August from Brandis

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August (Friedrich Carl) von Brandis (born May 12, 1859 in Berlin-Haselhorst , † October 18, 1947 in Aachen ) was a German painter and draftsman . He is considered the most important interior painter of German impressionism and enjoyed a high international reputation during his lifetime.

Live and act

August von Brandis was born in the same decade as Vincent van Gogh or Lovis Corinth, for example . Even though his parents lived in the Baltic States, they wanted their son to spend his school days in Germany. August von Brandis therefore lived first with relatives in Hanover and then with his brother in Berlin, who worked as a stenographer in the Reichstag.

Berlin

As a schoolboy he went to Berlin museums to draw and after graduating from high school he began studying medicine, which he broke off. He switched to studying at the Royal Prussian Academy of the Arts in Berlin . In addition, he passed an examination as a drawing teacher in 1884 and taught at a Berlin high school to finance his studies. At the academy he began to have doubts about academic painting: “There was nothing that could have inspired me […], nothing but mannerism.” He was first in Hugo Vogel's class and, after he left, in that of the strict academic Anton from Werner , who, however, gave him the greatest possible freedom. In his private life August von Brandis received commissions as a portraitist.

In 1890 he won an internal academy competition with the work "The Raising of the Daughter Jair", followed by other religious works. In 1892 he exhibited at the "Berlin Academic Art Exhibition", then at the Great Berlin Art Exhibition , where in 1894 his work "Entombment of Christ" was shown. He participated with works in the exhibition almost continuously until 1900. The "Wedding of Kanaa" was exhibited for the first time in the hall of honor of the Great Munich Art Exhibition, together with the work "Christ in Olympus" by Max Klinger .

August von Brandis developed his own teaching methods in drawing lessons, and the Prussian Ministry promoted him to head of training for drawing teachers. He was entrusted with curating the exhibition of Berlin painters at the Great Art Exhibition in Munich, from where he also visited the Dachau artists' colony.

With his professorships first in Danzig, then in Aachen, von Brandis withdrew from the influence of the academically conservative authorities in Berlin. In spite of this, or because of this, swipes were not absent, so his pastose style of painting was described in an article in the Prussian yearbooks as "gelatinized", and attempts to improve were attested to him.

Dachau artists' colony

Around 1897, the Neu-Dachau artists' colony had formed in Dachau . Brandis was in contact with Adolf Hölzel , with whom he later had a lifelong friendship and from whom a lively correspondence has been passed down. He worked at Hölzel's painting school and became a member of the Dachau artists' colony in 1900 .

As part of the artist group "North German Workshop" Brandis exhibited in 1904 together with Constantin Starck , Franz Stassen , Friedrich Klein-Chevalier , Richard Eschke , Berthold Genzmer and Franz Paczka in the Berlin Künstlerhaus, but the group soon disbanded due to different positions. In the same year at the latest, Brandis turned primarily to interior painting and painted, for example, the Uphagensche house.

On October 1, 1904, he was appointed professor of figure and landscape painting at the Technical University of Danzig. The Neue Pinakothek in Munich acquired the work Durchblick in the same year . In March 1906 he exhibited together with Eugen Bracht, Albert Gartmann, Konrad Lessing and Hans Licht.

In Dachau, von Brandis oriented himself primarily to the painting of the artists of Paris and their impressionistic style in the sense of the Barbizon school . As part of the German art exhibition in the Kunsthalle Bremen with an integrated special exhibition of northwest German artists in 1908, he presented his new experiences and techniques for the first time. The art chronicle wrote in 1909: The interiors that the artist showed at the Berlin art exhibitions in recent years were among the best pictorial achievements that one could encounter there. On Brandi's initiative, Hölzel and the district spent three months in Monschau to paint there.

Aachen

August von Brandis (left) with students from the architecture faculty, 1920s

The Suermondt Museum had previously purchased the "Entombment of Christ". In 1909, Brandis was appointed as the successor to Alexander Frenz at the Faculty of Architecture at RWTH Aachen University as a full professor for figure and landscape symbols and watercolor painting . Brandis also held various university offices and was dean in 1925/26. In addition to the students, he also accepted free students. His students included u. a. Fritz Faber, Karl Theodor Heimbüchel, Adolf Kogel, Jo Hanns Küpper , Rolf Robischon , Adolf Wamper , Vincent Weber , Benno Werth and Heinrich Wolff.

