![Philipp Etter, portrayed by Ernst Emil Schlatter, graphic print, 1943.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/etter-titel-300x225.jpg)
Switzerland’s first architect of cultural policy
Federal Councillor Philipp Etter held office for 25 years. Laying out Switzerland’s cultural policy from the 1930s onwards was one of his greatest challenges.
![Members of the Federal Art Commission examine specimen pieces in an art scholarship competition in Bern’s Wandelhalle in 1941.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/kunstkomission-300x271.jpg)
Minister for Culture Philipp Etter
![Federal Councillor Philipp Etter was a cigar aficionado.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/etter-zigarre-231x300.jpg)
Ambivalent relationship with ‘supporting the arts’
![Print of Erni’s ‘Landi’ picture Die Schweiz, das Ferienland der Völker (Switzerland, Vacation Land of the People).](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/wandbild-300x147.jpg)
![The Bundesbriefarchiv (now the Bundesbriefmuseum), established in 1936.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/museum-300x205.jpg)
![At the 1939 National Exhibition in Zurich, the sea of flags of the municipalities and cantons on the Höhenweg mountain trail represented the Swiss Federation’s ethos of diversity in unity.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/landi-1-287x300.jpg)
Opinions were divided on Etter’s cultural policy
![Philipp Etter and Leland B. Harrison, US Minister to Switzerland, at the opening of the ‘USA baut’ exhibition of American architecture at the Kunstgewerbemuseum in Zurich, September 1945. Keystone / Photopress-Archiv / Milou Steiner](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/usa-baut-287x300.jpg)
![Philipp Etter with curator Paul Hilber and Art Commission members in Lucerne, 1943.](https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/app/uploads/eroffnung-300x244.jpg)