On Leaving Traces

Hans Dllgast's Alte Pinakothek in Munich (1946Munich ( -1973) ) is an established design referent for architectural reconstruction in a manner light in touch and sober in idiom.Scholarly writing, pedagogical studies and statements made by architectural practitioners have all contributed to this interpretation.Although this historiography, present in the first retrospective to include the museum in 1974, is at odds with facts apparent in the documents for the project's construction, nothing Dllgast said or published would have corrected it.Both historiographic narrative and Dllgast's complicity in it obscure the preservation theory and practice with which the project resonates.Reconsidering his writing, sketches, pedagogic materials, technical drawings and students' work, and the reception of Dllgast's museum since his death, can address some of the lacunae in understanding an architect who, for whatever reasons, preferred to cultivate a persona that downplayed the high-cultural traditions of which he was part.