Objects from the Albert Schweitzer Collection

From the Emmy Martin Estate

On the 11th of November we will be auctioning untold art works from the Albert Schweitzer collection coming from the Emmy Martin estate.

Auction in Wurzburg:
Saturday, 11 November 2017 starting at 2 pm

Preview in Wurzburg:
Wed 8 until Fri 10 November from 10 am until 7 pm
Sat 11 November from 9 am until 1.30 pm

Eight classic Punu-masks from Gabon are part of the offer.

There are untold treasures from the Albert Schweitzer collection (1875-1965) and his time in Lambaréné in West African. Works from the former French Equatorial Africa, today Gabon, which Schweitzer gave, over the years to his "faithful" companion Emmy Martin, which have remained to this day in her families possession.

Emmy Martin (born 1882) and Albert Schweitzer met for the first time in the years between 1917, Albert Schweitzer's compulsory return from Gabon, and 1924, when the clinic in Lambaréné was reconstructed. On the advice of her friends, she wanted to return to her interest in music after the early death of her husband, and asked Albert Schweitzer, the former theology friend of her husband and organist, for advice. Things turned out differently for her.

Albert Schweitzer and Emmy Martin in Lambaréné 1961

As early as the spring of 1925, she embarked for Equatorial Africa to assist Albert Schweitzer for several months in his household and also to nurse in the “jungle hospital” as an expected second nurse was not able to travel. She remained there until October and visited Lambaréné again at least two more times with her son Hans at Christmas 1951 and August 1962.

In 1913, together with his wife Helene, Albert Schweitzer founded a hospital for the poorest of the poor at the mission station of the Parisian Evangelical Mission in Andende / Lambaréné (French Equatorial Africa). In the First World War, he was compulsorily interned as a German, and thus as an "enemy" to French colonial power. In 1917 he had to leave the country. It was not until 1924 that he returned to Lambaréné to rebuild and expand the now dilapidated hospital. In 1925, he decided to build a hospital on his own land, which, two years later, was inaugurated in January 1927. It was only a few kilometers up river from the original hospital. It will make him famous around the world as the "jungle doctor" and later Nobel Peace Prize laureate (1952).

She supported Schweitzers life work for more than forty years, from the Alsatian town of Günsbach, where Schweitzer’s home is located. In addition to Schweitzer's wife Helene, she is his closest confidante and co-worker, and at the same time liaised between Lambaréné and the rest of the world, organizing and accompanying him on concert and lecture tours, plus providing links to the financial backers of his hospital.

Albert Schweitzer and Gabon
1913-1917 and 1924-1965

14 works of art - some with personal dedications from Schweitzer – are in the legacy, including classic 'okuyi' masks from different periods. The most important face mask is from the Lumbo, that was produced before 1913 by the creators of the so-called “White Masks of Ogooué”.

Eight masks from Gabon, Punu/Lumbo

346 Anthropomorphic face mask „okuyi“, H: 28 cm

347 Anthropomorphic face mask „okuyi“, H: 27 cm

345 Female face mask "okuyi",H: 32 cm

350 Anthropomorphic face mask „okuyi“, H: 36 cm

349 Anthropomorphic face mask, H: 21,5 cm

348 Anthropomorphic face mask „okuyi“, H: 25,5 cm

351 Two anthropomorphic face masks „okuyi“, 30 cm, 32 cm

Provenance:

Albert Schweitzer, Lambaréné, Gabon, collected in situ (1913-1917)
Emmy Martin, Alsace
Hans Martin (born 1910), son of Emmy Martin
Suzanne Leiberich, née Martin, daughter of Hans Martin
Family estate until today

Overview