{"id":6059,"date":"2022-05-18T09:39:00","date_gmt":"2022-05-18T07:39:00","guid":{"rendered":"\/blog\/?p=6059"},"modified":"2022-05-18T09:53:35","modified_gmt":"2022-05-18T07:53:35","slug":"whats-that-for-an-address-slip-from-paris","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"\/blog\/2022\/05\/18\/whats-that-for-an-address-slip-from-paris\/","title":{"rendered":"What\u2019s That For? An Address Slip from Paris"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What\u2019s That For? An Address Slip from Paris<\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n

Katja Pinzer-Hennig | 18 May 2022 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s just a small piece of paper, now in the holdings of the Richard-Wagner-St\u00e4tten Graupa. But it contains a clue to Richard Wagner\u2019s travels and one of his times spent in Paris. Custodian Katja Pinzer-Hennig reports on this seemingly unspectacular loan, which is currently on show in the exhibition \u201cRichard Wagner and the Nationalization of Feeling<\/a>\u201d.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

No, this isn\u2019t another opportunity to discuss Wagner\u2019s finances, even though he was perpetually concerned with money \u2013 be it in The Ring<\/em>, in various writings, or in his private and creative life. Today\u2019s question does concern Richard Wagner as a millionaire \u2013 though not in terms of marks, but in kilometres. Did Wagner crack the million mark? Did he travel more than a million kilometres, at a time, moreover, when people usually hardly ever left their hometown? This was, after all, a time when travelling on foot, horseback, or by carriage was arduous and tedious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whether his journeys actually amounted to more than a million kilometres remains to be seen. But what we can say is that Wagner was a frequent traveller. It is known that the composer visited Paris at least ten times between 1839 and 1862. Commemorative plaques on various buildings in the city refer to his presence there. A small piece of paper from the holdings of the Richard-Wagner-St\u00e4tten, Graupa, contains a hidden clue as to one of Wagner\u2019s whereabouts and stays in the French capital. The slip in question measures just 3.3 x 8.2 cm. The note reads: \u201cR. Wagner. rue de Provence, 59 (cit\u00e9 d\u2019Antin).\u201d While citing a Parisian address, the note is undated, meaning it doesn\u2019t reveal which of the many sojourns the composer was enjoying at the time. Nor does it reveal whether it is the address of his lodgings or those of a sender, whether Wagner himself penned the slip or some other, unknown, person did. The rue de Provence in the Quartier de la Chauss\u00e9e-d\u2019Antin still exists today. But there is no reference to Wagner there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, Wagner\u2019s correspondence and a quick aside in his autobiography provided more information. While in search of an \u201capartment away from noise\u201d he found \u201clodgings with a room in the Cit\u00e9 de Provence\u201d. In volume 3 of the collected letters, \u201cS\u00e4mtliche Briefe Richard Wagners\u201d, one of the first letters Wagner writes to his wife from Paris contains the note: \u201cFinally today … I have taken other lodgings, in a Cit\u00e9 (Cit\u00e9 d\u2019Antin) on the 4th floor \u2013 65 francs!!…\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The sender\u2019s address of rue de Provence subsequently appears in ten of the 17 letters Wagner dispatched from Paris in the period 2 February to 13 March 1850. One of the letters \u2013 without a street name, however \u2013 is written to the painter, friend, and his \u201ccompanion in hunger\u201d from his first stay in Paris (1839\u201342), Ernst Benedict Kietz. In it, Wagner writes: \u201cThat you come to Truffaut today! I advise you to. I need the book of Lohengrin again: bring it with you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Handwritten foundation reference by Gustav Adolph Kietz, photo: Bestand Richard-Wagner-St\u00e4tten\/ Katja Pinzer-Hennig <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

This presents us with a possible explanation as to how and why the address slip pictured above made its way to Graupa, the place in Saxony where Wagner\u2019s opera \u201cLohengrin\u201d started to take shape. For the back of the slip contains the following handwritten note: \u201cDonated by Prof. Dr. Kietz. Dresden\u201d. The person who penned those words was evidently the younger brother of the painter Ernst Benedict Kietz, to whom Wagner had written the letter requesting the book. The sculptor Gustav Adolph \u2013 the \u201cprof.\u201d of the note above \u2013 met the composer through his brother. He visited the Wagners during their summer retreat in Graupa in 1846 and later described their quarters in a commemorative book. In the year of the first performance of \u201cLohengrin\u201d in Bayreuth, he had a plaque placed on the house in memory of the revered composer and, in 1907, became a co-founder of the preservation society for what is now known as the Lohengrin House in Graupa. He donated several objects for display in the Wagner rooms set up in the house that same year, among them the address slip shown here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Gustav Adolph Kietz’s souvenir book with dedication, photo: Bestand Richard-Wagner-St\u00e4tten\/ Katja Pinzer-Hennig<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

But who\u2019s to tell? It could be that this little address slip was originally attached to Richard Wagner\u2019s letter to Ernst Benedict Kietz of 13 February 1850. It could also be that Wagner wrote the address on the note and sent it to his friend via a third party. Whichever is the case, the note slip was preserved with other mementos and was deemed significant enough to be kept and eventually donated to Graupa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

No one can claim this is a sensational object. It does not grab the eye or provoke a rush of excitement. And there certainly are other exhibits in Graupa\u2019s Wagner Museum today that leave a greater impression on the beholder. But that said, the slip nevertheless conveys vital historical information on Wagner\u2019s location and his travels. It tells a story or even stories that are interesting to explore further. The desire has to be there to discover them in the first place; only that way do we get a foothold on larger chapters in the composer\u2019s history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n
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Katja Pinzer-Hennig<\/h4>\n

<\/p>\n

Katja Pinzer-Hennig has a degree in cultural studies and has worked at various Saxon museums, including as a museum docent at the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden and, from 1993, as a research assistant at Schloss Weesenstein and Albrechtsburg in Meissen.
\nShe has been a curator at the Richard-Wagner-St\u00e4tten in Graupa since 2008, where she is custodian of the collections and is responsible for exhibition curation.\n<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What\u2019s That For? An Address Slip from Paris<\/h2>\n

It\u2019s just a small piece of paper, now in the holdings of the Richard-Wagner-St\u00e4tten Graupa. But it contains a clue to Richard Wagner\u2019s travels and one of his times spent in Paris. Custodian Katja Pinzer-Hennig reports on this seemingly unspectacular loan, which is currently on show in the exhibition \u201cRichard Wagner and the Nationalization of Feeling\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6045,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1765],"tags":[2454,2217,2426,2458,2477],"class_list":["post-6059","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-whats-that-for","tag-dhmwagner","tag-paris","tag-richard-wagner","tag-richard-wagner-and-the-nationalization-of-feeling","tag-richard-wagner-staetten-graupa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6059","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6059"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6059\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6064,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6059\/revisions\/6064"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6045"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6059"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6059"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6059"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}