Neue Frankfurter Schule

Neue Frankfurter Schule (NFS, New Frankfurt School) is a group of writers and artists which was founded by former members of the editorial staff of the satirical magazine pardon. They have published the magazine Titanic from 1979.

History[edit]

Among the founding members of the group, which first had no name, were:

• F. W. Bernstein (1938–2018)
• Bernd Eilert [de] (born 1949)
• Robert Gernhardt (1937–2006)
• Eckhard Henscheid [de] (born 1941)
• Peter Knorr [de] (born 1939)
• Chlodwig Poth [de] (1930–2004)
• Hans Traxler [de] (born 1929)
• F. K. Waechter (1937–2005)

The name Neue Frankfurter Schule was chosen in memory of the philosophical Frankfurter Schule (Frankfurt School) around Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno, among others, which had pursued a critical theory of society in the 1930s. The name Neue Frankfurter Schule alludes firstly to Frankfurt as a centre for many members and the publication of Titanic. Secondly, the name is a satiric allusion to the Franfurter Schule Thirdly, serious similarities connect the NFS to the critical theory of the former group. Oliver Maria Schmitt [de] regards cultural critic as the focus of the NFS,^[1] Michael Rutschky noted that the satirical conscience ("satirisches Bewußtsein") of the NFS is the focus of the Frankfurter Schule.^[2]

The name was chosen years after the forming of the group, in 1981, when a good name was needed for an exhibition of works by Gernhardt, Traxlera and Waechter.^[3]

A second generation of NFS members has included Max Goldt, Gerhard Henschel [de], Simon Borowiak [de], Thomas Gsella [de], Ernst Kahl [de], Duo Rattelschneck [de] and, after the Peaceful Revolution, Michael Rudolf [de].^[4]

In 2006, the city of Frankfurt acquired c. 7,000 original drawings by Bernstein, Gernhardt, Traxler and Poth for a new museum of comic art, the Caricatura Museum Frankfurt, which was opened on 1 October 2008 as an independent department of the Historical Museum.

Literature[edit]

• W. P. Fahrenberg (ed.): Die Neue Frankfurter Schule, ARKANA Göttingen 1987, ISBN 3-923257-70-8
• Oliver Maria Schmitt [de]: Die schärfsten Kritiker der Elche. Die Neue Frankfurter Schule in Wort und Strich und Bild, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-8286-0109-X
• Klaus Cäsar Zehrer: Dialektik der Satire. Zur Komik von Robert Gernhardt und der ‚Neuen Frankfurter Schule. (dissertation) Universität Bremen. 2002.

References[edit]

External links[edit]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Neue Frankfurter Schule.

• Literature by and about Neue Frankfurter Schule in the German National Library catalogue
• Stadt Frankfurt kauft Werke der „Neuen Frankfurter Schule“ – Meldung des Hessischen Rundfunks (16. Mai 2006, nicht mehr online)
• Texts of the NFS