Sarah Eckhardt, PhD- Associate Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art Virginia Museum of Fine Arts

Reconstructing the Ludwig and Rosy Fischer Collection of German Expressionism at VMFA

*This program has been organized by the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts and is supported, in part, by the Paul Mellon Endowment and the Jean Stafford Camp Memorial Fund.

Sarah Eckhardt is VMFA’s assistant curator of Modern and Contemporary Art and holds a PhD in art history from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She received her MA in art history from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and BA in art and English from Valparaiso University.

Ludwig and Rosy Fischer were forward-thinking collectors from Frankfurt, Germany, who embraced the challenging art of their time. Between 1915 and 1925, they built one of the most important collections of German Expressionist art in Germany, with a strong emphasis on Die Brücke- "the Bridge"- a pivotal group within the movement. After their deaths, their collection was divided between their two sons, Max and Ernst Fischer. Of Jewish descent, both brothers needed to flee Germany after the Nazis came to power. Ernst and his young family arrived in Richmond, Virginia in 1935 with his portion of the collection, which now comprises the Ludwig and Rosy Fischer Collection of over 200 German Expressionist art works at the VMFA. Max, however, left most of his collection behind. In recent years, three important works from Max's half of the collection have been located and restituted to the Fischer heirs, who have in turn ensured that these works rejoin the larger Fischer collection at VMFA. Inspired by the Fischer descendants' commitment to the legacy of their family's collection, VMFA will hold an exhibition at VMFA scheduled for 2027 that reconstructs as much of the original Ludwig and Rosy Fischer collection as possible. Dr. Sarah Eckhardt will discuss the history of the collection as well as the complex and ongoing detective work required to find many of these masterpieces.