Alfred Karl Mayer

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Alfred Mayer during his time in Frankfurt, 1885

Alfred Karl Mayer (nickname Alfred, born March 31, 1860 in Frankfurt am Main , † April 15, 1932 in Munich ) was a German art and theater critic .

Even after his death, Alfred Mayer was considered to be “a real Schwabing figure: bald and hatless, the good eyes behind glasses.” He was forgotten for almost 75 years and was mistaken for the German writer and publisher Alfred Richard Meyer alias Munkepunke . It was only rediscovered in 2005 and identified for the first time in a photo by Gabriele Münter from April 1913. The photo shows Mayer together with Wassily Kandinsky on the balcony of the house at Ainmillerstraße 36 in Munich.

Life

origin

Alfred Mayer was the offspring of a Frankfurt Jewish merchant family. He was the son of Carl Rudolph Mayer and Rosalie Amelia Oppenheim (born March 24, 1837). You know next to nothing about your childhood and schooling. Only so much is known that, as “the eldest son, he was destined to take over the management of his parents' company […] L (öb) S (alomon) Mayer.” But he made a different decision, his younger brother Leo Saloman Mayer (Leo S. Mayer, born November 15, 1864; † 1913) took over the company and moved to Berlin. Important sources for his further life are his "guest books" as well as "letters, postcards and pen drawings", which inform about his diverse contacts.

From Frankfurt to Berlin, 1886–1906

In Berlin, the Jewish literary and theater critic and stage director Otto Brahm Mayer shaped Mayer's enthusiasm for the theater. Mayer's guest books testify to his friendliness and a. with the poet and literary critic Julius Hart , who together with his brother Heinrich founded the “Berlin Monthly Issues for Literature, Criticism and Theater”. There are also entries by the writer Wilhelm Lentrodt and the writer Martha Asmus . The writer and women's rights activist Hedwig Dohm dedicated the aphorism to him in Grunewald in August 1906 : "The strong will to happiness is the beginning of happiness."

From Berlin to Munich, 1906–1914

On November 10th, 1906, Alfred Mayer registered as an art writer and editor in the registration office in Munich. “Not only his entry there testifies that he had meanwhile also familiarized himself with the fine arts , but also a letter from the painter Fritz von Uhde dated “5.12.06”, which stylistically was essentially still stuck to realism . But Mayer soon favored the avant-garde. B. the painters Albert Weisgerber and Richard Seewald , as well as the two illustrators Rolf von Hoerschelmann and Alfred Kubin . Mayer developed a particular weakness for the Russian painters, who also frequented the “pink salon” of the painter Marianne von Werefkin . Robert Genin and Wassily Kandinsky had done it to him. In 1912 Alexej Jawlensky left in one of his guest books as a colorful watercolor the repetition of a lost oil painting with the original title "Head" , with the sibylline inscription: "Our weaknesses are our strength." A few pages further there is a "Self-portrait as a dancer" by Alexander Sacharoff , a member of the Neue Künstlervereinigung München . Also in 1912, Gabriele Münter adorned a page of the same guest book with a pen drawing with six colorful masks. - A whole series of other painters immortalized themselves in Mayer's guest books. This includes u. a. the Jewish painter Margarete Pohl , who married Albert Weisgerber in 1907. Furthermore, the illustrator Emil Preetorius , as well as the writers Wilhelm von Scholz , Wilhelm Schmidtbonn or Heinrich Mann and the poet Else Lasker-Schüler .

