The Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation (German: Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz; SPK) is a German federal government body that oversees 27 museums and cultural organizations in and around Berlin, Germany. Its purview includes all of Berlin's State Museums, the Berlin State Library, the Prussian Privy State Archives and a variety of institutes and research centers. As such, it is one of the largest cultural organizations in the world, and also the largest cultural employer in Germany with around 2,000 staff as of 2020. More than four million people visited its museums in 2019.The SPK was established in 1957 with the mission to acquire and preserve the cultural legacy of the former State of Prussia. Its current operations include the preservation and care of the museum collections and the continuation of academic and scientific research to encourage learning and understanding between different peoples.In July 2020, Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media Monika Grütters announced that the SPK would be dissolved and converted into four independent foundations: State Museums, State Library, Secret State Archives and Ibero-American Institute. This followed recommendations by the Science Council that the SPK was too unwieldy in its current form. As a result, a reform commission has been set up consisting of representatives from the federal government, several German states, the SPK Presidium and museum directors to implement the dissolution by 2025.
“White” papers in artworks show a wide range of hues, which often provide insight into their condition and past exposures. We seek to explain color changes in fine art papers, drawing on analytical data obtained from laboratory papers with known compositions and selected test prints. We use color measurements as well as—for laboratory papers—analysis of iron ion content, molar mass, and carbonyl groups. Laboratory papers, which primarily contained iron ions or gelatin sizing, exhibited the most clearly distinguishable changes, corresponding to typical color changes seen in naturally aged papers. Our data support the existence of typical radiation and post-irradiation effects in such paper and, furthermore, more light-induced damage on recto sides than on unexposed verso sides. Our findings can aid in the characterization of color changes in papers from historical artworks caused by iron or gelatin content.
This article presents the curatorial concept for the new permanent exhibition of the Museum for Islamic Art at the Pergamon Museum, reopening in early 2027. Building on the museum’s historical role in shaping the discipline of Islamic art history, the new galleries rethink how Islamic art can be communicated to contemporary audiences through immersive spatial design, visitor-oriented interpretation, and participatory approaches. The exhibition takes the Mshatta façade (eighth century) as an important conceptual point of reference, using it to frame Islamic art within longer histories of cultural continuity, exchange, and transformation linking Late Antiquity and the Islamicate world. Combining chronology, geography, thematic narratives and multisensory experiences, the exhibition foregrounds migration, plurality and exchange as defining forces of cultural production. Particular attention is given to accessibility strategies, intergenerational learning, contemporary artistic interventions and the integration of visitor perspectives into the curatorial process. Rather than presenting Islamic art as a static canon, the exhibition frames it as a dynamic cultural history shaped by mobility, interaction and ongoing reinterpretation.
Summary Publication of an early Roman offering table for the woman Tasouchion. The table probably came from the Fayum and was inscribed with a rare bilingual Hieroglyphic-Greek inscription. The Hieroglyphic text contains a ritual, while the Greek text offers a Greek version of the well-known and wide-spread Latin epitaph sit tibi terra levis . Both texts are analyzed in the context of ancient funerary practices.
