Gewandhaus

The Gewandhaus on Augustusplatz is Leipzig's third concert hall of that name, inaugurated in 1981 as the permanent home of the Gewandhaus Orchestra — one of the world's oldest civic orchestras, founded in 1743. Its predecessors included a converted cloth merchants' hall in the old town (1781) and a neoClassical purpose-built venue in the Musikviertel (1884) that was destroyed in World War II. The current building, constructed under the GDR, is a striking example of late-communist brutalism: exposed concrete facades, a vast glass frontage facing the square, and a sweeping foyer ceiling mural, 'Der Zug des Lebens' (The Procession of Life), painted by Sighard Gille. The main hall seats around 1,900 and the smaller Mendelssohn-Saal hosts chamber and solo programmes. The Gewandhaus Orchestra's chief conductors have included Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy, Wilhelm Furtwängler, and Kurt Masur, giving the institution one of the most storied podium lineages in classical music.