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The Oskar Reinhart Collection ‘Am Römerholz’ brings together outstanding achievements of European art. The collection ranges from a large holding of Impressionist art, then goes backwards in time to nineteenth-century French Realism, Romanticism and Neo-Classicism, and Old Masters, who are represented by just a few important works. Only those Post-Impressionists who were particularly indebted to Impressionism were made part of the collection. Works by later twentieth-century artists are few and far between and mark a symbolic boundary with the art of high modernism.
Oskar Reinhart’s ideas on art were greatly influenced by the way in which French Impressionism was received in Germany around 1900. He regarded the Impressionist celebration of colour and light as a gold standard for all artistic efforts. This belief was combined with a dream to create a comprehensive museum of European art. He therefore not only paid particular attention to French Impressionism but also collected art from the more recent and more distant past, though only if it showed similarities to Impressionism in artistic and aesthetic terms.
Oskar Reinhart was interested in great artists, not in different periods. He paid as little attention to the historical context as to the artist’s oeuvre. He was concerned only with acquiring the best available work by an artist who interested him.