Walter Benjamin Archive

Walter Benjamin, Passport photo, c. 1928 / Theodor W. Adorno, 1946

Walter Benjamin, Was ist Aura? Draft of Das Kunstwerk im Zeitalter seiner technischen Reproduzierbarkeit

Walter Benjamin, Einbahnstraße, 1928, Book cover by Sasha Stone

Walter Benjamin, Entries in his blue leather notebook, c. 1927/1928

Photo collection in Theodor W. Adorno’s personal papers

Florens Christian Rang’s notebook with entry by Walter Benjamin, Agon und Theater, 1922

The Walter Benjamin Archive was founded in 2004 as an institute of the Hamburger Stiftung zur Förderung von Wissenschaft und Kultur in the Akademie der Künste (Academy of Arts). The Archive preserves Walter Benjamin’s Literary Estate as well as an extensive collection of his personal papers. In an ongoing process, the holdings are being expanded with a collection on the reception of Benjamin’s works. The Archive also provides the basis for the new critical edition Werke und Nachlaß (Writings and Literary Estate), edited by Christoph Gödde and Henri Lonitz, and published successively since 2008 by the Suhrkamp Press.

In addition, the Walter Benjamin Archive comprises the Florens Christian Rang Archive, the Rolf Tiedemann Archive, the Archive Library, the Leo Löwenthal Library and the collections on Fritz Fränkel and Gisèle Freund. The holdings in the Theodor W. Adorno Archive in Frankfurt am Main can also be accessed through the Walter Benjamin Archive.

Walter Benjamin, coloured symbols for cross-referencing Passagen / Baudelaire