Johan Tobias Sergel

Johan Tobias Sergel (born 28 Augustjul / September 8 1740greg in Stockholm, .. † February 26, 1814 ) was a Swedish sculptor and draftsman. He is regarded as the most important classical artist and one of the greatest sculptors of Sweden.

Life

Johan Tobias Sergel (originally Sergell ) was born as the son of Pearl ticker Kristofer Sergell and his wife Elisabeth Zwirner, who had immigrated in 1739 from Germany to Sweden. He began an apprenticeship as a stonemason at the palace in Stockholm and received from the age of 15 lessons in drawing and modeling at JE Rehn and from 1756 with Pierre Hubert L' Archevêque. 1758 he traveled with L' Archevêque to Paris, where he stayed for seven months, and won a medal of the Academy of Arts.

After his return he was employed by the Schlossbaudeputation for work on the sculptural decoration of the royal castle. 1761 large gold medal of the Academy of Fine Arts Stockholm he was awarded. In 1767 he received from the Academy of Arts and Schlossbaufonds a scholarship with which he fulfilled his long-cherished dream of a trip to Italy. In August, he arrived in Rome, where the realization of his artistic deficits initially plunged him into a deep depression. Then he decided to become a thorough study of anatomy, classical sculpture and Renaissance painting. Among his artist friends in Rome included Jakob Philipp Hackert and Johann Heinrich Füssli.

In 1778 he was the Swedish king Gustav III. recalled and returned via Paris and London to Stockholm, where he arrived in June 1779 after he became a member of the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture in Paris. Gustav III. appointed him as the successor to the Royal L' Archevêques sculptor and 1780 as a professor at the Art Academy. In Stockholm he was at the center of a fun-loving circle of friends, to which the poet Carl Michael Bellman belonged. In 1783 he traveled as a companion of King Gustav III. again for nine months after Italy.

Except for two short stays in Copenhagen in 1794 and 1796, he spent the rest of his life in Stockholm, where he stood in high favor with the King as the audience. In 1803 he was appointed Hofintendanten ennobled and 1808, which resulted due to a typographical error in the patent of nobility to his name change from Sergell to Sergel. Sergel remained unmarried, but had with his landlady Anna Rella Hellström a son Gustav, he legitimized and continued his name. After Sergels death, his artistic estate was purchased in 1815 by the Swedish State.

Work

Sergel is considered the founder of the Swedish sculpture. Before him, large sculptures were created in Sweden only by foreign artists or imported.

Of crucial importance for Sergels artistic development were his years in Rome. They influenced him so much that he later wrote that until the day of his arrival in Rome " my studies really began ." Previously, he had to designs by L' Archevêque a statue king Gustav I. and run an equestrian statue of King Gustavus Adolphus II in the typical contemporary French rococo taste. In Rome, where he copied intensively ancient sculptures, he turned into the classicists, the " antiquity and nature " as a teacher recognized only, and was next to Thorvaldsen the most important representatives of neoclassicism in the Nordic countries.

In comparison with other classical artists his works stand out for their peppy choppiness. Important works of the Roman period are the "Reclining (or drunken ) Faun " ( 1770-1774 ), who established his fame as a sculptor, and the group "Amor and Psyche", which was originally designed for Madame du Barry. After his return to Stockholm, he created among other things, Descartes Memorial ( 1781) and the resurrection Relief ( 1785), in the Adolf Fredrik Church. His main work, the bronze statue of Gustav III applies. , Which was purchased in 1796 by the City of Stockholm and placed in front of the Royal Palace.

In remarkable contrast to Sergels sculptural work are his drawings, which are often sketchy, partly caricatured and an expressive realism, reminiscent stylistically to Füssli. However, unlike its chill and romantic subjects they show next to mythological subjects preferred scenes from everyday life and are therefore important as a cultural-historical source.

After Sergel Torg Sergels the was, a place in central Stockholm, named after. There is now on the site of his former studios a still image Sergels.