"Maps 12 & 15 von Willebrand Collection Vault map (12) and inset (15) (Dresden, Germany, 1919?).
(...) von Willebrand lived to the age of 97, finally expiring at a spa outside of Kaiserslautern, an obscure minor nobleman who never escaped his internal exile to the provinces. He died in the same year as the Weimar Republic, in 1933. The Margrave’s ill-advised attempt to keep up with the times led to the von Willebrand vault map’s misidentification as Degenerate Art. As a result, almost all copies were destroyed by the newly established Reich Chamber of Culture. Only the original copper plate matrix of the vault map remained untouched in the Sophienkirche annex, together with a pair of printed copies. The church was comprehensively destroyed during the Allied bombing of Dresden in 1945. Incredibly, a controlled detonation of unexploded ordinance in the immediate postwar period led to the unearthing of the vault map plate and a pair of prints in pristine condition"
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