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49-599: The Fridericianum is a museum in Kassel , Germany . Built in 1779, it is one of the oldest public museums in Europe. Since 1955 the quinquennial art festival documenta has been centred on the site, with some artworks displayed on Friedrichsplatz , in front of the building. The exhibition building itself was fully renovated by 1982. Ever since 1988, Fridericianum has continually hosted changing exhibitions of contemporary art. Since June 2013 Susanne Pfeffer has been director of

98-400: A dynamic economic and social development in the recent years, reducing the unemployment rate by half and attracting many new citizens so that the population has grown constantly. Several international operating companies have factories or headquarters in the city (Volkswagen, Mercedes Benz, SMA, Wintershall, Krauss-Maffei Wegmann, Rheinmetall, Bombardier). The city is home of several hospitals;

147-452: A number of low-floor buses complete the Kassel public transport system. The introduction of low-floor buses led to the development of the Kassel kerb which improves the accessibility at bus stops. The city is connected to the national rail network at two stations, Kassel Central , and Kassel-Wilhelmshöhe . The traditional central station (Hauptbahnhof) has been reduced to the status of

196-535: A regional station since the opening of the Hanover-Würzburg high-speed rail line in 1991 and its station (Kassel-Wilhelmshöhe) on the high-speed line at which the InterCityExpress (ICE) and InterCity services call as well as Nightjet and Flixtrain . Kassel is connected to the motorways A 7 , A 49 and A 44 . The city is served by Kassel Calden Airport . The current mayor of Kassel

245-526: Is Sven Schoeller of Alliance 90/The Greens , who was elected in March 2023. He succeeded Christian Geselle ( SPD ), who had been in office since 2017. The Kassel city council ( Stadtverordnetenversammlung ) governs the city alongside the Mayor. The most recent city council election was held on 14 March 2021, and the results were as follows: The University of Kassel is a public higher education institution and

294-495: Is divided into 23 local districts, each of which has a local council with a local mayor as chairman. The local councils are elected every five years by the population of the local districts. The local advisory board can be heard on all important issues affecting the local district. However, the final decision on a measure rests with the Kassel city council. Around Kassel is the administrative district ( Landkreis ) of Landkreis Kassel . The following cities and municipalities border

343-772: Is the Druselturm; the Brüderkirche and the Martinskirche are also, in part, of medieval origin. The towers of the Martinskirche are from the 1950s. The main Protestant church of Kassel, it was begun in 1364 and finished in 1462. Severely damaged by British bombing in 1943, it was later reconstructed in a more modern style between 1954 and 1958. St. Bonifatius was designed and built in 1956 by Josef Bieling . The complex includes Wilhelmshöhe Palace (with

392-434: The documenta , an international exhibition of modern and contemporary art , has been held regularly in Kassel. The documenta now takes place every five years. As a result of the documenta 6 (1977), Kassel became the first town in the world to be illuminated by laser beams at night (Laserscape, by artist Horst H. Baumann). This laser installation is nowadays still visible at weekends. Artworks from former editions of

441-728: The Enlightenment period with those of contemporary art. In 1998 René Block took over from Loers as Artistic Director of the Fridericianum, focusing on the supposed peripheries of the global art world. Following Block, the Fridericianum was directed from 2008-2011 by Rein Wolfs, who organized the first exhibition of Danh Vo 's "We the People", for which the artist recast a life-size Statue of Liberty from 30 tons of copper sheets. Since June 2013 Susanne Pfeffer has been director of

490-862: The Franco-Prussian War of 1870–71 Napoléon III was imprisoned in Wilhelmshöhe. In 1918, Wilhelmshöhe became the seat of the German Army High Command (OHL): it was there that the military commanders Hindenburg and Ludendorff prepared the German capitulation. Another large park and also part of the European Garden Heritage Network is the Karlsaue along the Fulda River. Established in

539-596: The Kassel University Library . In 1955, the first documenta exhibition, founded by Arnold Bode , took place in the provisionally restored Fridericianum building. Since then documenta has been held every five years in the Fridericianum, which was fully renovated by 1982. The Fridericianum began hosting its own temporary exhibitions as well in 1988, opening with Veit Loers' exhibition "Schlaf der Vernunft" (1988), which made reference to Fridericianum's original purpose, juxtaposing museum objects from

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588-669: The Museum Fridericianum was founded in 1779. By the end of the 19th century the museum held one of the largest collections of watches and clocks in the world. Other art museums in Kassel include: Hessen Kassel is the football club in the city, who plays in the Hessenliga after being relegated from the Regionalliga Südwest in the 2017/2018 season. The city's own football stadium, the Auestadion

