Henry P. Newman
Henry Percy Newman (born 6 January 1868 in Altona; died 6 February 1917 in Berlin) was a German merchant and art collector. The entrepreneur, who came from a banking family, was one of the leading grain importers in the German Empire. His important art collection included works by the French and German impressionists. Life Henry P. Newman's ancestors came from England on his father's side and had made their fortune in maritime trade. His father Henry L. Newman (1813-1897), son of an English consul, had been a partner in the Hesse bank (later Hesse Newman) since 1845 and married the banker's daughter Mary Hesse who was Jewish. From this marriage, Henry P. Newman, born in Altona in 1868, was the second son. Henry P. Newman began his professional career in his parents' bank and completed his apprenticeship there. At the age of 28, he went into business for himself as a grain dealer and merchant banker in 1896 and headed the grain agency and commission business HP Newman, a company that soon became one of the leading grain importers in the German Empire. In 1890 he married Maria von Düring, called Mariechen. In 1893 the couple moved into a stately home at 7 Fontenay-Allee. Today, the Hotel InterContinental is located here. At that time, the property extended to the Alster and had its own tennis court. The Newmans received numerous well-known guests in the house, including the poet Richard Dehmel and his wife Ida Dehmel. For their summer stays, the Newmans first used the Newman country house in Nienstedten, before they acquired a plot of land in Hittfeld in 1905 and had the Sunderberg house built there. Alfred Lichtwark, director of the Hamburger Kunsthalle and one of Newman's neighbors, advised him on building his art collection. Henry P. Newman was one of the co-founders of the Hamburg Scientific Foundation and during the First World War, donated his own hospital train. Newman died in Berlin in 1917. Art collection Newman was known for his exquisite collection of French impressionists, which included A View of the Waterloo Bridge and the garden landscape The Garden of Monet’s House in Argenteuil (Le repos dans le jardin, Argenteuil) by Claude Monet, The Pastel Dancer, Tying her Sandal by Edgar Degas and Édouard Manet's Still Life Nuts and Apples in a Bowl and Die Badenden. Other works by French artists in the collection included Moulin de Bonnevaux by Gustave Courbet and Provençal Landscape with a Red Roof and Chestnut Trees in the Park of Jas de Bouffan by Paul Cézanne. Newman also owned the painting Pot with Zinnias by Vincent van Gogh and Ferdinand Hodler's Lumberjack and Forest Interior in Reichenbach. On the recommendation of the Hamburg district court director and art critic Gustav Schiefler, the paintings Seascape and Village Street by Edvard Munch were also added to Newman's collection. He also collected German artists: Schimmel im Grünen by Fritz von Uhde and Landscape near Bernau by Hans Thoma, Snow Painting by Hans Olde and Hemsbach