August Kiss

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August Kiss 1865 on a graphic by Adolf Neumann

August Karl Eduard Kiß , also August Kiss (born  October 11, 1802 in Paprotzan , Province of Silesia , †  March 24, 1865 in Berlin ), was a German sculptor who was part of the Berlin School of Sculpture .

Life

Amazon on horseback in front of the Berlin Altes Museum

Kiß grew up around the Paprotzaner ironworks in Tichau , where his father worked as an administrator. In 1822 Kiß went to Berlin to learn sculpture. His training centers were the Prussian Academy of the Arts and Christian Rauch's studio . As a schoolboy he made the relief for the gable field at the Nikolaikirche in Potsdam based on Karl Schinkel's compositions .

Kiß became famous in 1839 for the modeling of an Amazon fighting a panther . He executed it in marble for King Ludwig I in 1842 , a little later it was cast in bronze by Christoph Fischer in the Royal Casthouse and set up in front of the Altes Museum in Berlin. The artist has shown in a moving way the highest human expression of the brutal violence of the attack against a wild animal.

In 1847 the equestrian statue of Frederick the Great , modeled by Kiß and executed in bronze by Klagemann, was unveiled in Breslau . King Friedrich Wilhelm III. Kiß formed three times in bronze, once for Potsdam on foot in a general's uniform with a coat and uncovered head, then on horseback with the laurel wreath for Königsberg (1851), with six female allegorical figures adorning the pedestal of the monument at the corners, while the fields with reliefs from Prussian history were adorned. Another version with a bicorn for Breslau was made in 1861.

Furthermore, Kiss created an archangel Michael , how he defeated the dragon, in bronze; a gift from King Friedrich Wilhelm IV to furnish Babelsberg Palace , the Potsdam seat of his brother Wilhelm in memory of his high command during the suppression of the uprising in Baden in 1849 , a colossal equestrian statue of St. George slaying the dragon in bronze for the great palace courtyard of Berlin Palace , which now stands on the Spree in the Nikolaiviertel , a statue of Christian Beuth in front of the Berlin Building Academy and the bronze figures for Wilhelmplatz in Berlin, which replaced six older marble statues. Four of them, James Keith , Hans von Zieten , Friedrich von Seydlitz and the old Dessauer , remained unchanged; Hans von Winterfeldt and Kurt von Schwerin remodeled Kiss. Today Wilhelmplatz is part of Wilhelmstrasse or is overbuilt with post-war buildings from the former GDR . Zieten and the old Dessauer have now withdrawn from the lapidary and are back in their old freshness on Wilhelmstrasse at the corner of Mohrenstrasse.

The only larger work in marble that Kiß completed is a grave monument for Countess Laura Henckel von Donnersmarck , which is based on Christian Rauch's monument to Queen Luise of Mecklenburg-Strelitz .

August Kiss died surprisingly on March 24, 1865 in Berlin. His grave in the old St.-Matthäus-Kirchhof there has been dedicated to the city of Berlin as an honorary grave since 1958 . In Tychy, where he grew up, an obelisk has been commemorating the son of the town since 2003 not far from Lake Paprotzaner .

Works (selection)

Prussia Monument (1860)
Archangel Michael (on the St. Michael Church in Berlin )
Saint George (in Berlin's Nikolaiviertel )
Art instructs industry and applied arts (cast zinc relief in the west gable of the Neues Museum in Berlin)
1837-1841    Amazone on horseback in front of the Altes Museum, Berlin, preserved (1864/65 marble version for the Brussels Academy)
1830-1850 plastic decoration of the main facade of the Nikolaikirche together with Ludwig Wichmann , Potsdam, reconstruction
1836-1837 Cast zinc reliefs on the altar in the Nikolaikirche (based on a design by Schinkel), Potsdam
1837 Bronze sculpture Amazon group - Fighting Amazon, Naundorf Castle , sculpture missing since 1985.
1841 Equestrian statue of Frederick the Great, Breslau, destroyed after 1945
after 1841 Karl Friedrich Schinkel's tomb, cemetery of the Dorotheenstadt and Friedrichswerder communities , Berlin, has been preserved
after 1845 Grave stele for Ludwig Persius (based on a design by Friedrich August Stüler ), Bornstedter Friedhof, Potsdam
around 1850-1852 Prussia monument in Karlsruhe (only the figure of the Archangel Michael, architecture by Friedrich Eisenlohr ), 1953 removed
1851 Statue of King Friedrich Wilhelm III. in Potsdam on Wilhelmplatz, destroyed after 1945
1851 Equestrian statue of King Friedrich Wilhelm III. in Königsberg , destroyed after 1945
1851-1856 Statue of the Archangel Michael, St. Michaels-Kirche , Berlin, preserved
around 1856 Gilded statue of the Archangel Michael, large dome of the Schwerin Castle , preserved
1854-1861 Statue of Christian Peter Wilhelm Beuth , square in front of the Bauakademie, Berlin
1854-1855 Sculptures in the garden of Villa Lützow and a deer statue at the Parkhotel Richmond in Karlsbad (Karlovy Vary)
1855 Statue of Saint George slaying the dragon, formerly in the large courtyard of the Berlin City Palace, after restoration in 1950 in the Volkspark Friedrichshain , since 1987 in the Nikolaiviertel
after 1857 Portrait medallion Christian Daniel Rauchs on his grave in the cemetery of the Dorotheenstädtischen and Friedrichswerder communities, Berlin
1858 Statue of Prince Leopold III. Friedrich Franz von Anhalt-Dessau (1740–1817), which was unveiled on October 20, 1858 on the Dessau Neumarkt. It was poured into Lauchhammer . The initiators of the memorial were members of a Dessau committee under the leadership of Adolf von Heydeck , the prince's illegitimate nephew
1861 Equestrian statue of King Friedrich Wilhelm III. in Breslau , destroyed after 1945
1862 Cast zinc relief Die Kunst instructs industry and applied arts in the tympanum of the west gable of the Neues Museum , Berlin
Griffin at the Johannitertor of Glienicke Palace , Berlin
Grave monument for Laura von Donnersmarck in the mausoleum in Wolfsberg / Carinthia
1865-1869 Faith, Love, Hope (completed by Gustav Blaeser ), National Gallery Berlin, on permanent loan in the Berlin Cathedral, Hohenzollern Crypt

literature

Web links

Commons : August Kiss  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Entry under 43/18 in Ewidencja miejsc pamięci miasta Tychy (list of monuments Tychy, PDF).
  2. ↑ Illustrirte Zeitung No. 1128 of January 28, 1865, p. 63.
  3. ↑ http://stadtlexikon.karlsruhe.de/index.php/De:Lexikon:top-3257 Information from the Stadtlexikon Karlsruhe
personal data
SURNAME Kiss, August
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kiss, August
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German sculptor
DATE OF BIRTH October 11, 1802
PLACE OF BIRTH Paprotzan, today in Tichau
DATE OF DEATH March 24, 1865
Place of death Berlin