Eduard Magnus
Eduard Magnus ( born January 7, 1799 in Berlin, † August 8, 1872 ibid ), was in his time one of the busiest and most celebrated portrait painter in Berlin. Thanks to its high reputation and the outstanding position of the Magnus family, he was one of the influential members of various art commissions. His paintings are part of the collections of the National Gallery in Berlin, Hermitage (Saint Petersburg ), National Portrait Gallery (London ), Thorvaldsen Museum, Copenhagen. The largest part is located, however, privately owned. Some images have been lost in the turmoil of the years 1942 to 1945.
Origin and family
The Magnus family came from Judaism. The father, a wealthy businessman Meyer Immanuel Magnus from Schwedt / Oder, with his sons converted to Protestantism in 1807 and acquired in 1809 the right of citizenship. In the same year he founded in Berlin under his new Christian name Johann Matthias Magnus Magnus, the bank, which was among the precursor institutions of Deutsche Bank. In the education and training of the sons of the father was important that they have followed their talents and inclinations. The two oldest sons took over the banking business. Eduard Magnus pursued a career as an artist. The younger brother and most famous was the physicist Heinrich Gustav Magnus. Another brother became a farmer, another doctor. The mother Louise Marianne ( born Merle Fraenkel ), which formed the center of the family and an open house led, mediated the generous life, which continued in the charity of the children. Residence of the family for decades was the home Behrenstr. 46 in Berlin's financial district. On the upper floor there were also the apartment and the first artist's studio.
Life
Eduard Magnus was born on 7 January 1799. After visiting the Friedrichswerder school, he tried his hand at studying architecture at the Berlin Academy of Architecture. At the same time he learned in the Aktklasse the Art Academy. Its further development is, however, influenced self-taught. Longtime artistic advisor was a few years older fellow painter Jacob Schlesinger, professor and restorer at the Royal Museums in Berlin.
Magnus went on study trips to France, Italy, Spain and Egypt. In Rome, where he lived for eight years, he had his own studio. Drawings from this period include the stock of Bibliotheca Hertziana in Rome. On his return to Berlin, he was a member of the Academy in 1837 and 1844 Professor. At the ripe age of 67 years, the Academy of Arts appointed him to the Senate, where Magnus was instrumental in expert's decisions.
Eduard Magnus remained unmarried only one of the six sons of Magnus. He cared lovingly for nephews and nieces and his mother, who survived her husband for almost twenty years. The well maintained by her hospitality, he continued on a smaller scale as a bachelor. In later years, Magnus also dealt with theoretical questions of art. In lectures and books he discussed, for example, suitable for art museums and exhibition spaces construction, decoration and lighting. He was an interested contemporary, the public on current related position also.
His later residence, including studio he took in the Anhaltstr. 8 (today hitchhiker Str ). A deep friendship developed between him and the ancient historian Gustav Adolf Scholl, later Grand Duke's librarian at Weimar. A portion of the correspondence is preserved. Magnus supported him throughout his life and gave him testamentary 20,000 thalers, which would have had the buying power of over half a million euros in 2009, according to estimates by Deutsche Bundesbank.
1862 was diagnosed with Magnus Cataracts. After several operations he finally suffered a stroke and died on August 8, 1872. His final resting he found on the Dorotheenstädtischer Cemetery, the burial place of the Magnus family, alongside his brother Heinrich Gustav Magnus, who had died two years before him.
Work
Already his early work reveals joy of painting. Pronounced is the secure feeling for proportion, color and shape. There are mostly genre scenes southern theme. These is the image of the homecoming smugglers, which in 1836 exhibited at the Berlin Academy attracted considerable attention. In 2011, the figure has graced the cover of the catalog for the 150th anniversary of the National Gallery. Magnus ' further work is determined by the portrait painting, with which he has handed down an image of the upper-class society and the intellectual and artistic Berlin. This happened with him - as with all painters of his time - in dealing with the emerging medium of photography. While the portrait photography took over background design and draperies from the painting and then reduced clichéd, the Malkünstler recollected in old traditions and largely dispensed with accessories.
Among the portraits of important contemporaries fall on the many pictures he received from colleagues, composers and artists talk - has made - sometimes even more than once. These include portraits of Friedrich Curschmann, Wilhelm Taubert, Livia Frege, Adolf Menzel, Richard Lauchert, Bertel Thorvaldsen, Ludwig Schwanthalerstraße and Felix Mendelssohn. With the latter, distantly related, he made a number of portraits of members of the composer's family.
To Magnus ' most famous images include the portrait of Jenny Lind, which was shown over time in eight special exhibitions throughout Europe, most recently in 1998 in Stockholm. Another portrait - the singer Henriette Sontag - received an award at the Paris World Exhibition in 1855. Both paintings were exhibited in 1852 in Antwerp, and was declared " the best in the salon ." When the viewer the impression of light-heartedness urges, which can be explained with Magnus's origin and its material independence. As it seems, he painted for pleasure and in this sense he also portrayed family and friends.
Honors and Awards
Portraits ( selection)
- Ludwig Cauer (1823 ), Ludwig Cauer
- Lida Schadow (1830 ), daughter of Gottfried Schadow
- Cécilie Mendelssohn Bartholdy (1835 ), wife of the composer Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy Cécile Charlotte Sophie Mendelssohn Bartholdy
- Mathilde Countess of Lynar, two portraits ( to 1837)
- Adolph Menzel (1843 ) Adolph Menzel
- Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (1846), Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy
- Jenny Lind, two images (1846 and 1862 ) Jenny Lind
- Ernestine von Wildenbruchstrasse (1848 ), Ernestine von Wildenbruchstrasse
- Livia Virginia Frege ( 1850 ), Livia Frege
- Adolf Heinrich Graf von Arnim - Boitzenburg, Adolf Heinrich Graf von Arnim - Boitzenburg
- Bertel Thorvaldsen (about 1855), Bertel Thorvaldsen
- Wilhelm Taubert (1862 ), Wilhelm Taubert
- Anna von Pfuel, née Countess von Brühl (1865 )
Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy, 1846
Mathilde Countess of Lynar, 1837
Send Aglaya E., 1839
Wilhelm Taubert, 1862
Ernestine von Wildenbruchstrasse, 1848
Writings
- The polychromy from the artistic point of view. Strauss, Berlin, 1872.
- About the decoration and lighting of spaces for installation of paintings and sculptures. Ernst & Korn, Berlin, 1864.