The Myth and scandal of Bacchantenzug

Bacchantenzug” (procession of Bacchantes) by Adolf Meyer, 1900. Photo: Augustina Zeya

One radiant summer afternoon, I found myself strolling along the lakeside promenade of Seefeldquai in Zürich, when the light caught a long, elegant relief. The inscription simply bore the name “A. Meyer”, and nestled beside it, the date “1900”. There was no further plaque or explanatory panel, just the artist’s name and year. I paused, spellbound. I was standing before a work that was 125 years old. The sunlight warmed its marble surface, sharpening the carved figures and casting slender shadows that brought the scene to life. It was this moment of encountering a historic artwork with almost no contextual signposting that ignited my curiosity to delve deeper into its story.

The sculptor behind the relief is Adolf Meyer (1867–1940). He was born in Basel, began as a plasterer apprentice, and studied drawing and sculpture; after further training in Berlin, he settled in Zürich and later in Zollikon. Meyer specialised in architectural sculpture, mostly large-scale reliefs and decorations integrated into buildings. The relief in question was commissioned by Karl Gustav Henneberg, a wealthy Zürich-Seefeld silk manufacturer and art patron, who commissioned Palais Henneberg and the artwork that was going to crown it. The artwork stood at the intersection of architecture and sculpture: the building facade becomes a stage for a narrative of movement and festivity, decorative and somewhat playful yet also large-scale and prominent. According to one contemporary description¹, it was a “marmorrelief … 2 Meter hoch und 20 Meter lang.”

Palais Henneberg 1898. Photo: Ernst Linck / Baugeschichtliches Archiv

The subject matter, the Bacchantes or the Bacchae², was drawn from Greek mythology. These female followers of Dionysus were associated with ecstatic dance, music, and ritual intoxication. In late 19th- and early 20th-century European art, classical myths were a common source for public commissions, as they allowed artists to explore the human body, emotion, and movement within socially acceptable allegorical frameworks. In Meyer’s relief, the choice of Bacchantes allowed him to depict exuberant motion and the human form in a playful yet elegant manner, aligning with the decorative goals of architectural sculpture.

Bacchantenzug” (procession of Bacchantes) by Adolf Meyer, 1900. Photo: Augustina Zeya

Aside from factual descriptions, the local press alluded to a bit of scandal. Public art in a broad sense was welcomed, but the city was conservative in its societal mores and often cautious about the kinds of figurative expression permitted in shared places. After the artwork reveal, the Neue Zürcher Zeitung remarked that the relief, entitled Bacchantenzug, revealed “quite a lot of bare flesh.” The artwork immediately became something of a flashpoint, and the local Sittlichkeitsverein (morality association) lodged a formal complaint, calling for the covering of certain figures.

Despite the objections, the city council ultimately allowed the relief to remain unchanged, marking one of the earliest public debates in Zürich about the boundaries of nudity in civic art. This controversy actually drew more public attention, turning the relief into a destination for both the curious and the art-minded.

The Palais, though, had much more complicated and sad fate. Following Henneberg’s death in 1918, the Palais Henneberg underwent multiple transformations serving as an event hall, a casino, a Migros language school, a lakeside clubhouse, and finally demolished in the 1960s to make way for a modern office complex designed by Jacques Schader for IBM Switzerland. The relief, a silent witness to the shifting landscapes and two world wars, eventually found its home in a peaceful place.

Today, the artwork is often overlooked, becoming a backdrop for parked bikes, a hiding spot for playful children, and a canvas of dancing shadows. I, standing in the golden light of a summer afternoon, could not help feeling as though I had discovered a hidden gem of the city. One with so many stories to tell, its mythic figures still caught in eternal dance...

Text by Jonas Spielman

Address:

Seefeldquai, Zürich

Commissioned by:

Karl Gustav Henneberg

Notes:

1. Die Kunst für alle. (1897–1898). Malerei, Plastik, Graphik, Architektur, 13. Personal- u. Atelier-Nachrichten – Denkmäler – Vermischte Nachrichten – Ausstellungen und Sammlungen – Kunstliteratur u. vervielf. Kunst.

2. Euripides, The Bacchae. (Powell, Classical Myth, pp. 272-283.)