Beeskow Castle

Beeskow Castle is a moated castle in the district town of Beeskow in the Oder-Spree district in Brandenburg.

The castle was first mentioned in a document in 1272 and, like Storkow Castle, belonged to the Lords of Strehle, with which and other moated castles it formed a network of defensive structures in the Mittelmark.

The Lords of Strele were succeeded by inheritance by the Lords of Bieberstein between 1377 and 1382. In 1518, Ulrich von Bieberstein pledged the castle to the Bishop of Lebus, Dietrich von Bülow, who developed it into an episcopal residence.

In 1556, the castle and lordship came into the possession of Margrave Johann I of Brandenburg-Küstrin. After his death, the castle and lordship finally fell into the possession of the Electors of Brandenburg in 1575 and served the Hohenzollerns as an administrative building until 1915. Subsequently, it continued to be used by the city of Beeskow, which had acquired the complex, for administrative and economic purposes.

At the end of the Second World War, the east wing of the castle burned out in 1945 due to combat operations. After the war, the complex served as accommodation for refugees from East Prussia and Silesia.

Based on a resolution of the district parliament in 1991, the castle was transformed into a cultural and educational center. A regional museum on historical, ethnographic, and ecological topics of the Beeskow-Storkow region, as well as a medieval magazine with a torture chamber, were established in the complex. Changing exhibitions primarily focus on the art of the GDR. The Beeskow Art Archive is housed in the castle, whose collection comprises around 23,000 objects, mainly paintings, prints, drawings, and watercolors, but also photographs, sculptures, handicrafts, and medals that belonged to parties, mass organizations, and state organs of the GDR until 1990.

Together with the castles in Storkow and Friedland NL, Beeskow Castle belongs to the Strele Castles association, which aims to promote cultural activities in the Oder-Spree district.