In 1910 and 1911 Brandis received the Golden Medal for Art donated by Kaiser Wilhelm II at the Great Berlin Art Exhibition and in 1911 the Golden Medal at the Art Exhibition in Munich. Between 1910 and 1918 his work was shown abroad, including in Santiago (Chile), Rome, Paris, Buenos Aires, Toronto and Sofia, partly on the initiative of the German Society for Christian Art . In 1914 the work "Autumn Sun" was exhibited at the Venice Biennale and the "Morning Mood" at the Great Berlin Art Exhibition.

In 1929 August von Brandis retired and was succeeded by Hermann Haas . Together with other former colleagues, von Brandis successfully protested in the late 1930s against a "war-related closure" of the university by the National Socialists. In order to decorate its own premises, the NSDAP district leadership in Aachen-Stadt got the work “Coronation Hall” from the Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum as a “permanent loan”. The work later disappeared and is considered lost.

In 1939 the Lord Mayor presented him with the Suermondt badge. Brandis was described as a “masterful porter of old Aachen living culture” and his works as “full of color”. In fact, however, Brandis rejected a purely academic painting as well as the use of intense bright colors.

plant

Bertha von der Kuhlen, the wife in a painting by the artist

In a 1914 review in Kunst und Künstler, which was published by Bruno Cassirer , Brandis, in contrast to other impressionists, is certified as having the "most honest will to search for painterly form". The Impressionist work mainly comprises interiors, Brandis is considered the most important interior painter of German Impressionism. Brandis, for example, only painted portraits in isolated cases, primarily of his family.

The early religious work

The work “Hochzeit zu Cana”, which was shown at the Great Berlin Art Exhibition in 1897, is inspired by his teacher Anton von Werner and is in the style of historicism. In general, his early work can be attributed to sacred art. In 1909 he participated a. a. with Lovis Corinth at the exhibition for Christian art in Düsseldorf, both were certified in a review to convince less through theological and more through artistic qualities.

The two sacred works "Entombment" and the "Wedding at Cana" are permanently exhibited in St. Foillan . In their large format, these represent an imposing enrichment of this church.

The garden pavilion

The turn to painting Impressionist interiors began shortly before the turn of the century, when he was painting a Rococo garden house designed by Jakob Couven on the property of his in-laws in Kaldenkirchen , and falls into the era when his religious work enjoyed the greatest public recognition. Hardly any other motif has been painted by Brandis in so many interior and exterior views as the garden house, from which he later developed the “spatial images”.

The "spatial images"

Rococo room in the Würzburg Residence

August von Brandis had got to know the French Impressionists during stays in Paris and also shared their views. Nevertheless (comparable to the other German Impressionists ) painting differed from that in France. Instead of painting outdoors, he turned to painting interiors, although he rejected the term "interiors", since these strive for a representation comparable to a still life, while he is concerned with the changing lighting conditions, he therefore prefers the term "spatial images" .

From then on August von Brandis dedicated a large part of his work to historical interior design, including the Biedermeier room of the Couven Museum in Haus Fey , which opened in 1929, and the Red House in Monschau .

Many of his trips were devoted to looking for and painting historical spaces, primarily in Germany, but also to Italy, the Netherlands and France. Brandis and Carl Moll agreed not to paint rooms that are currently inhabited.

Working in the context of RWTH Aachen

  • Drafts for the glass windows of the Walter Rogowski Institute at RWTH Aachen University. These clearly show the relationship to Adolf Hölzel and served as a model for his stained glass windows in Stuttgart City Hall. Due to the Second World War , however, the Aachen glass windows were never completed.
  • Painting of the smelting laboratory in the Hüttenmännisches Institut with Professor Wilhelm Borchers (1856–1925) as an example of work that is thematically related to RWTH, but not all of which have been found or can be assigned.
  • Ironworks Institute of the Technical University of Aachen
  • Commemorative plaque of the college for the fallen students in the First World War

The importance of color in Brandis' work

According to one review, “in works by Brandis, the light emanates from a single spot and shines on objects in the interior, the effect being softened by the dissolution into the spectral colors. Another example is: The loud jubilation of the white, gold and marble colors of this most beautiful rococo church is wisely muted and softly coordinated with gray and yellow. ” Richard Hamann wrote in 1925 about the work of Brandis:“ What new color sensations through this impressionistic art, which retreats to the stimulus as such, in pure still lifes. "

Works (selection)

St. Marien in Lübeck, 1921

The city museums in Aachen and the university have a collection that illustrates almost all phases of Brandi's development, with many of the images having a specific reference to Aachen. Works are u. a. to be found in the following museums:

