Jewish Business, Polish Nationalism, and Art Collecting in Habsburg L’viv: Naftuła and Michał Toepfer

Heretofore neglected in the art history of eastern Europe, the family of Naftuła and Michał Toepfer, Polish Jewish businessmen and Kulturträgers , performed an outstanding role in the cultural, urban, and political life of turn-of-the-century Lemberg/Lwów/L’viv, the capital of Habsburg Galicia. Between 1905 and 1907 Michał Toepfer donated to the city hundreds of artworks which he had collected alongside his father. The Toepfers’ donations created the core collection and the foundation for the establishment of the L’viv City Art Gallery, a pivotal cultural venue for the rapidly urbanizing multi-ethnic fin-de-siècle city. Reconstructing the Toepfers’ historical personae within a broader context of cultural nationalism and Jewish urbanization, this article traces the evolution of the Toepfers’ public image, from stereotypical semi-folkloric personages of Jewish tavern-keepers, to government figures in the Austrian parliament, to bohemian cabaret-owners and museum donors. The Toepfers and their collection are considered as a phenomenon at the crossroads of Jewish acculturation, local patriotism, and cultural nationalism in the late nineteenth–early twentieth century.