Special exhibition
25th October 2024 to 15th June 2025
Hessian State Museum

With a shop window into the Astronomical-Physical Cabinet, Hessen Kassel Heritage presents masterpieces from the collection from 23.10.2024 to 15.6.2025 at the Hessian State Museum Kassel. The small but exquisite special exhibition "Make Use of Time: Artworks of Time Measurement" showcases mechanical clocks as they were used in a historical context and for princely representation. A special highlight are film installations, where visitors can gain insight into the functioning of pocket watches and their mechanisms.

Mechanical watches as coveted status symbols

Since their invention in the late 13th century, mechanical clocks have been considered coveted status symbols. They combine endless possibilities for decorative design on the outside with technical sophistication and inventiveness on the inside. The metrological usefulness of clocks in general only gradually emerged as scientific tasks challenged watchmakers to increase the accuracy of the movements.

In the 16th century, Kassel contributed significantly to this technological development: The "Astronomer Landgrave" Wilhelm IV (1532 - 1592) worked since 1560 with excellent clockmakers such as the Swiss Jost Bürgi to refine clocks technically so that they could be used scientifically as minute-accurate timepieces at the landgrave's observatory. Around 1600, this was considered utopian due to the proverbial inaccuracy of mechanical clocks.

After the devastating Thirty Years' War, Landgrave Carl (1653 - 1730) continued the tradition of Wilhelm IV to acquire the most technologically innovative clocks of his era. In 1962, the State Art Collections in Kassel took over the astronomical clocks from the Hamburg Observatory Bergedorf dating from the 19th and early 20th centuries.

World-class watch collection in Kassel

The watch collection of Hessen Kassel Heritage enjoys an outstanding reputation nationally and internationally today. This is due, among other things, to the special objects that clearly illustrate many important milestones in watchmaking and its development from 1550 to 1900.

Insights into the Kassel Collection

With the start of this exhibition, Hessen Kassel Heritage at the Hessian State Museum Kassel offers changing insights into the valuable and internationally renowned collection of the Astronomical-Physical Cabinet. Integration into the permanent exhibition of the Hessian State Museum is currently being planned.

Originally, there was a museum exhibition in the Orangery in Kassel. Due to serious deficiencies in the technical facilities and the overall structural condition of the Orangery, a comprehensive renovation of the building is unavoidable. Therefore, the collection of the Astronomical-Physical Cabinet had to move out in 2020.

Ensuring the continued operation of a partial building use by the planetarium, a gastronomic business, and the existing rental apartments has recently been secured. However, operating a museum is no longer possible due to the existing deficiencies. Hessen Kassel Heritage is currently working on preparing the necessary major construction measures and their corresponding consideration in the Hessian state budget.