Children's drawings 100 years ago

What helps children to overcome the trauma of war? After the First World War, teachers were also confronted with this question. Wilhelm Daiber, a progressive teacher at the Stein primary school near Nuremberg, focussed on art lessons - an unusual approach in the 1920s. Most of his pupils had hardly ever painted or drawn in their private lives. They simply had no time. Their lives were characterised by hard work and poverty.

But Daiber achieved the unexpected. He used innovative methods to motivate the children to engage in artistic endeavours - over a period of years. This not only trained their perception and concentration, but also opened up ways for them to express their feelings, hopes and fears. Many an amazing talent came to light in the process.

Between 1924 and 1929, around 4,500 sheets of children's drawings were collected, a contemporary document that not only reflects a successful didactic concept, but also reveals traces of social upheaval. Wilhelm Daiber, later one of the best-known German reform pedagogues, kept the drawings, analysed them and researched them. Long unnoticed, they were rediscovered by academics decades later. The collection offers a unique field of research for art historians, educationalists, folklorists and school historians. Daiber's approach could also provide many ideas for today's art lessons. Today, the Daiber Collection is one of the most important holdings of the School History Collection at the Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg.

In cooperation with the Schulmuseum Nürnberg (School Museum Nuremberg) and the FAU Collections and Museums Department, the Stadtmuseum Erlangen (Erlangen City Museum) is now showing a selection of these pictures for the first time, which were named World Documentary Heritage by UNESCO in spring 2025 along with 16 other international collections of children's drawings - because they open up new perspectives on Europe's cultural memory in an extraordinary form and inspire dialogue, compassion and remembrance.

Last edited on 02.03.2026