MUSEUM FÜR OSTASIATISCHE KUNST - MUSEUM OF FAR-EASTERN ART

The Far East art museum opened in 1913 and was the first of its kind to be inaugurated in Germany. Its collection allows visitors to discover the distant and fascinating world of Chinese, Japanese and Korean arts. The founders of the museum, Adolf Fischer (1857-1914) and his wife Frieda Bartdorff (1874-1945) gathered an important collection of Japanese art to form the basis of the exhibition. This includes remarkable works of Buddhist painting and wood sculpture, Japanese paintings, color wood engravings. Other world-renowned treasures of the Far East Art Museum include Chinese religious bronzes, first-class examples of Buddhist sculptures, bronze art, ceramics from China, Korea and Japan, and Korean pottery in the Koryô dynasty. But it is not only works of art within the museum that are significant, the museum building itself deserves further examination, because it is one of the most beautiful and important historical buildings of the classic Modernist period in Cologne. The flat-floor flat building, which offers a 1,390 square meter exhibition area, was designed by the famous Japanese architect Kunio Maekawa, a student of Le Corbusier. The museum includes a cafeteria which is also accessible outside the museum's opening hours. Here you can sit down and relax and enjoy the view of the Aachener Weiher. More interesting is the view on the garden in the inner courtyard of the museum, which was conceived in the style of traditional Japanese meditation gardens according to the plans of the Japanese sculptor Masayuki Nagare. The combination of Japanese architecture and Japanese garden art creates a harmonious overall impression of the Far East. The museum changes its presentation of selected objects from its permanent collection several times a year. He also organizes special exhibitions of works from his own collections.