Year in Culture

An 80-year-old retiree named Cornelius Gurlitt had more than one thousand valuable artworks stashed in his Munich home. There was immense global interest in the story - and not purely in the art world. Many of the works were suspected of being looted art - including paintings by Picasso, Monet and Renoir, confiscated from their mainly Jewish owners during the Nazi era in Germany.

Defending his innocence, Gurlitt agreed to return many of the artworks. Then, in May he died - but the fascinating case doesn't end there. It was soon announced that Gurlitt had bequeathed his entire estate to the Art Museum of Bern, Switzerland. But before being transferred, each item must be investigated for its origins.

Meanwhile, protests from Gurlitt's family played out like a soap opera. A cousin filed a psychological report claiming the late art collector had suffered from a "schizoid personality disorder" and "paranoid delusions." The cousin lodged a claim to the inheritance.

The Bern Museum accepted the inheritance, but all suspected looted art works remain in Germany for further investigation.

On the subject of art…

The famous German painter Gerhard Richter was only one who wondered why people would spend immense sums of money on art (even his own). One of Richter's paintings came under Sotheby's hammer in 2012 in London, selling for 26 million euros - a small sum compared to the sale of a painting by Francis Bacon at Christie's in 2014. Bacon's triptych "Three Studies of Lucian Freud" went for a cool 106 million euros in New York; the buyer remains unknown. Insiders say the sum was an auction record but that even larger amounts have been paid in under-the-table purchases.

2014 also witnessed a sensational case of financial fraud in the art world, with Düsseldorf art consultant Helge Achenbach accused of defrauding one of Germany's richest families. While negotiating a number of art deals on behalf of Aldi heir Berthold Albrecht, Achenbach allegedly doctored a number of invoices and pocketed around 23 million euros. His trial commenced in December.

A year of remembrance

One hundred years after the beginning of the First World War, art and culture played big roles in marking the anniversary. Novels, exhibitions, plays and even computer games revolved around the "seminal catastrophe of the 20th century." The German Historical Museum in Berlin staged a six month exhibition on the path leading to the war, detailing its global impact - with nearly 170,000 visitors since opening.

And of course the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9 offered a number of opportunities for cultural expression. The year saw more books than usual about life in former East Germany, including a number of autobiographical narratives such as that of Roland Jahn, the current commissioner for records of the regime's vast state security apparatus. Former East German athlete Ines Geipel has also written of her life in the GDR.

The Society of German Language chose "Lichtgrenze" (light border) as 2014 Word of the Year. The word refers to the wall of balloons that marked the path of the Berlin Wall and were set free on anniversary day.

Sound and terror

The year saw several theatrical presentations that came to terms with the trial of the NSU (National Socialist Underground), the right-wing terrorist cell allegedly responsible for a number of murders. The music industry responded with songs such as "Right Stuff," "Judgment" and "The Gap," dealing in various ways with the threat of terrorism from neo-Nazi groupings. "The White Wolf," staged at Frankfurt's City Theater, posed the question: would these murders have happened if the trio of terror had grown up in West, not East Germany? Staged while the trial was going on, it was a piece with a spooky, disturbing ambience.

Major film awards

Major European film festivals are always a time for glamor. But this year the juries showed that "blockbuster" doesn't automatically translatea to "prize winner." The Berlinale's Golden Bear went to Chinese Thriller "Black Coal, Thin Ice" over firm favorite "Boyhood." Similarly, the Palme d'Or in Cannes was taken by the Turkish film "Winter Sleep," and German director Wim Wenders won a special jury prize for his stunning documentary "The Salt of the Earth," a portrait of photographer Sebastião Salgado.

Finally, German-Swedish co-production "A Pigeon Sitting on a Branch Reflecting on Existence" won the Golden Lion in Venice. In the US, "12 Years a Slave" cleaned up at the podium with three Oscars, a Golden Globe and numerous critics awards. The most successful film in German cinemas, however, was the French comedy "Monsieur Claude and his Daughters," which pokes fun at everyday racism.

Best books of the year

Thrillers, fantasy and historic novels remain favorite German reads. As with film, critics don't always reflect the popular choice of the readers, which often makes the German Book Prize awarding a controversial event. This year the prize went to Lutz Seiler for his debut novel "Kruso." Telling the story of an extraordinary friendship between two men on a small Baltic island, the book catapulted the newcomer onto the bestsellers list.

The Peace Prize of the German Book Trade went to computer scientist, writer and internet pioneer Jaron Lanier for his unique views of the digital world and the social and cultural changes brought about by the internet.

The most important German literature award - the Georg Büchner Prize - went to 81-year-old writer and poet Jürgen Becker largely on the strength of his poetic works that, in the words of the jury, "make our everyday world experience visible and memorable in a unique way."

French writer Patrick Modiano took the Nobel Prize for Literature - surprising many bookmakers who had their money firmly on Kenyan writer Ngugi wa Thiong'o.

Farewell to major personalities

The world of culture mourned the death of a number of renowned artists and writers in 2014. Frank Schirrmacher - author, journalist and co-publisher of the "Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung" newspaper - died unexpectedly of a heart attack on June 12 at age 54. On August 16, renowned journalist and writer Peter Scholl-Latour died, age 90. His last book "The Curse of the Evil Deed" was published posthumously.

Famous actors also took their leave, including Joachim "Blacky" Fuchsberger on September 11. Actor and film dubbing artist Peer Augustinski followed on October 3, age 74. Augustinski was the German voice of, among others, Robin Williams. Williams himself had been found dead two months earlier, having commited suicide at age 63.

On December 10, Germany lost another leading writer and journalist, Ralph Giordano, who died at the age of 91. In his writings, Giordano campained tirelessly against injustice, inhumanity and ignorance.