  • “And they followed him”, exhibition in the Munich Glass Palace
  • “Young woman with baby in front of the cloister gate”, 1891
  • "Praying Girl" Academy of Arts, Berlin
  • “In the Kaldenkirchen garden house”, 145 × 105 cm.
  • "Girls at the table in front of the veranda", NS auction order (December 4, 1938)
  • “View into the Mirror Cabinet”, 1900 Martin von Wagner Museum Würzburg, acquired in 2013.
  • “Durchblick”, Neue Pinakothek, 83 × 68 cm, Munich, purchased in 1904
  • "Mood in Blue (Interior)", 1911 purchase from the Great Berlin Art Exhibition, National Gallery Berlin, lost.
  • "Morning Mood", exhibited at the Great Berlin Art Exhibition, 1914
  • “Herbstsonne”, (Sole Autennale) 128 × 100 cm, shown at the 11th Venice Biennale in 1914, later: Museums of the City of Aachen / Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum Aachen, lost.
  • “Interior from a garden house”, 1915 purchase from the Great Berlin Art Exhibition, National Gallery Berlin , lost.
  • "Wuerzburger - castle / reception room - mood in white, two yellow sophas", 83 × 66 cm
  • “Herbstwald”, 50x68, formerly Arthur Dahlheim collection

Exhibitions

Works by Brandis were shown several times during his lifetime in the Great Berlin Art Exhibition and in the Glaspalast in Munich, and in 1900 at the annual exhibition of the Cooperative of Fine Artists in Vienna.

Solo exhibitions showed u. a. the Städtisches Museum Danzig , the Städtisches Museum Düsseldorf , the Kaiser Wilhelm Museum in Krefeld 1914–1915 in its skylight hall and the Suermondt Museum as the last major exhibition during Brandis' lifetime in 1939. In 1921 the Leopold Hoesch Museum in Düren showed the exhibition “Three Rhenish Painters” with works by Brandis, Hermann Peters and Louis Ziercke .

Galleries in many German cities showed exhibitions or carried works by Brandis, for example the Kunsthaus Hermann Zirkel in Bonn in 1917 and the Eduard Schulte Gallery in Berlin in 1925 and 1928.

In 1999 a large number of his works were shown and cataloged on the occasion of an exhibition in the coronation hall of the Aachen town hall and in the Troistorff house in Monschau. This first catalog contained more than 70 large-format oil paintings in his style based on classical realism and influenced by impressionism. In addition to the landscapes, there are primarily light-flooded interiors.

Until 2006, the Simferopol Art Museum in Crimea exhibited works by Brandis that had arrived there as spoils of war during World War II. These very characteristic works with interiors, still lifes and garden sheds have meanwhile been restituted to Germany, at least one of them came from the Suermondt Museum.

In 2010 the Tuschererhaus in Monschau showed works by Brandis in the exhibition “Old and New Paintings”. In 2013, the Barthelmess & Wischnewski gallery in Berlin showed works by Brandis in the exhibition Masters of Light. In 2015, the NDR program Lieb & Teuer took a painting as an occasion for a trip to the Kaldenkirchen garden house.

Private

The house at Luitpoldstrasse 47 in Berlin-Schöneberg, where Brandis lived until 1904

August von Brandis comes from the line of the old noble von Brandis family from Alfeld an der Leine, who moved to Hildesheim . His father August Friedrich von Brandis looked after the family's estates in the Baltic States, his mother Therese Henriette Arendt came from a Königsberg family of scholars. In 1897 he married Bertha von der Kuhlen (* December 30, 1876 in Kaldenkirchen; † July 28, 1964 in Aachen), daughter of the Kaldenkirchen honorary citizen Hermann von der Kuhlen. The doctor and professor Hans-Joachim Friedrich von Brandis (born August 24, 1901 in Berlin; † 1971) emerged from the marriage. In Berlin, August von Brandis lived at Luitpoldstrasse 47 until 1904. Subsequently, during his time in Danzig, at Johannisberg 11 in Langfuhr near Danzig. In 1911 he bought a house as a holiday home in Huizen on the Zuidersee in the Netherlands. In 1914 he was one of the more than 3,000 signatories of the declaration by university teachers in the German Reich .

He was a member of the "Erholungsgesellschaft Aachens", a foundation under Prussian law for merchants, lawyers, manufacturers and nobles, as well as the Club Aachener Casino and since 1946 belonged to the Aachener Burschenschaft Teutonia in the German Burschenschaft .

The estates of contemporary personalities include autographs from the exchange with Brandis, for example a photo at Ludwig Fahrenkrog , and letters to Max Laeuger , Wilhelm Scholkmann and Friedrich Kallmorgen .

August von Brandis was the owner of the house at Carlstrasse (later Karlstrasse, today Haßlerstrasse) No. 24, in which he also lived.

Von Brandis found his final resting place in the family grave in the Aachen forest cemetery .

