Building and business activities of the Löw-Beer family

In August last year, a book titled "The Löw-Beer Villas and the History of an Entrepreneurial  Family" was published, dedicated to the Jewish textile industrialists and traders, the Löw-Beer family. The authors focus on the rise of the family from the Boskovice ghetto to textile magnates and patrons active not only in Brno but in the whole of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire. They also analyse the intricate genealogy of the family and their economic and building activities.

 

The lecture of a team of researchers, who are also co-authors of this book, will be opened by Petra Svobodová, curator of the Löw-Beer villa in Brno. She will speak about the history and present of Grete Tugendhat’s parental art nouveau villa in Drobného street 22 (below the Villa Tugendhat). A restoration of the building was completed in December last year and the villa will open to the public this summer.

Historians Vladimír Velešík and Vladimír Velešík jun. will introduce the branch of the Löw-Beer family coming from Brněnec and their business and building activities in the Polička and Svitavy region including the Löw-Beer villas in Svitávka and Brněnec-Půlpecen.

Chronicler of Svitávka Pavel Krejcar will present the Löw-Beer family tree, which is being continuously updated, and briefly introduce the personality of Fritz Löw-Beer, cousin of Greta Tugendhat and an important collector of East Asian art.

Dagmar Černoušková (Villa Tugendhat Study and Documentation Centre) will at the end briefly present the villa of Fritz’ brother Ernst Löw-Beer, which he had built in in Brno-Pisárky in the mid-1930’s.

 

The lecture series will be concluded by a screening of a feature documentary about the Jewish business family of Löw-Beer in Svitávka, "The Story of a Found Suitcase".

At the very end, the Löw-Beer Villas travelling exhibition installed in the technical basement of Villa Tugendhat will be opened with a toast.

The lecture will be held on Monday, 16 February 2015 at 5 pm. (A tour of the villa is not part of the lecture).

Due to an exceptional number of speakers and the screening of a twenty-minute documentary, the lecture will last ca. two hours.

 

Entrance fee: 100,- CZK; students and senior citizens 50,- CZK
A prior reservation to attend the lecture is required by telephone: +420 515 511 015/017
or e-mail: info@tugendhat.eu
(limited capacity of 70 persons).

You can download a poster of the lecture here.

Related information: www.vilalowbeer.cz; www.low-beerovy-vily.cz