During the First World War in Munich

At the beginning of the war, Mayer had still lived at Isabellenstrasse 24. In 1915 he moved to Kunigundenstrasse 29. There he had contact and a. with the writer Hertha Koenig , the writers Hans Ludwig Held , Felix Braun , Georg Hirschfeld and the painter Josef Eberz . Mayer was particularly concerned about the Blauer Reiter Franz Marc , who “enthusiastic about the war” had reported early “on August 4, 1914” for the service of the weapon. He seriously thought about how to get Marc "exemption [...] from the war." While on leave from the front, Marc painted a "Cup with a fox and a roebuck" in Mayer's guest book using mixed media and a collage . The dedication reads: "Alfred Mayer served from fm in the war year 1915". One December day in 1916 Mayer received a postcard from Alfred Kubin with the cynical words: "I [...] wish you all the best warrior Christmas you can muster." The pen drawing on the reverse shows the gloomy depiction of death in plague robe, who wields the war torch, behind it a military cemetery , grave crosses with spiked bonnets stretching to the horizon. On February 8, 1917, the almost 57-year-old Mayer married the attractive 24-year-old Elisabeth Holnstein . When Kubin found out about it, he congratulated him with a pen drawing entitled “The Cupid Catcher” . The illustration shows: Mayer with the glasses on his nose, a botanizing drum on his back. In a meadow a winged creature had fallen into the butterfly net. The accompanying short message reads: “Congratulations! to the news that surprised me! ”On December 31, 1917, their daughter Eva (December 31, 1917 in Munich; † August 28, 2008 in Leipzig) was born.

In Munich 1919–1932

During this time, u. a. Contacts with the directors Julius Gellner and Josef Eichheim , the actors Erna Pinner and Otto Wernicke , the writer and cabaret artist Joachim Ringelnatz , the painters Adolf Oberländer , Max Kaus , Joseph Eberz, Helmuth Macke and Conrad Felixmüller and the dancers Clotilde von Derp and Alexander Sacharoff prove. In 1921 Mayer visited the art collector Heinrich Kirchhoff in Wiesbaden and signed his guest book on “30.9.21”. On October 19, 1923, the Mayers' marriage was divorced “through the fault of the wife”. The father received custody of the five-year-old daughter. Probably sensitized by the Hitler putsch in November 1923 and foreseeing political developments, Alfred Mayer wisely had his Jewish daughter baptized a Catholic before she started school in 1924. Godparents were the city councilor and librarian Hans Ludwig Held and the painter Josef Eberz . After a “stay of several months in Ascona ”, Helmuth Macke Mayer's daughter dedicated a view from the canton of Ticino with the caption: “Dear Eva in memory of your stay on Lake Maggiore in August 1930 and your Helmuth Macke.” When Alfred Mayer on Had died April 15, 1932, the cremation took place on April 18 in the Ostfriedhof in Munich.

Fonts (selection)

