Conrad Weitbrecht

Conrad Weitbrecht, self-portrait at the age of around 24

Conrad Weitbrecht (born May 24, 1796 in Ernsbach ; † July 15, 1836 in Stuttgart ) was a German sculptor and draftsman of the late classicism and art professor in Stuttgart.

His sculptural work consists exclusively of reliefs. He created five relief cycles, of which only his main work, the four- seasons frieze in Rosenstein Castle in Stuttgart, was executed, while the others were published as sequences. As a stylistic innovator, he created a large number of designs for iron art casting for the ironworks in Wasseralfingen from 1818 onwards.

Weitbrecht's reliefs and drawings are characterized by “folk-related content that has been copied from life,” which he combined “with the formal ideals of the classical tradition”. His master work, the "Ornaments Drawing School" published in 1833, was well received and widely distributed.

Life

origin

Georg Conrad Weitbrecht was born on May 24, 1796 in Ernsbach, today a district of Forchtenberg in Hohenlohekreis in Kochertal . He came from the Schorndorf line of the Weitbrecht family . His father was the humble hatter Johann Konrad Weitbrecht (1756–1828), a son of the hatter Abraham Weitbrecht in Schorndorf.

The father settled in Güglingen , where he married Marie Christine Elisabeth Kubach (1754–1812) in 1781, the daughter of the master saddler and customs officer Johann Christoph Kubach. Around 1788 the parents moved to Ernsbach, where their son Conrad was born. In 1810 the family moved to Bonfeld, 20 kilometers away .

education

As a boy, Weitbrecht cut figures from his father's felt scraps that showed the boy's budding talent. The Bonfeld landlords became aware of the boy's talent and had him teach with their own sons. The art collector, art patron and writer Karl Friedrich Emich von Uexküll-Gyllenband , a childless friend of the estate family, also became aware of the 14-year-old boy. He took him to Stuttgart and gave him a better education there. Since Conrad Weitbrecht wanted to become a painter, Uexküll-Gyllenband sent him to the private art school of the sculptor Johann Heinrich Dannecker in 1813 and 1814 , where he was to learn to draw and model and to meet with his classmates Wilhelm Gangloff, who died in 1814, and the English-Italian painter Trajano Wallis from Florence became friends. Copying plaster models did not satisfy him and his friend Gangloff in the long run. To train in painting, Uexküll-Gyllenband sent his protégé to the art academy in Milan in 1815/1816 and to the art academy in Florence in 1816/1817. However, the work he created there met with little approval, and he had to recognize that his talent was not in the field of painting.

Working life

Bruckmann

After his return from Italy, Weitbrecht found a job as a chaser at the silver goods factory Peter Bruckmann & Sons in Heilbronn at the turn of the year 1817/1818 . The artistically educated Peter Bruckmann wanted to replace the customary forms of the braid style with antique forms, and for this he welcomed the likewise artistically educated Weitbrecht. Weitbrecht quickly learned the technique of engraving, but no individual works in the factory can be assigned to him, as these were not identified by name.

In his free time, the child and people-friendly artist made numerous genre drawings, for which he was modeled by the Bruckmann family and their children. He was able to give free rein to his love of observation and did not have to submit to any strict style constraints. The artist's transformation from painter to relief sculptor can be seen in his perceived plastic outline drawings. The genre drawings based on Bruckmann's family scenes formed the basis of the unrealized relief cycle “Die Hausfrau”, which appeared posthumously in a lithographic folder in 1838. It was also during this period that he began the cycle “The Road”.

Wasseralfingen

At the end of 1823, Weitbrecht was employed as a modeller in the Wasseralfingen ironworks with a free apartment and studio in Schloss Wasseralfingen . During his probationary year, he created an impressive number of drawings and models. He also ran a drawing school for apprentice molders. After the probationary year, King Wilhelm appointed him inspector of the molding shop in 1825 with the rank of building inspector.

His main task in the smelting works was to renew the iron art casting and to replace the outdated braid style with a classic design language. He created an extensive repertoire of cast iron models for stove tops, clock cases, decorative vases, candelabras and other handicraft objects, using classic ornaments and interweaving genre scenes from the everyday life of the common people. In addition, the cycle "Wasseralfingen studies on the work in the mine and ironworks Wasseralfingen" was created.

Four season frieze and trip to Italy

In 1825, King Wilhelm commissioned him to create a relief frieze for the Rosenstein Castle , which was under construction, on the subject of “Country life through the seasons”. From 1826 to 1828, Weitbrecht created 38 individual scenes for the 65 meter long plaster frieze. The four seasons frieze is considered to be his main work and was the only one of his five relief cycles to be realized and printed as a graphic portfolio with 70 individual scenes.

In recognition of his services, King Wilhelm granted him a scholarship for a study trip to Italy. In addition to his annual salary of 800 guilders, he received a travel grant of 1000 guilders. In August 1828 he set out for Italy with his wife and adopted son Konrad Deschner. In Florence, in Naples and especially in Rome, he made sketches of ancient works of art and created his first two marble reliefs in Rome in the workshop of the sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen . After the long-awaited birth of a son on March 23, 1829, the planned return trip had to be postponed twice due to his poor health, so that Weitbrecht's stay was extended from one year to one and a half years with the approval of the king. After the two extensions of the stay, the king increased his travel grant by 700 guilders each.

