Dr. Hugo Haberfeld

Hugo Haberfeld was an art historian and writer based in Vienna who expressed an early interest in modernism by hiring the young architect and future cultural critic Adolf Loos to design his apartment in 1902. Widely known for this commission, Haberfeld also acted as the director of the Viennese avant-garde Galerie Miethke between 1907 and 1915, a period in which the gallery most fervently promoted international modern art.

Born in Auschwitz in what was then the Austro-Hungarian province Galicia, Haberfeld first studied philosophy and law at the universities in Berlin and Vienna before transferring to the University of Breslau, where he attended lectures in art history, archaeology, history, and philosophy. In 1900, following the completion of his dissertation on Renaissance painter Pietro di Cosimo, Haberfeld became a freelance writer in Vienna, working for various publications including Die Zeit (The Time). He also contributed to one of the leading German art magazines Kunst und Künstler (Art and Artists), edited by the progressive Berlin-based art dealer Paul Cassirer. As the magazine’s Vienna correspondent, Haberfeld reviewed exhibitions at Galerie Miethke and eventually began to write for the gallery’s publications, including a preface for a posthumous retrospective of the fin-de-siècle Austrian painter Anton Romako, whose artistic importance Haberfeld recognized and helped rehabilitate.

In 1907 Haberfeld assumed the position of managing director at Galerie Miethke, which was under the artistic leadership of the Viennese Secessionist artist Carl Moll. Working together, Haberfeld and Moll successfully staged exhibitions of Edouard Manet and Claude Monet in May and June, respectively, of 1910. During this period, Haberfeld also fostered relationships with foreign museum directors and other agents such as the Berlin-based curator and art historian Wilhelm von Bode. In 1912 his work at the gallery and far-reaching contacts resulted in his appointment to the Galerie Miethke as an official appraiser for old and modern paintings.

By mid-1912, professional rivalry had caused the relationship between Haberfeld and Moll to deteriorate; compounded by the endorsement of Haberfeld by the gallery’s owner, Emma Bacher, Moll resigned. In the following years, Haberfeld continued to expand the gallery’s programming through exhibitions of modern international art and through his role directing the municipal Kunsthalle in nearby Karlsbad. In January and February 1913, for example, under his leadership, Galerie Miethke organized Die Neue Kunst, an exhibition modeled after the groundbreaking 1912 Sonderbund exhibition in Cologne; the project included such paintings as Georges Braque’s Terrace at L’Estaque (1908; Centre Pompidou, Paris). In the early summer of 1913, Haberfeld organized at the Karlsbad Kunsthalle a presentation of Old Master and French Impressionist painting as well as fin-de-siècle German and Austrian artists. The following year, in February and March, a smaller version of the first comprehensive retrospective of Pablo Picasso’s work came to the Viennese gallery through Heinrich Thannhauser’s Moderne Galerie in Munich. These exhibitions provided some of the first opportunities for local audiences to experience Cubism in person. In organizing highly engaged and progressive programming, Haberfeld also cooperated with other art dealers including the Galerie Bernheim-Jeune and private collectors, whose holdings he presented. Indeed, Haberfeld’s initiative to display private collections in a sales gallery attracted visitors in new ways. Among the first collections featured at Galerie Miethke was that of the Viennese doctor Oskar Reichel, whose collecting tastes ranged from the Austrian Expressionists to Edvard Munch and Paul Gauguin.

In 1915 Galerie Miethke was forced to close its doors. In early 1917, Haberfeld acquired the firm H. O. Miethke (also known as Galerie H. O. Miethke, Kunsthandlung und Kunstverlag, Miethke & Wawra, Kunstsalon Miethke, and Kunsthandlung Miethke) from Bacher. Unable to reestablish the gallery with its previous focus on modern art after World War I, Haberfeld shifted his focus in the interwar period to Old Master paintings. In these years, he also temporarily worked as an expert and auctioneer for the Viennese auction house Glückselig.

Conscious of the rise of Germany’s National Socialist party that accompanied Adolf Hitler’s appointment as Reich Chancellor on January 30, 1933, Haberfeld and his family immigrated to Paris. Last registered at a small guesthouse in Vienna, the Haberfelds notified the municipality of their departure from this address on February 22, 1938, just prior to the annexation of Austria in March. After this date, there is no trace of them. On October 1, 1940, officials erased the firm H. O. Miethke from municipal records.