Cramer, Hans Max, 1920-2012

Hans Max Cramer, German art dealer. Decorated officer Order Orange Nassau, The Netherlands. member of the board Dutch Art Dealer"s Fair, Prinsenhof Museum, Delft, 1959, chairman, 1966, 71; member board Society Friends Municipal Museum, The Hague, 1968-1982.; Member Dutch Art Dealer"s Association (director) 1968), Nieuwe of Littèraire Sociëteit de Witte.

Cramer, Hans Max was born on January 7, 1920 in Cassel, Germany. Naturalized, Netherlands, 1951. Son of Gustav and Gertrud V.A.M. (Reisewitz) Cramer.

Student, Netherlands Institute Art History, The Hague, 1940—1945.

Assistant curator Netherlands Institute Art History, The Hague, 1948—1950. Owner old master paintings G. Cramer Oude Kunst h.v., since 1961. Board member Prinsenhof Museum, Delft, chairman board, 1966, Delft, 71.

Delegate confederation International des negociants en Oenvres d'art, since 1962, vice president, 1970. Decorated officer Order Orange Nassau, The Netherlands.

Hans Max Cramer has been listed as a noteworthy art dealer by Marquis Who's Who.

Member of the board Dutch Art Dealer"s Fair, Prinsenhof Museum, Delft, 1959, chairman, 1966, 71. Member board Society Friends Municipal Museum, The Hague, 1968-1982. Member Dutch Art Dealer"s Association (director) 1968), Nieuwe of Littèraire Sociëteit de Witte.

Married Ada N.Th. Deurvorst, June 17, 1954 (divorced April 1978). Children: Catharina Helena, Anna-Paulina.

Father: Gustav Cramer
Mother: Gertrud V.A.M. (Reisewitz) Cramer
Spouse: Ada N.Th. Deurvorst
child: Catharina Helena Cramer
child: Anna-Paulina Cramer

This conversation between Hans Cramer, the proprietor of Oude Kunst Gallery, and Louis Marchesano, Jonathan Petropoulos, and Anja Heuss, was taped on 1-2 April 2004 at the Getty Center. Cramer discusses the history of his family's firm during the 1930s and 1940s in Berlin and the Hague, as well as the postwar years when he became sole proprietor. Other topics discussed include collectors with whom he was associated, such as Norton Simon and Heinrich Thyssen, and the dispersal of Dutch art collections after the second world war.

The gallery of the art dealers Gustav Cramer (1881-1961) and his son Hans Max Cramer (b. 1920) was one of the most renowned and influential galleries dealing in old master paintings during the 20th century in Europe. The gallery was founded in Kassel in the late 19th century by Gustav Cramer's grandfather, Max Cramer. In 1914 Gustav Cramer inherited the gallery. After World War I Gustav Cramer moved to Berlin where for many years he worked at the renowned Van Diemen gallery, in charge of the old masters section, or Alte Kunst. In 1933 he opened his own gallery in the Lennéstrasse in Berlin. In 1936, he was expelled from the official artists' organization Reichskammer der Bildenden Künste (Reich Chamber of Visual Art). In 1938, in order to escape the Nazi regime, the family moved to the Netherlands and opened the G. Cramer Oude Kunst gallery in Javastraat 38 in The Hague. Under the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands Gustav Cramer's son Hans Max Cramer became the official owner of the gallery. While the son officially represented the gallery, the father continued to be in charge of business. After Gustav Cramer's death in 1961, Hans Max Cramer continued his father's business.

During World War II Gustav Cramer dealt on consignment in fine and decorative arts, mainly with German dealers in Berlin. He also engaged as an intermediary in transactions between Nazi agents collecting for Adolf Hitler's museum in Linz and Dutch collectors and dealers who wanted their transactions with the Nazis to remain anonymous. After the war he continued to sell decorative arts and old master paintings to a primarily Dutch and German clientele.

Between 1954 and 1959, the gallery eliminated decorative arts from its stock in order to focus on old master paintings. Records from this period indicate that the firm also began to engage in business more regularly with numerous museums and private collectors in the United States. In 1960 Hans Max Cramer changed the business strategy again and began selling paintings almost exclusively on consignment, a concept for which he was criticized during the early 1960s. This approach turned out to be successful at a time when many private collections were being sold and dispersed. Cramer was able to make substantial business deals by representing some of the most important private collections in the Netherlands, including H.E. ten Cate, the Becker collection, the C.J.K. van Aalst collection, the Sidney van den Bergh collection, and numerous others. The pool of clientele expanded to include the world's most significant old master collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the J. Paul Getty Museum, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the National Gallery, London, the National Gallery, Washington, the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, the Toledo Art Museum, and the collections of L.H. Gilbert, Armand Hammer, Norton Simon, Baron Thyssen-Bornemisza, and many others.

Hans Max Cramer studied at the prestigious Dutch school for art history, the Rijksinstituut voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie in The Hague. He was head of the study-room for Dutch and Flemish old masters, and wrote a great number of articles for the Dutch encyclopaedia Winkler Prins. During the 1980s he curated the exhibition Dutch Painting of the Golden Age from the Royal Picture Gallery, Mauritshuis and the Galleries of Hans M. Cramer and John Hoogsteder, held in The Hague in 1986. It was the first publicly sponsored exhibition curated by dealers.

Hans Max Cramer
Birthdate: January 07, 1920
Birthplace: Kassel, Kassel, Hesse, Germany
Death: August 15, 2012 (92)
The Hague, The Hague, South Holland, Netherlands
Immediate Family:
Son of Gustav Max Cramer and Gertrud Viktoria Anna Marie Cramer
Ex-husband of Ada Nathalia Theresia Cramer

G. Cramer Oude Kunst (H.M. Cramer)
Javastraat 38
2585AP Den Haag
The Netherlands

+31 703630758

Hans Cramer specializes in fine old master paintings. The firm was founded by his grandfather over 120 years ago, then taken over by his father during the first World War. In 1940 Hans Cramer, who always wanted to study law, took over the firm given the pressure of the second World War. For more than half a century he has been running the gallery.

Cramer, Hans M.

Cramer, Hans M., 1973-1974.