Hermine Feist

Hermine Antonie Feist, née Wollheim (born December 20, 1855; died November 17, 1933 in Berlin) was a German porcelain collector. She is also known as Hermine Feist-Wollheim.

Life Hermine Wohlheim was the daughter of the Jewish coal wholesaler Caesar Wollheim and his wife Caroline, née Pollack. Her sister Martha (1857-1942) later married the ophthalmologist Max Reichenheim, while her sister Else (1858-1904) was married to the chemist and industrialist Franz Oppenheim, the chairman of the Agfa board. She married the merchant Otto Feist (1847-1912), the son of a tradesman in Frankfurt am Main and had three children Paul (1882-1886), Ernst (1884-1939) and Hans (1887-1952). The latter died shortly after his release from the Oranienburg concentration camp.

Art collection Hermine Feist and her husband inherited the property and the villa at Bergstrasse 5 Hermine Feist commissioned the architect Alfred Breslauer to redesign the villa so that it could be used both for residential purposes and for the museum presentation of the collection. Parts of Hermine Feist's collection were transferred to Dresdner Bank and other creditors in 1933. The Free State of Prussia acquired the majority of these objects in 1935, as a result of which they became the property of the Museum of Decorative Arts in Berlin. and in 1941 at Theodor Fischer in Lucerne. Hermine Feist is commemorated by the bust of Madame X/Hermine Feist by Rudolf Großmann, created in 1929, which is now in the Jewish Museum Berlin.

Claims for restitution for Nazi-looted art The Feist-Wollheim family was persecuted under the Nazis because of their Jewish heritage, and, as of 2024, the , heirs of Hans und Ernst Feist-Wollheim have registered 1550 search requests for art objects on the German Lost Art Foundation. Of these five ceramic objects are listed as restituted. In 2013 the Austrian Commission recommended against restituting a bronze statue.

Literature

Anna-Carolin Augustin: Berliner Kunstmatronage, Sammlerinnen und Förderinnen bildender Kunst um 1900. Wallstein, Göttingen 2018.