Karl Wilhelm Diefenbach

Karl Wilhelm Diefenbach ( born February 21, 1851 in Hadamar, † December 15, 1913 on Capri ) was a German painter and social reformer.

Diefenbach is considered an important champion of the reform of life, as a pioneer of nudism and the peace movement. His country commune " Himmelhof " in Ober Sankt Veit (1897-1899) was one of the models for which was founded by his pupil Gusto Graser reform settlement Monte Verità above Ascona. As a painter, he is an independent representative of Art Nouveau and Symbolism.

Life

Diefenbach was a son of the painter and art teacher at the high school Hadamar Leonhard Diefenbach. He attended the Munich Academy of Art and was not impressed by Arnold Bocklin and Franz von Stuck. His paintings found early attention and recognition. His right arm was crippled by a severe typhoid disease and surgery. Because he thought he had saved his life with natural healing methods, he walked under the influence of natural medicine practitioner Arnold Rikli and Eduard Baltzer, the founder of the Vegetarian Society in Germany, to be an apostle of nature-friendly lifestyle. To 1881, he resigned from the church and became a member of the independent congregation.

In habit and sandals, he announced in Munich his teaching. His ideas ( life in harmony with nature, rejection of monogamy, turning away from any religion, exercise in the fresh air and exercise of nudism, and a meatless diet as a vegan ) were taken by his contemporaries as an opportunity to him as " Kohlrabi Apostles " to mock and persecute. After the police had suppressed his meetings, Diefenbach be moved back to an abandoned quarry near Höllriegelskreuth. There, the young painter Hugo Höppener was his assistant and disciple. Diefenbach called him Fidus, which became the stage name Höppeners. Operating together, the great frieze Per aspera ad astra arose. An exhibition of his paintings in Vienna in 1892 was a sensational success and made ​​him famous, but he lost as a result of fraud led by the Austrian Kunstverein all his works.

He fled to Egypt, where he created huge temples. To regain his pictures, he went in 1897 to Vienna, planned the publication of a journal Humanitas and organized a major exhibition. A circle of friends, which the pacifist Bertha von Suttner and the publicist Michael Georg Conrad belonged, supported his ventures. During this time gathered around him on the Himmelhof in Vienna a community of up to 20 pupils or disciples, including at times the painter František Kupka, Konstantinos Parthenis and Gusto Graser and the subsequent animal rights Magnus Schwantje. The standards that docked Diefenbach on himself and his followers were quite different; he lived himself at the same time in at least two relationships with women, so he asked his followers from chastity and absolute obedience, whose post was controlled by him personally. The artist commune went bankrupt, and Diefenbach moved to the island of Capri, where he won success and reputation while he was forgotten in Germany. He died there in 1913 at the age of 62 years from the effects of intestinal obstruction.

Estate, exhibitions and honors

After his early death in 1913 his estate remained hidden for half a century and subjected to decay. Since the 1960s, collected and researched his grandson Fridolin von Spaun ( born July 4, 1901, Capri, † 20 March, 2004 Geretsried ) in his large family archive in Villages at Wolfratshausen Diefenbach's estate. From Spaun recognized early by his background, childhood experiences with Diefenbach, the encounters with various propagandists of the reform of life and participation in the migrant bird movement on his experience rich life, the great cultural and historical significance of his grandfather. He helped in the development of public museums for art Diefenbach in Capri and in his home town of Hadamar. Of 29 October 2009 until 31 January 2010, his work was made ​​available to the German public again in an exhibition at the Museum Villa Stuck in Munich. His written heritage is now in the archives of the German youth movement on Ludwigstein.

1927 Karl Wilhelm Diefenbach Alley was named after him in Vienna Hietzing, 1945 Diefenbach street in Munich - Solln.

Works

• A contribution to the history of contemporary art care. Vienna 1895.
• Divine youth., 1914.
• N.N. (Museo Diefenbach in the refectory of the Certosa di San Giacomo on Capri )