The Institute

The Ita Wegman Institute for Basic Anthroposophical Research in Arlesheim (Switzerland) was founded in 2002. Its central task is to work on the spiritual-scientific foundations of anthroposophy and its application in various areas of civilisation – with an orientation towards the history of ideas and in the context of the history of science and the social history of the 19th and 20th centuries.

The Institute is based in the Holzhaus – “wooden house”—which Rudolf Steiner designed in 1924 and had built for his medical colleague Ita Wegman on the garden grounds of her clinic. It maintains several publicly accessible working archives assembled from the estates of Rudolf Steiner’s pioneering colleagues, particularly in the fields of medicine, curative education, pedagogy and general anthroposophy (including the Ita Wegman Archive, and the estates of Hilma Walter, Willem Zeylmans van Emmichoven, and Karl Schubert.)

The Institute is directed by Prof. Dr. med. Peter Selg, who – in addition to his research and publication tasks, public seminars and lecture activity – has teaching duties at the University of Witten-Herdecke and at the Alanus University of Art and Society in Alfter (near Bonn) in the field of medical anthropology and ethics. The Institute’s other staff members work in the archives, the secretariat, and the Institute’s own publishing house.

Rudolf Steiner

1861-1925, Dr. phil., founded and developed anthroposophical spiritual science in numerous writings and lectures. He conceived impulses for change and model institutions for various areas of life — in collaboration with representatives of professional groups (including doctors and curative educators, teachers, and priests, natural scientists and economists.)

Ita Wegman

1876-1943, Dr. med., directed the Medical Section at the Goetheanum (School for Spiritual Science, Dornach) from 1924 to 1935; founded several clinics, curative institutes, and therapeutics; and was the central figure in Anthroposophical Medicine during the first half of the 20th century. (For her life and work see the section „Ita Wegman Archive.“) (for her life and work see the section „Ita Wegman Archive“)