Janis RozentÄls
Janis Rozentāls ( born March 18, 1866 in the municipality of Saldus, Courland Governorate, † January 8, 1916 in Helsinki, Finland) was a Latvian painter.
Life
Janis Rozentāls father was a blacksmith. With 14 years ended in the education of the young Rozentāls in Saldus and Kuldīga, due to lack of funds. After various jobs in Riga, he got an apprenticeship with the painter J. Celēvičs. Then Rozentāls learned from 1885 to 1888 at the Riga German craft school. At an exhibition of school in St. Petersburg in 1888, he won a silver medal.
By 1894 Rozentāls then attended the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts. For his thesis he chose a national issue: the domestic church in Saldus. He lived for some years in St. Petersburg and traveled from there from Germany, France and Austria.
In 1900 Rozentāls returned to Latvia. Here he learned the Finnish singer Elli Forsell, whom he married in Helsinki in 1903. In the years before 1914 Rozentāls then taught at various art schools and was artistic editor of the journals " Vērotājs " and " Druva ". As in the first world war the front line approached Riga, Rozentāls moved with his family to Helsinki. Here he fell ill in 1916 and died hard on 26 December. In 1920 his remains were reburied at the Riga Brothers' Cemetery (Riga). In the former studio Rozentāls in Alberta ielā 12 is now home to a Rozental and Blaumanis Museum.
Work
Rozentāls was one of the first painters who precisely and directly thematized the life of the people at the end of the 19th century. The representation of the rural population corresponded here with the literary work of his friend, the writer Rudolf Blaumanis. An important part of the work of Rozentāls take a portrait. He also worked on domestic, symbolic, mythological, folklore, and other topics. His individual style is characteristic of the move away from academic schools at this time. Influences of Impressionism, Symbolism, Art Nouveau and Post-Impressionism are recognizable.