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A sports museum is an institution in which the history of exercise, sports, and play is preserved and presented. In short, a sports museum deals with the history of the culture of movement. The Berlin Sports Museum has itself been the object of a very special culture of movement for the
2nd Newsletter – Berlin Sports Museum can finally exhibit its collection! – The AIMS Marathon Museum of Running in the Olympic Park – German Sports Forum (Deutsches Sportforum)
A sports museum is an institution in which the history of exercise, sports, and play is preserved and presented. In short, a sports museum deals with the history of the culture of movement.
The Berlin Sports Museum has itself been the object of a very special culture of movement for the past 15 years: it was located at 14 different venues in Berlin and Brandenburg, some for shorter periods of time, some for longer! The 15th site is the natatorium wing at Jahnplatz of the German Sports Forum (Deutsches Sportforum) in the Berlin Olympic Park. The Berlin Sports Museum found its permanent residency there in the late summer of 2005, with approx. 1,500 m² of space for its varied collections and archives.
In 1925 and in 1930, during the Weimar Republic, there were plans for a museum in what is now the Olympic Park, made by both the Museum of Physical Exercise (Museum für Leibesübungen) and Werner March, the architect of the Berlin Olympic Stadium.
The interiors of two floors of the natatorium wing were cored out in 2003 according to the restoration plans of the architectural firm Brenne, and the wing has been rebuilt as a sports museum according to current museum requirements.
The renovations include the creation of acclimatised rooms for the photo archives and painting collection. The original facade of the building has been reconstructed with newly created windows according to the regulations
for historical buildings. At the same time, the new windows were constructed so that they also comply with the necessary safety and light specifications for museum venues. Fire and theft safety devices within the building
assure the appropriate protection for the collections.
For the first time, the staff of the Sports Museum is able to catalogue and process the collection with out time-consuming and cumbersome travels to the various depots. At the same time, it is now possible to host sport history events for up to 30 people in a seminar room, while the nearby lecture hall in the Haus des Deutschen Sports has capacities for about 200 people. For the first time, the expansive Sports Museum library can be viewed in its entirety – in the same location where an expansive book collection of the then-sports organization and Reich Academy for Physical Exercise existed from May 1936 to May/June 1945. During that same period, the part of the building now used by the Sports Museum then housed the administration offices for the Department of Physical Fitness (Turnen).
80 years after the founding of the Museum für Leibesübungen and 15 years after its re-founding, the Berlin Sports Museum had found an appropriate and final venue for four fifths of its museum functions: collection, preservation, cataloguing, and research. With exemplary cooperation between the administrative offices for the sport, building, and cultural authorities – almost unprecedented in Berlin – we have succeeded in creating a professional repository and workspace in the Berlin Olympic Park. We would like to express our sincere thanks once again to all those responsible and involved in this major effort!
Since the beginning of November 2006, the 500m² Lichthof (reception hall in the Haus des Deutschen Sports ) can now be utilized as a (still provisionary) exhibition space. The final fifth museum task that had been missing, the one that in the public’s eye is the true duty of a museum – the presentation and sharing of the collectionhas thus been realized.
Currently, the exhibit “Sports under the Sign of David” is being presented in the Lichthof in the Haus des Deutschen Sports (see Newsletter 1).
“Gallery of Names” opened
The Berlin Sports Museum presented the first ten exhibition panels of the “Gallery of Names” on November 19, 2006 during a commemoration of German athletes on Remembrance Day in the Haus des Deutschen Sports Sports. Until the start of the World Championships in Athletics in 2009, this sport history exhibit will be presenting a sophisticated and extensive overview of all of the important people, terms, locations, and events that are tied to the Olympic Park. As soon as the renovation project in the Haus des Deutschen Sports is finished, the panel exhibit will be complimented with numerous objects pertaining to sport history – the glass cases have already been put in place and will be ready to be filled by around May of 2007.
The first people (appropriate to the occasion) to be presented in the “Gallery of Names” are Karl Friedrich Friesen, Hanns Braun, Rudolf Harbig and Erich Mindt. In addition, all (known) Olympians – from around the world – who died from acts of violence are honoured. Starting in the spring of 2007, there are to be guidebooks and pedagogical materials available for the “Gallery of Names.”
We are looking for …
We are looking for …advertising, archival materials, athletic measuring devices, award certificates and ribbons, certificates, documents, emblems, exercise and sports equipments, flags and pennants, graphic arts, magazines, medals, newspapers, paintings,photographs and photo albums, pins, placards, posters, post cardsprizes and trophies, programmes, recordings, sculptures, slides, films, videos, souvenirs, sports clothing, sports equipment, sport history literature, training equipment … and much more!
Opening Hours:
Mo – Fr: 10 a.m.–14 p.m. Uhr (for the winter half year)
Admission price:
Berlin Olympic Park: 1 €, reduced 0.50 €
Exhibit: free
Contact:
Tel.: 030 – 3 05 83 00
Fax: 030 – 3 05 83 40
E-Mail: Sportmuseum.Berlin@t-online.de
