102 Part II: A Change of Scene
to Georg Swarzenski, an outstanding connoisseur and protagonist of
contemporary art. Under his direction, the Städel Art Gallery flourished.
Those teaching at the Städel included Max Beckmann, whose own paint-
ings at this time featured portraits of members of the cultural elite, such
as Heinrich Simon, Georg and Marie Swarzenski, Fritz Wichert, the art-
dealer Battenberg, and the collector and patron of the arts Lilly von
Schnitzler-Mallinckrodt.
One institution on the side of the modernists was the radio, which
had been based in Frankfurt since 1922. Its programming was highly
ambitious under the direction of Carl Adolf Schleussner, and more
especially of Hans Flesch, who was keen to promote modern music,
experimental radio drama and the radio essay. In addition, the Frank-
furter Zeitung, which had been founded by Leopold Sonnemann and
was run as a Jewish family business, was known for its liberal political
views and its open-minded attitude in cultural matters. The literature
section edited by Heinz Simon, in particular, stood out for its willing-
ness to publish unconventional writers. These included Benno Reifenberg
and Siegfried Kracauer and the reviews and essays of Walter Benjamin
and Soma Morgenstern, as well as the reportages of Joseph Roth.^28 For
a number of years, this paper was noted for a pluralism which enabled
it to provide a platform for progressive developments in the arts. The
same pluralism was evident in the theatre, both in the Schauspielhaus
and the Neues Theater, where, alongside the classics, there were pro-
ductions of modern dramatists, such as Fritz von Unruh, Carl Sternheim,
Paul Kornfeld and Georg Kaiser. There were bold innovations, too, at
the Frankfurt Opera under Clemens Krauss, Alwin Kronauer and Lothar
Wallenstein. Even in the Friday concerts of the Museumsgesellschaft,
which were always important social occasions during the winter season,
the works of modern composers could be heard, as was also the case
with the symphony orchestra’s Monday concerts.
In 1927, the city authorities organized a music exhibition that set out
to give a complete overview of current trends in music, an event that
attracted a great deal of attention. During the summer, the exhibition
was combined with a concert series. As a regular commentator on all
major musical events, Adorno reviewed the exhibition, Music in the
Life of the Nations, as well as the summer concerts. Of the exhibition
he observed that it represented the vain attempt ‘to replace the now-
disintegrated cosmos for the ear ... with an encyclopedia for the eye’.^29
While he praised the performances of the Vienna Philharmonic and the
Orchestre du Conservatoire, he was scathing about the ‘Negro revue:
Black People’ in the Schauspielhaus:
This is said to be Josephine Baker’s troupe, and this meagre show
could easily be conceived as a foil to an impetuous temperament,
one that makes use of uniformity to show off one’s own great
form. But Josephine Baker was not there and the meagre show