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Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

The Museum of the Work of Our Lady, located in Strasbourg in the former Frauenhaus (House of the Work), is dedicated to the arts of the Middle Ages and Renaissance in the Upper Rhine (Alsace, Baden, Rhineland Switzerland, Palatinate). Founded in 1931 by Hans Haug, it merges four collections: the deposited sculptures of the cathedral, the fonds of the Society for the Conservation of Historic Monuments of Alsace, the works of the second museum of fine arts designed by Wilhelm von Bode, and those of the Hohenlohe-Museum. The building itself, the historic seat of the Fondation de l'Ouvre Notre-Dame (created in 1246), combines a Gothic wing of 1347 and a Renaissance wing of 1579, with a spiral staircase and a portal by architect Hans Thoman Uhlberger.

The museum's collections cover statuary, stained glass, paintings, architectural drawings, furniture and tapestries. Among the major pieces are the original statues of the cathedral gates (XIIIth–XVIth centuries), paintings by Konrad Witz, Hans Baldung or Sébastien Stoskopff, and a rare collection of Gothic drawings, including those by Erwin of Steinbach and Ulrich of Ensingen. The medieval garden, recreated in 1937 by Hans Haug, is inspired by the treatises of Albert the Great and features ornamental, medicinal and aromatic plants used in the Middle Ages. A funeral slab of Louis V de Lichtenberg (1471) and a Romanesque baptismal tank are also exposed.

The museum was deeply marked by the destruction of the Second World War: bombarded in 1944, it was restructured in 1946 and reopened in 1956 in its present form. Hans Haug, pioneer of modern museography, applied the concept of a "museum of ambiance", combining works of art and architectural elements on an immersive journey. The 17th century carved wooden galleries, saved from Strasbourg houses destroyed during the Great Perceia, or the fragments of the Jube of the cathedral (demoli in 1682) illustrate this approach. Today, the museum remains a unique testimony of Strasbourg art, at the crossroads of Latin and Germanic influences.

Collection

De la célèbre Tête de Christ dite de Wissembourg, l'un des plus anciens vitraux connu, aux corbeilles de verres cristallines peintes par le maître de la nature-morte Sébastien Stoskopff, ses collections remarquables sont autant de manifestations de la vitalité de l'art strasbourgeois.

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