biography

Ernst Steinmann was born on September 4th, 1866 in Jördenstorf (Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania), son of protestant pastor Adolf Steinmann. Since 1887 he studied theology and art history in Tübingen, Rostock and Leipzig; among his teachers were Johannes Adolph Overbeck (1826-1895) and particularly Anton Springer (1825-1891). In 1891 Steinmann became scientific associate at the Archeological Institute in Leipzig, completing his dissertation on inscriptions and wall paintings in medieval churches in 1892. Since late 1893 Steinmann worked in Italy predominately in Rome and Florence where he dedicated his studies to Renaissance art, especially to Michelangelo who became his lifelong pivotal artist. Steinmann’s writings were often criticized for their wistful and lyrical style, but his publications had notable success also because of the outstanding quality of the photographic illustrations, many of them produced by Domenico Anderson (1854-1938). After his marriage with Olga von Gerstfeld (1866-1910) in June 1901, Steinmann became director of the Art Museum in Schwerin in 1903. He resigned the position in 1911 and moved to Rome. Since 1894 Steinmann was closely related to Henriette Hertz (1846-1913) and encouraged her early to build up a scientific library for scholarship in Art History in the Palazzo Zuccari in Rome. In 1913 Steinmann became the founding director of the Bibliotheca Hertziana which, after long negotiations, became one of the first institutes of the newly founded Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gesellschaft (since 1948: Max-Planck Society). During the First World War Steinmann lived in Germany and continued working on his study on Napoleon’s “Kunstraub”, completely published only in 2007. At the end of 1919 he returned to Rome to reenter his position as director of the Bibliotheca Hertziana. Faced with declining health and the coming into power of the Nazi regime in Germany, Steinmann retired in 1934 naming Leo Bruhns (1884-1957) to become his successor. Though the scientific relevance of his own studies is not much valued today, Steinmann played a significant role in the development of studies in Italian Renaissance and Barock art. As director of the Bibliotheca Hertziana he promoted important research projects and supported the early career of eminent scholars such as Richard Krautheimer (1897-1994) and Rudolf Wittkower (1901-1971). Steinmann died on November 24th, 1934 in Basel. His burial place is in Rome.