Press release -
“One of the greatest editions in history” >>> Celebration of Rudolf Steiner’s Complete Works
Goetheanum, Dornach, Switzerland, 7 April 2026
The edition of Rudolf Steiner’s complete works, consisting of 450 volumes, has been finalized. The Rudolf Steiner Estate Administration (Nachlassverwaltung) and the General Anthroposophical Society will celebrate the completion of this project with a festive event at the Goetheanum on 17 April 2026.
“It is like a miracle that one of the greatest editions in history could be completed within seven decades,” says Cornelius Bohlen, president of the Rudolf Steiner Estate Administration. After Rudolf Steiner’s death in 1925 it was important to Marie Steiner to publish her husband’s work in a complete edition. With this in mind she founded the estate administration in 1943. The first volumes of the complete edition (Gesamtausgabe or GA) were published in the 1950s. In 2016, David Marc Hoffmann, the then head of the Estate Administration’s archives, planned for this project to be finalized within a decade. Since then the last sixty of a total of 450 volumes have been published.
Cornelius Bohlen adds that “this would not have been possible without the untiring input of numerous editors in the Rudolf Steiner Archives and the generous help of loyal supporters.” Stefan Hasler, a member of the Executive Council at the Goetheanum and co-editor of the volumes on eurythmy, thinks that “without this immense commitment the anthroposophical work would have no solid foundation. We are deeply grateful to everyone involved.”
Since 2025 the Rudolf Steiner Archives have been under the direction of Angelika Schmitt and Philip Kovce. “Our task is and will be to preserve, explore and publish Rudolf Steiner’s work,” Angelika Schmitt says. Work continues on three projects that are related to the complete works: the last three volumes containing all letters, the compendium on the complete edition and the digital edition of all notes. The Rudolf Steiner Archives will continue to curate the analogue and digital complete edition, for instance by publishing new editions. Their main task, however, will be to focus more intensely on the preservation, research, exhibition and distribution of Rudolf Steiner’s work.
The celebration of the finalization of Rudolf Steiner’s Complete Works at the Goetheanum will offer former and current heads of the Rudolf Steiner Archives the opportunity to share their views on the maintenance, exploration and publication of Rudolf Steiner’s complete works. At Duldeck House, the home of the Rudolf Steiner Archives, visitors can talk to the editors about the history of the edition. In the Goetheanum Library co-workers of the publishing company Rudolf Steiner Verlag will provide information on the design of the complete edition and how it has evolved whilst remaining consistent and recognizable. A permanent exhibition on the life and work of Helene Finckh will open in the hut located in the Goetheanum Park where she transcribed into longhand around two thousand lectures by Rudolf Steiner which she had previously taken down in shorthand.
(2979 characters, 467 words/Sebastian Jüngel; English by Margot M. Saar)
Celebration of Rudolf Steiner’s Complete Works (in German) Goetheanum, 17 April 2026, 5 pm Web (in German)
Contact persons at Rudolf Steiner Archives Angelika Schmitt, Philip Kovce
Contact person Goetheanum Stefan Hasler
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The Goetheanum is the headquarters for the School of Spiritual Science and the General Anthroposophical Society. The School of Spiritual Science with its eleven sections is active worldwide in research, development, teaching, and the practical implementation of its research findings and is supported by the Anthroposophical Society.