Honor

In addition to the awards for his work, Brandis also received personal honors:

  • In 1896 Brandis received the Menzel Prize in Berlin .
  • In 1926, the Technical University of Gdansk honored him by making him an honorary citizen.
  • “Due to his general reputation and his great importance as a creative artist as well as in recognition of his work as a university lecturer, who knew how to awaken and promote the artistic spirit of young people with particular success through his strong personality and thus the reputation of the university also to serve externally ”was made an honorary citizen of RWTH Aachen University on May 12, 1929, according to a resolution by the Senate.
  • Opening of the August von Brandis Hall in the Suermondt Ludwig Museum in Aachen , 1948.
  • von-Brandis-Straße on the occasion of his 100th birthday in 1959.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b arcadja.com
  2. ^ Irmgard Wirth: Berlin painting in the 19th century. Siedler Verlag Berlin 1990, p. 526.
  3. ^ Prussian yearbooks. Volume 177, 1919 p. 424.
  4. ^ Dachau artists' colony .
  5. ↑ a b [1]  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / spkkunstbibliothek-cdm.gbv.de  
  6. ↑ Kunstchronik: Weekly for art and applied arts. Issue 32 (September 10, 1909) p. 549.
  7. ^ Print n Press Verlag GmbH: Exhibition: Nico Sawatzki in the gallery Friday 6.30pm .
  8. ↑ shadow Gallery: The Lost Works of Gemaldesammlung. P. 284.
  9. ↑ The art. No. 79 - p. 126, 1939.
  10. ^ Art and artists: Illustrated monthly for fine arts and art history. No. 12, 1914.
  11. ↑ [2]  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / spkkunstbibliothek-cdm.gbv.de  
  12. ↑ "Art Library of the State Museums in Berlin", 25.1910; P. 10.
  13. ↑ Pictures .
  14. ↑ Wolfgang Hammer, Andreas Petzold: August von Brandis 1859-1949. Exhibition catalog Monschau / Aachen, 1999 p. 14.
  15. ↑ August von Brandis: Castle Views ( Memento of the original from February 4, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.hampel-auctions.com
  16. ^ Upper Bavarian Archive, No. 106, p. 130, 1981.
  17. ↑ Christine Roll, Klaus Graf: 40 Years of the RWTH Aachen University Archives, p. 58, 2010
  18. ^ Aachener Kunstblätter - Volumes 19-21, p. 132, 1960.
  19. ^ Richard Hamann: German painting from the 18th to the beginning of the 20th century. Teubner, 1925, p. 400.
  20. ↑ easydb.archive .
  21. ^ In the Kaldenkirchen garden house from August von Brandis - archive .
  22. ^ Harms auction (January 5, 1939), owned by Minna Priester
  23. ↑ a b Conservator Kossatz presented donations . August 16, 2013.
  24. ↑ Lost Art ID 256761
  25. ↑ depicted on: Art for everyone: painting, sculpture, graphics, architecture - 29.1913–1914. P. 548.
  26. ↑ ASAC Dati: Ricerca avanzata opere d'arte .
  27. ↑ Lost Art ID 135492
  28. ↑ Lost Art ID 256762.
  29. ↑ Auction 36 at von Zezschwitz, 2007.
  30. ^ Annual exhibition, Genossenschaft der Bildenden Künstler Wien, catalog p. 41.
  31. ↑ Art Chronicle. EA Seemann, 1915.
  32. ^ Robert Scheithe: Louis Ziercke - Publications .
  33. ↑ Georg Bierman: The Cicerone. Klinkhardt & Biermann, 1917. p. 61.
  34. ^ Art and artists: illustrated monthly for fine arts and applied arts (23.1925) .
  35. ↑ Georg Bierman: The Cicerone. Klinkhardt & Biermann, 1928. p. 120.
  36. ↑ August von Brandis: artnet.de .
  37. ↑ Harald Müller: Cultures of Knowledge: Conditions for Scientific Innovation. P. 160.
  38. ^ Helge Dvorak: Biographical Lexicon of the German Burschenschaft. Volume II: Artists. Winter, Heidelberg 2018, ISBN 978-3-8253-6813-5 , pp. 87-88.
  39. ↑ digiporta.net
  40. ^ Entry on August von Brandis in Kalliope
  41. ↑ Historic Addressbooks - Addressbook entry .
  42. ↑ a b archiv.rwth-aachen.de (PDF).
personal data
SURNAME Brandis, August of
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Brandis, August Friedrich Carl von
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German painter, draftsman and professor
DATE OF BIRTH May 12, 1859
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin-Haselhorst
DATE OF DEATH October 18, 1947
Place of death Aachen