History of the Collection

Folk art as a museum theme was discovered towards the end of the 19th century. In Dresden, Oskar Seyffert (1862-1940), Professor at the Königliche Kunstgewerbeschule, founded the Verein für Sächsische Volkskunde in 1897. One of its aims was to establish a museum. After collecting a large number of objects, Seyffert was able to open the “Museum für Sächsische Volkskunst” in the freshly restored Jägerhof in Dresden-Neustadt in 1913. He himself was its first Director. It was due to Seyffert’s charismatic personality and the popularity of the many events in the museum that this was the first of Dresden’s museums to reopen after the Second World War. Despite having suffered considerable damage, the building was repaired and the museum reopened in 1952. It has been part of the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden since 1968.

The origins of the Puppentheatersammlung can be traced back to the private collection assembled by the Leipzig teacher and researcher on the history of puppet theatre Otto Link (1888-1959), which from 1952 was affiliated to the Museum für Sächsische Volkskunst in Dresden in the form of a state research centre. At first, a travelling exhibition was created in order to propagate the idea of puppet theatre, and then a number of thematic exhibitions were held. From 1960 until 2003 the collection was housed in the Hohenhaus in Radebeul, where a permanent exhibition was set up in 1985 after major restoration work. After the Hohenhaus was restored to its former owners after 1990, the collection was moved first to the Dresden Garnisonkirche and then, in 2005, to the Museum für Sächsische Volkskunst, where there are now annually changing exhibitions as well as additional short-term exhibitions on specific themes.