637-807: The Oktogon ( Hercules monument ) and of the Orangerie . In the late 18th Century, Hesse-Kassel became infamous for selling mercenaries ( Hessians ) to the British crown to help suppress the American Revolution and to finance the construction of palaces and the Landgrave's opulent lifestyle. In the early 19th century, the Brothers Grimm lived in Kassel. They collected and wrote most of their fairy tales there. At that time, around 1803,

686-471: The Protestant stronghold against Catholic enemies. Secret societies, such as Rosicrucianism flourished, with Christian Rosenkreutz's work Fama Fraternitatis first published in 1617. In 1685, Kassel became a refuge for 1,700 Huguenots who found shelter in the newly established borough of Oberneustadt. Landgrave Charles , who was responsible for this humanitarian act, also ordered the construction of

735-447: The documenta (mainly sculptures) can be found in many places in Kassel; among those are the " 7000 Oaks ", a work of land art by the German artist Joseph Beuys . The latest/current edition of the documenta , known as " documenta 15 ", runs from 18 June until 25 September 2022. Kassel experiences an oceanic climate ( Köppen : Cfb ) but not so far from marine climates, with a more notable continental influence than Berlin . Using

784-778: The 16th century, it is famous for the Orangerie , a palace built in 1710 as a summer residence for the landgraves. Today, the Orangerie contains the Museum of Astronomy and Technology, with a scale model of the Solar System spanning the entire park and beyond. In addition, the Park Schönfeld contains a small, municipal botanical garden , the Botanischer Garten Kassel . Europe's first public museum,

833-622: The 1961–1990 normal and 0 °C isotherm, the city already had a humid continental climate ( Dfb ). Kassel has a population of about 200,000 and is the 3rd largest city in Hesse state and the only large city in the North Hesse region. Kassel is often called the city that located on the center of Germany, due to its position; however, the real center of Germany is not far away. Kassel first reached its first population peak of over 100,000 in 1899 and its second in 1943 with about 225,000. Kassel

882-508: The 19th century the museum held one of the largest collections of watches and clocks in the world, and with the 1926 changing of the spelling of the town to Kassel, the name became synonymous to licensed clock making. The Fridericianum also contained a library built to house 100,000 volumes, and was connected to the medieval Zwehrenturm tower, which had been made into an observatory. When, in the early 19th century, Napoleon 's youngest brother Jérôme Bonaparte became King of Westphalia and Kassel

931-721: The Antiquities Collection and Old Masters), the Hercules monument, and the Lions Castle. Wilhelmshöhe Palace above the city was built in 1786, by landgrave Wilhelm IX of Hesse-Kassel. The palace is now a museum and houses an important collection of Graeco-Roman antiques and a fine gallery of paintings comprising the second largest collection of Rembrandts in Germany. It is surrounded by the beautiful Bergpark Wilhelmshöhe with many appealing sights. The complex

980-482: The Chatti, a German tribe that had lived in the area since Roman times. Another assumption is a portmanteau from Frankonian cas , meaning "valley or recess", and sali meaning "hall or service building", which can be interpreted as "(town) hall in a valley". A deed from 1189 certifies that Cassel had city rights, but the date when they were granted is not known. The first castle in Kassel was constructed in 1277, which

1029-455: The Fridericianum originally housed the state library of Hesse , the art collections of the Hessian landgraves , including the "Modern Statue Gallery", as well as a medal, machinery and watch room, a print room, a manuscripts room and map gallery, scientific instruments, cork models of Roman architecture, and wax figures of historic Hessian landgraves. Europe's first public museum, by the end of

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1078-432: The Fridericianum. Having sold soldiers to the British, Frederick II, Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel used his riches to build the world's first public museum building, which was to stand on the recently laid out parade square in Kassel. The Fridericianum was designed by Huguenot architect Simon Louis du Ry for Landgrave Friedrich II and opened in 1779 as the world's first purpose-built public museum. An encyclopedic museum,

1127-534: The Fridericianum. Pfeffer presented an exhibition trilogy "Speculations on Anonymous Materials" (2013), "nature after nature" (2014) and "Inhuman" (2015). In 2015 she dedicated a large-scale retrospective to the American experimental filmmaker Paul Sharits . On the occasion of the 60th anniversary of documenta , Pfeffer organised a retrospective of the Belgian artist Marcel Broodthaers , featuring works from all of

1176-670: The Karlsaue park in the Southern city district. Several courts are located in Kassel, including: Kassel is twinned with: [REDACTED] Media related to Kassel at Wikimedia Commons [REDACTED] Kassel travel guide from Wikivoyage Fulda River The river arises at Wasserkuppe in the Rhön mountains in Hesse. From there it runs northeast, flanked by the Knüll mountains in

