Joseph Elsner (architect)
Joseph Elsner ( born September 29, 1845 in Schlaney, county Glatz, † March 3, 1933 in Munich) was an architect and church decorators of historicism as well as community representative of the Munich City Council.
Life
Elsner attended elementary school in Schlaney 1859 and began an apprenticeship as a cabinetmaker and sculptor in the workshop of Franz X. Moschner in Baumgarten near Frankenstein, where he remained employed as a journeyman. At the suggestion of Wilhelm Hauschild, who came from Schlegel and at the time in Munich was already a famous history painter, went Elsner 1868 to Munich. Besides his work as a sculptor and draftsman, he attended evening classes and holiday and extended his knowledge as a guest student at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts and at the Polytechnic, where he majored in structural theory for architects, art history and construction. In 1878 he made his own as an architect and opened a " studio of Christian Art " in Munich. One of his first students was Thomas Buscher, who with his own studio led by several orders of sculptor Joseph Elsner later. 1892 Elsner took his nephew Adalbert Wietek in to, continued his carpentry apprenticeship in the Elsner 's workshops and later also a prominent architect was.
Elsner worked mostly for ecclesiastical patrons from Munich, Upper Bavaria and Lower Bavaria, the Bavarian Swabia and Silesia. Several projects he worked together with his mentor, the Munich architect Johann Margrave. Individual orders were transmitted to him also in neighboring countries. According to his plans numerous churches were newly built, rebuilt, altered or renovated stylistically. From his workshop he delivered trim kits or items in all forms of historicism, which were produced by his drawings. Many of his historicist church furnishings were removed in the mid- 20th century, because they no longer corresponded to the contemporary taste. In contrast, the neo-Gothic St. Nicholas Church overseas, which had been built and equipped 1902-1904 by Elsner was a few years ago faithfully restored and included in the monument list the Bavarian State Office of Historic Monuments. For the built according to a design by August Hardegger 1903-1905 Parish Church of St. Joseph in the Swiss Abtwil Elsner designed the neo-Gothic interior that was created in its workshops.
His Silesian homeland remained Elsner always connected. Despite the great distance and he paid there built several churches, including in Bad Reinerz, neurodegeneration, Schlegel, low stones, Maria snow and 1909, the Branch Church Nativity of the Virgin in his home town Schlaney.
Since 1875, Joseph Elsner was a member of the Society for Christian Art in Munich. In the election period 1899-1905 he was a member of a community representative to the Second Chamber of the Munich City Council. He was vice chairman of the District Association of Catholic men clubs, since 1892 a member of the Board of Directors of Gesellenhaus Foundation and was also a member of the Association of Commercial Hansa Munich. For his services he received several awards, including the Order of Saint Michael, the King Ludwig Cross and the papal medal Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice.
Joseph Elsner died in Munich and was buried at the cemetery Sendlinger. At the funeral ceremony was attended, among others, the Bavarian Minister President Heinrich Held and Mayor of Munich Karl Scharnagl and Father Rupert Mayer, the former president of the Marian Congregation of Men.
Joseph Elsner was married since 1876 to the Munich- Walburga Hauser ( 1857-1924 ). The couple had 13 children, six of whom died in infancy. The business was run by his son Joseph Elsner junior on.