INFORMATION PORTAL OF THE MARSHAL'S OFFICE OF THE KUJAWSKO-POMORSKIE Region IN TORUŃ

In unusual circumstances, the regional self-government came into possession of a collection of books and documents left by the eminent German-American art historian Kurt Weitzmann, who died more than a quarter of a century ago. The collection will now be placed in the hands of researchers from the Institute of Art History at the Humboldt University in Berlin, and in return the Kazimierz Wielki University in Bydgoszcz will receive a collection of Humboldt-Universität publications on the history of the Italian Renaissance and Baroque (half a thousand volumes).

It is a story almost like a novel. Born in 1904, Weitzmann – a graduate from the Universities of Münster, Würzburg and Vienna, and an alumnus of some of the most eminent art historians and archaeologists of the German-speaking world – specialised in the study of the art of the Middle Ages and researched, among other things, Byzantine illuminated manuscripts. In 1935, he escaped from Nazism to the USA, where he worked, among others, at Princeton University and collaborated with the Harvard University centre on Byzantine art, lecturing, researching, writing and publishing. When he died in 1993 (and his wife also died shortly afterwards), a friend sent his archive – books, manuscripts, typescripts, private correspondence, personal memorabilia – to the antiquarian Volker Westphal in Berlin. Unfortunately, she got the address wrong and these items – 20 large and heavy cardboard boxes – never reached the addressee.

And now there is a Polish, or more precisely a Bydgoszcz, thread in this story. An employee of the courier company involved in the transfer, a resident of Bydgoszcz, decided not to dispose of the unclaimed parcel, rightly believing that the contents might have scientific value and should end up in the right hands.

Before Vice Marshal Zbigniew Ostrowski became interested in the case, Kurt Weitzmann’s archive had lain in one of Bydgoszcz’s garages for several years. Now – in accordance with the intention of the sender, and certainly of Weitzmann himself – we are handing it over to German researchers. Volker Westphal’s designated recipient is Prof. Stefan Trinks from the Institute of Art History at Humboldt University, who will be met tomorrow (3 July) at his office in Gotha (Gotha, Thuringia) by Vice Marshal Zbigniew Ostrowski and UKW Rector Prof. Bernard Mendlik.

For me, the silent hero and key figure in the whole affair is Mr Robert Tworek, who was the depositary of this consignment. He lacked neither imagination nor sensitivity when he decided to interest me in this consignment. We are delighted that the archives of Weitzmann and his wife Josephine Weitzmann-Fiedler will go to the Humboldt University in accordance with their will – said Deputy Marshall Zbigniew Ostrowski before leaving for Thuringia.

The magnanimous gift from the Humboldt-Universität – one of the most significant and prestigious in Germany (among the eminent figures associated with it are 57 Nobel Prize winners) – to our UKW is 500 scientific items devoted to the works of Italian masters of the Renaissance and Baroque. They will certainly be of use to students of the faculties of history and cultural sciences.

Beata Krzemińska

Press spokesperson for the Marshal’s Office

July 2, 2025