1225-623: The Landgraviate was elevated to a Principality and its ruler to Prince-elector . Shortly after, it was annexed by Napoleon and in 1807 it became the capital of the short-lived Kingdom of Westphalia under Napoleon's brother Jérôme . The Electorate was restored in 1813. Having sided with Austria in the Austro-Prussian War to gain supremacy in Germany, the principality was annexed by Prussia in 1866. The Prussian administration united Nassau , Frankfurt and Hesse-Kassel into

1274-638: The Prussian center of power in Berlin, and in 1913 Fridericianum ceased to function as a museum, retaining only its status as a state library. The Fridericianum was heavily damaged in World War II , during the bombing raids on Kassel in 1941 and 1943. After the war, all that remained of the Fridericianum and library were the enclosing walls and the Zwehrenturm library. The surviving books were moved into

1323-515: The ancient buildings in the city centre were not restored, and large parts of the inner city area were completely rebuilt in the style of the 1950s. A few historic buildings, however, such as the Museum Fridericianum (see below), were restored. In 1949, the interim parliament (" Parlamentarischer Rat ") eliminated Kassel in the first round as a city to become the provisional capital of the Federal Republic of Germany ( Bonn won). In 1964,

1372-546: The artist's creative periods. 51°18′49″N 9°29′51″E  /  51.31361°N 9.49750°E  / 51.31361; 9.49750 Kassel Kassel ( German pronunciation: [ˈkasl̩] ; in Germany, spelled Cassel until 1926 ) is a city on the Fulda River in northern Hesse , in central Germany. It is the administrative seat of the Regierungsbezirk Kassel and

1421-600: The casualties were civilians or wounded soldiers recuperating in local hospitals, whereas factories survived the attack generally undamaged. Karl Gerland replaced the regional Gauleiter , Karl Weinrich , soon after the raid. The Allied ground advance into Germany reached Kassel at the beginning of April 1945. The US 80th Infantry Division captured Kassel in bitter house-to-house fighting during 1–4 April 1945, which included numerous German panzer-grenadier counterattacks, and resulted in further widespread devastation to bombed and unbombed structures alike. Post-war , most of

1470-493: The championship playoffs, losing to Adler Mannheim , and reached the semi-finals on three more occasions. The Huskies ran into financial difficulties and dissolved in 2010. The "Young Huskies", which is a junior and youth hockey club, decided to enter a men's team in the Hessenliga. This is the fifth division and the lowest men's competition in the state of Hesse . The new club was expecting no more than 3,000 supporters for

1519-453: The citizens in 2017 had a migration background). Kassel was first mentioned in 913 AD, as the place where two deeds were signed by King Conrad I . The place was called Chasella or Chassalla and was a fortification at a bridge crossing the Fulda river . There are several yet unproven assumptions about the name's origin. It could be derived from the ancient Castellum Cattorum , a castle of

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1568-402: The city of Kassel (starting clockwise in the north): Ahnatal , Vellmar , Fuldatal , Staufenberg , Niestetal , Kaufungen , Lohfelden , Fuldabrück , Baunatal , Schauenburg , Habichtswald . Of these, Vellmar and Fuldatal in the north, Kaufungen in the east, Lohfelden in the southeast and Baunatal in the south are growing ever closer to the urban area. In 1558 the first German observatory

1617-536: The city. During World War I the German military headquarters were located in the Wilhelmshöhe Palace. In the late 1930s, Nazis destroyed Heinrich Hübsch 's Kassel Synagogue . During World War II Kassel was the headquarters for Germany's Wehrkreis IX, and a local subcamp of Dachau concentration camp provided forced labour for the Henschel facilities , which included tank production plants. There

1666-554: The district of the same name , and had 201,048 inhabitants in December 2020. The former capital of the state of Hesse-Kassel , it has many palaces and parks, including the Bergpark Wilhelmshöhe , which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site . Kassel is also known for the documenta exhibitions of contemporary art . Kassel has a public university with 25,000 students (2018) and a multicultural population (39% of

1715-457: The famous water features take place. They start at the Oktagon and during a one-hour walk through the park visitors can follow the water's way until they reach the lake of the Wilhelmshöhe Palace, where a fountain of about 50 metres (160 ft) marks the end of the spectacle. The Löwenburg ("Lions Castle") is a replica of a medieval castle, also built during the reign of Wilhelm IX. After

1764-407: The first home game in the Hessenliga. However, they had over 5,000 supporters come to watch. Kassel has seven tram lines (1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8), with trams arriving usually every 15 minutes. The city also operates a light rail Stadtbahn network called RegioTram using Regio Citadis low-floor trams which run on both tram and main line railway tracks with three lines (RT1, RT4, RT5). Moreover,

1813-546: The new Prussian province of Hesse-Nassau . Kassel ceased to be a princely residence but soon developed into a major industrial centre, as well as a major railway junction. Henschel & Son , the largest railway locomotive manufacturer in Germany at the end of the nineteenth century, was based in Kassel. In 1870, after the Battle of Sedan , Napoleon III was sent as a prisoner to the Wilhelmshöhe Palace above

