Over the course of several months, the portrait of the 352nd Rector and the first woman in this office was painted by Katrin Lau at her studio in Lubmin, not far from Greifswald. Katrin Lau is a restorer by profession and has been working freelance since 1981. She took on commissions for preserving historical monuments and from museums, art collections, and galleries, and also restored damaged paintings at the University of Greifswald. Since 2002, she has also been increasingly active as an artist herself. In 2017, she produced a portrait of the former Rector, Prof. Dr. Rainer Westermann.
"I cannot imagine a better tribute to my time as Rector than the permanent addition of my portrait to the University's “ancestral portrait gallery”. The importance given by universities to the documentation of their history by commissioning paintings of their rectors is shown by young universities that have adopted and continue this tradition,” says Johanna Weber.
The tradition of a university portrait gallery of professors at the University of Greifswald dates back to a council decision in 1691. Today, more than 200 portraits of professors from the 16th to the 21st centuries belong to the academic art collection, maintained by the Kustodie (University Collections). Collections of paintings of scholars are a permanent feature in the self-presentation and historical documentation of universities. The University’s collection includes more than 80 oil paintings from the 16th to 18th centuries as well as the commission of 32 portraits from the late Romantic period.
An especially valuable object in the university portrait collection is a copy of the earliest “painting of scholars” in Greifswald that dates back to the 18th century - the so-called “Rubenow-Tafel” (Rubenow board) (original around 1460 in St. Nikolai Greifswald). The painting in the Aula shows the first Rector of the University of Greifswald Heinrich Rubenow (1400 - 1462) together with six university professors from Rostock and Greifswald.
Further information
Collections of the University of Greifswald [de]
Academic Art Collection of the University of Greifswald
A media photo [de] can be obtained free of charge for editorial purposes via pressestelleuni-greifswaldde
Contact at the University of Greifswald
Dr. Thilo Habel
Kustodie (University Collections)
Domstraße 11, Entrance 4, 17489 Greifswald
Tel.: +49 3834 420 3061
thilo.habeluni-greifswaldde