literature

  • Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, pp. 69–124.
  • Hanns Holdt - Munich. An artist of the camera. In: German art and decoration. 37.1915 / 16, pp. 446-454.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Lucy von Jacobi: The patron with the backpack. Ein Münchner Schicksal , Vossische Zeitung , April 19, 1932, cf. Gabriele Münter - The Years with Kandinsky, Photographs 1902–1914 , Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munich 2007, p. 278 Fig. 218.
  2. ^ Vivian Endicott Barnett, Kandinsky, Catalog raisonné of Aquarelle, 1900-1921, Vol. 1, Munich 1992, p. 283 No. 314.
  3. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Jahrbuch des Historisches Verein Murnau 22, 2005, p. 69 Note 5; P. 86 fig. 9.
  4. ↑ Two years after the identification, the photo was published again, see: Helmut Friedel (Ed.): Gabriele Münter - Die Jahre mit Kandinsky, Photographien 1902–1914 . Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munich 2007, p. 278 Fig. 218.
  5. ^ LS Mayer company history .
  6. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 70.
  7. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 72.
  8. ↑ Bernd Fäthke, > Lieber Freund Mayer <, Newly discovered letters from Alfred Kubin to Alfred Karl Mayer in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum , in: Anzeiger des Germanisches Nationalmuseums , Nürnberg 2007, p. 215.
  9. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 70.
  10. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 71 ff.
  11. ↑ Valentine Macardé: Le renouveau de l'art russe picturale 1863-1914 . Lausanne 1971, p. 135 f.
  12. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 83.
  13. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 80 f.
  14. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 69 ff.
  15. ↑ Maria Jawlensky, Lucia Pieroni-Jawlensky, Angelica Jawlensky (Eds.): Alexej von Jawlensky, Catalog Raisonné of the oil-paintings , Vol. 1, Munich 1991, p. 367 No. 478.
  16. ↑ Otto Fischer: The new picture. Publication of the Neue Künstlervereinigung München , Munich 1912, p. 46 panel XXII.
  17. ↑ Bernd Fäthke: Jawlensky, His watercolor is the judge . In: Weltkunst Vol. 70, No. 14, November 15, 2000, p. 2401, illus. P. 2401, “Head Our weaknesses are our strength.”; Dütsch (), 0501 p. 69 Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the “Blue Rider”. Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 71.
  18. ↑ Bernd Fäthke, Von Werefkins and Jawlensky's penchant for Japanese art . In: in the exhibition catalog "... the tender, spirited fantasies ...". The painters of the "Blauer Reiter" and Japan , Schloßmuseum Murnau 2011, p. 119 Fig. 35.
  19. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Jahrbuch des Historisches Verein Murnau 22, 2005, fig. 8, p. 84, note 126.
  20. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Jahrbuch des Historisches Verein Murnau 22, 2005, pp. 95, 104, fig. 15, p. 105.
  21. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 74 ff.
  22. ↑ Mayer owned an almost square charcoal drawing of a sleeping girl by Marc, monogrammed and dated 1905, see Brigitte Roßbeck: Franz Marc, Die Träume und das Leben . Munich 2015, ill. P. 53, not in: Annegret Hoberg, Isabelle Jansen: Franz Marc, catalog raisonné , volume 2, watercolors, gouaches, drawings, postcards, reverse glass painting, applied arts, sculpture . Munich 2004.
  23. ^ Claus Pese: Franz Marc. Life and work . Stuttgart / Zurich 1989, p. 43.
  24. ↑ Brigitte Roßbeck: Franz Marc, The dreams and life . Munich 2015, p. 241.
  25. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 97.
  26. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Jahrbuch des Historisches Verein Murnau 22, 2005, p. 95 ff., Fig. 11, p. 96; see: Annegret Hoberg, Isabelle Jansen: Franz Marc, catalog raisonné , volume 2, watercolors, gouaches, drawings, postcards, reverse glass painting, applied arts, sculpture , Munich 2004, p. 260 no. 261, illus. p. 261.
  27. ↑ Bernd Fäthke, > Dear friend Mayer <. Newly discovered letters from Alfred Kubin to Alfred Karl Mayer in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum . In: Anzeiger des Germanisches Nationalmuseums 2007, p. 215.
  28. ↑ Bernd Fäthke, > Dear friend Mayer <. Newly discovered letters from Alfred Kubin to Alfred Karl Mayer in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum . In: Anzeiger des Germanisches Nationalmuseums 2007, p. 217.
  29. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 78 ff.
  30. ↑ Bernd Fäthke: Jawlensky and his companions in a new light . Munich 2004, p. 189 f., Ders .: Alexej Jawlensky, heads etched and painted. The Wiesbaden years . Galerie Draheim, Wiesbaden 2012, p. 10 f. Note 66.
  31. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 90 Fig. 10.
  32. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 74.
  33. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 74.
  34. ^ Burkhard Leismann, Helmuth Macke - a painter of Rhenish Expressionism . In: Exhibition catalog Helmuth Macke 1891–1936 , Kaiser Wilhelm Museum, Krefeld 1991, p. 24.
  35. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 76 f. Fig. 5a and 5b.
  36. ↑ Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the area of ​​the "Blue Rider". Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, p. 78 Fig. 6.
  37. ↑ See the list of publications by Irene Dütsch: Alfred Mayer - a patron in the vicinity of the “Blauer Reiter”. Behind the scenes of Munich bohemian . In: Yearbook of the Historical Association Murnau 22, 2005, pp. 79–80.
personal data
SURNAME Mayer, Alfred Karl
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Mayer, Alfred (nickname); Mayer, Alfred Carl
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German art and theater critic
DATE OF BIRTH March 31, 1860
PLACE OF BIRTH Frankfurt am Main
DATE OF DEATH April 15, 1932
Place of death Munich