1862-468: The public Klinikum Kassel is one of the largest hospitals in the federal state, offering a wide range of health services. Kassel is the largest city in the north of the federated state of Hesse in the south-western part of Germany, about 70 kilometers northwest of the geographic center of Germany. It is located on both sides of the river Fulda. Kassel's deepest point is in the north-eastern Fulda valley at 132.9 m above sea level. The urban area of Kassel

1911-581: The town hosted the fourth Hessentag state festival (again in 2013). In 1972 the Chancellor of West Germany Willy Brandt and the prime minister of the German Democratic Republic Willy Stoph met in Wilhelmshöhe Palace for negotiations between the two German states. In 1991, the central rail station moved from "Hauptbahnhof" ( main station ) (today only used for regional trains) to "Kassel-Wilhelmshöhe". The city had

1960-535: The university in 2017. The university offers a wide range of study programs from organic agriculture to social work. Furthermore, it offers several English master's programs as well as two short-term international programs, the Summer University and the Winter University . The Kunsthochschule Kassel (University of Fine Arts) is also part of the university with a satellite campus directly at

2009-815: The west and the Seulingswald in the east. Near Bebra it changes direction to the northwest. After joining the Eder river it flows straight north until Kassel , then changes direction to the northeast, with the Kaufungen Forest east and the beginning of the Reinhardswald forest northwest. The north end of the river meets the Werra in Hannoversch Münden , Lower Saxony, where the Fulda and

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2058-594: Was also a camp for Sinti and Romani people (see Romani Holocaust ). Allied prisoners of war from the Stalag IX-A POW camp were deployed to forced labour in the local arms industry in violation of the Geneva Conventions . The most severe bombing of Kassel in World War II destroyed 90% of the downtown area, and some 10,000 people were killed and 150,000 were made homeless. Most of

2107-497: Was built in 1953 and is able to hold 18,737 people. It is located in the south of Kassel at the quarter Südstadt, next to the Karlsaue. Kassel has a long ice hockey tradition, but it was not until 1977 that the Kassel ice rink (Eissporthalle) opened on a private initiative. The Kassel Huskies were founding members of the DEL in 1994, belonging to the league from 1994 to 2006 and again from 2008 to 2010. In 1997 , they were runners-up in

2156-583: Was built in Kassel, and a later version from 1714 survives as the Bellevue Palace . The Ottoneum , the first permanent German theatre building, was built in 1604. The old building is today the Natural History Museum, and the now-called Staatstheater Kassel is located in a nearby building that was constructed in the 1950s. Since 1927 Kassel has been home to Bärenreiter , one of the world's most important music publishers. Since 1955

2205-544: Was destroyed during World War II and became an industrial city in 1950s. Today, Kassel is home to a few companies and universities. The bombing raids of 1943 destroyed 90% of the city center. The city center was almost completely rebuilt during the 1950s and is a combination of renovated or reconstructed old buildings and architecture of the 1950s. Outside the city center, the suburbs are dominated by 19th-century architecture. Timber-framed old towns are situated in suburbs like Harleshausen and Bad Wilhelmshöhe. The oldest monument

2254-529: Was founded in 1971 as a so-called reform university offering new and innovative models of teaching. It is the newest university in the state of Hessen and has an urban and lively inner-city campus between the city center and the Northern city district, a typical working-class area with a multicultural population. There were 25,000 students enrolled at the university in 2018, 3381 of them non-Germans. Two hundred and twenty-four students obtained their doctorate from

2303-584: Was later replaced by a Renaissance castle, the Kassel City Palace , which burned down in 1811. In 1567 the Landgraviate of Hesse , until then centered in Marburg , was divided among four sons, with Hesse-Kassel (or Hesse-Cassel) becoming one of its successor states. Kassel was its capital and became a centre of Calvinist Protestantism in Germany. Strong fortifications were built to protect

2352-469: Was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2013. The Hercules monument is a huge octagonal stone structure carrying a giant replica of Hercules "Farnese" (now at Museo Archeologico Nazionale in Naples, Italy). From its base down to Wilhelmshöhe Palace runs a long set of artificial cascades which delight visitors during the summer months. Every Sunday and Wednesday afternoon at 14:30 (from May until October)

2401-471: Was named the capital of the kingdom, the Fridericianum was repurposed as the first parliamentary building in Germany. With Jérôme's expulsion in 1813, Fridericianum was returned to its original purpose as a museum. During that time the Brothers Grimm , Jacob and Wilhelm, were employed at the library. With the beginning of Prussian rule in 1866, the museum's collections were gradually transferred to

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