce sacred feelings and not to be enjoyed; not to be looked at but to exist. Form is safe so long, as the super-formal, that is faith, community, desire for symbol, style of humanity express it as a matter of fact.
Such a matter-of-fact and wonderful symbol appears to me the eternal guard at the Feldherrnhalle in Munich. Day after day, night after night, summer and winter two young Germans stand at attention, two hours each. The place is never vacant; I have often controlled these young men at night, quite unnoticed. As an ex-infantry man I know one thing: We old soldiers would have "cheated," but these two here stand two hours at attention even if there is no one to watch them. The man as a statue — that is our German symbol.
I must close because the ten minutes allotted to me are over. But you know what I wish to say. I tried to show you, as viewed from my own profession, what we have lost and which will again return, especially in Germany. It can only come if there is peace and honour. Honour also, is a concept of the middle ages. In the treaty of Versailles and its continuation in the form of the League of Nations the last concept of chivalry was buried. Now it will rise again!
He who goes and says "Yes" need not be a National Socialist, in that case it is understood, but every German must go, each man is responsible in order that our nation does its duty before the Leader and in order that it is justified before history. Hail Hitler!
The failure and aftermath of the 1923 Beer Hall Putsch.
The Bamberg Horseman and possibly The Tomb of Emperor Heinrich and Empress Kunigunde by Tilman Riemenschneider and the Romanesque statues in the Rose Garden of the Neue Residenz.
The Stifterfiguren at the Naumburg Cathedral.