The Martin S. Kermacy Collection is a collection of architectural books assembled by Martin S. Kermacy (1915-2007), a distinguished professor in the University of Texas at Austin School of Architecture from 1947 to 1983. The collection was accessioned in 1998 along with the architectural drawings (prints), photographs, slides, maps, and art currently housed in the Alexander Architectural Archives.
The primary subject of the Martin S. Kermacy Collection is Austrian and German architecture at the turn-of-the-century, particularly the Arts and Crafts Movement, the Austrian Secessionists, the Wiener Werkstätte, and German Jugendstil. The collection contains many important monographs on early modernists Otto Wagner, Josef Hoffmann, Joseph M. Oblrich, and Adolf Loos. Professor Kermacy began purchasing books on these subjects during his tenure as a Fulbright Lecturer at Technische Hochschule Wien during 1955 and 1956. The collection also contains rare and important imprints on artists and architects from around the world and surveys of art and architectural history from antiquity to the present.
Provenance notes have been added to all titles in the collection in order to enable greater access to the Martin S. Kermacy Collection and enhance awareness of Professor Kermacy’s generous gift to the University of Texas at Austin School of Architecture. This project was completed by Alana Verminski (2011) and Betsy Nitsch (2011-2012), students from the University of Texas School of Information.