Teacher and professor

After his return from Italy, Weitbrecht got a job as a teacher for drawing and modeling lessons at the Stuttgart Art School in November 1830 with a salary of 1400 guilders. He moved his residence to Stuttgart to Friedrichstrasse 2, but kept his functions in Wasseralfingen. In 1832 he was appointed second main teacher at the Stuttgart trade school, which later became the polytechnic, for drawing lessons in ornamentation and was appointed professor. Since eight of his students later gave lessons themselves, he was given the title of "progenitor of (the) entire Württernberg arts and crafts lessons". In 1833, on the basis of his Italian sketches and his own designs, he published an "Ornaments Drawing School in 100 Sheets for Artists, Manufacturers and Tradesmen", which was well received and widely distributed.

family

Conrad Weitbrecht's tomb

Conrad Weitbrecht married at the age of 24 in 1821 the penniless Anna Maria ("Marie") Zimmermann from Fulda (1796–1877), the daughter of a court surgeon. In 1826 Weitbrecht's sister Christina Sophia Deschner, née. Weitbrecht, who was married to the tailor Christoph Deschner. The Weitbrechts, who had remained childless until then, adopted their half-orphaned son Konrad Deschner (1823–1863), who later became a drawing teacher in Heilbronn and published a collection of elementary drawing templates.

During a study visit to Rome in 1829 Weitbrecht's wife died after seven years of waiting with a son, whom the parents named Felix Bernhard Weitbrecht (1829-1858). Felix Bernhard Weitbrecht became a lawyer, but died before he was thirty.

Conrad Weitbrecht died on July 15, 1836 of a lung disease at the age of only 40 in Stuttgart and was buried in the Hoppenlauf cemetery. His wife Marie married the senior building officer Friedrich Bernhard Adam Groß (1783–1861). She died in 1877 and was also buried in the Hoppenlauf cemetery.

plant

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Relief cycles

image	year	plant
	1820-1830	The street. Drawings, templates for an unrealized relief frieze. Illustration: two stone knockers and a four-horse stagecoach.
	1823-1832	Wasseralfingen studies about the work in the mine and ironworks Wasseralfingen. 46 drawings, templates for an unrealized relief frieze. Illustration: Workshop of the chaser.
	1826-1828	The four seasons . Plaster relief frieze from 38 individual scenes in Rosenstein Castle in Stuttgart. The underlying graphic cycle #Weitbrecht 1850 contains 70 relief templates. Illustration of treading grapes.
	1830–?	The village fire (The Song of the Bell). 18 drawings, templates for an unrealized relief frieze. Illustration of storm bells and family rescue.
	until 1836	The housewife. 17 drawings, templates for an unrealized relief frieze. Illustration of morning prayer.

Single reliefs

image	year	plant
Illustration	1820	Mother and children, plaster relief, Staatsgalerie Stuttgart.
Illustration	1828-1829	A boy has a thorn pulled out, marble relief, Staatsgalerie Stuttgart.
	1829	A girl hands a blind old man a jug, marble relief, State Gallery Stuttgart.
Illustration	1830 ~	Apprentice boy, marble relief, State Gallery Stuttgart.
	1840	New Testament tablet, lithograph by Eberhard Emminger after a drawing by Conrad Weitbrecht.
	1842	Christ floating adored by the faithful, lithograph by Eberhard Emminger after a drawing by Conrad Weitbrecht for an ivory carving.

Cast iron

See also: #Bieg 1996 , pages 11-16, #Hellwag 1913 , #Schaller 1912 , #Wintterlin 1896.2 , pages 343-344.

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  Top-mounted oven.

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  Watch case.

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  Ornamental vase.

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  Candelabra.

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  Openwork relief.

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  Openwork relief.

reception

In his short lifetime, Conrad Weitbrecht created five relief cycles, numerous cast iron designs for the Wasseralfinger Hüttenwerke and a large number of individual drawings. Today he is almost unknown, a fate that he shares with many other Württemberg artists.

His main work, the four seasons frieze in Rosenstein Castle, was the only one of his relief cycles to be realized. Christian von Holst , director of the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart from 1994 to 2006, devoted at least eight pages to Weitbrecht in 1993 in the exhibition catalog “Swabian Classicism between Ideal and Reality” and remarked: “We should emphasize the little-known Konrad Weitbrecht, who has been the Seasons frieze in Rosenstein Castle. ”Since the frieze is attached at a great height, visitors to the castle can hardly see details of the frieze with the naked eye. In a special exhibition at the Rosenstein Castle Natural History Museum in 2009/2010, a full-size, walk-in replica of Charles Darwin's research ship “Beagle” was installed in the portico of the castle. The visitors to the exhibition were therefore temporarily able to view the frieze from the deck of the ship almost at eye level.

A letter that Weitbrecht wrote to a friend while studying in Rome in 1829 contained his artistic credo:

“My bas-relief in marble has arrived and the king should enjoy it. I have now undertaken to chisel a second and modeled a third. Small objects from life. The constant thrashing on mythological ground can be quite fed up here. In the end, the objects from the Bible are only right for churches. At all times the artists worked on [themes] for their time - the ancients worked on their myths and folk deeds - in the Middle Ages for the church - and because they did this, they were understood and employed - that most of them would rather have something is closer to them, proves the emergence of so-called genre painting - and it is not to be blamed, because apart from the scholars, not everyone has penetrated mythology in such a way that they understand and understand a bas-relief or statue that has such content will be addressed. "

His turn to popular motifs in his cast iron designs and in his relief cycles established Weitbrecht's reputation, “to unite his art, copied from life, folk-oriented content with the formal ideals of the classical tradition and to mark his creatures in an unpathetic way with the grace of Biedermeier poetry or with dignity a moderate ideality. ”The sequence of images in his cycles are reminiscent of modern comics or storyboards long before they became known.

The Staatsgalerie Stuttgart owns 4 reliefs and around 1000 drawing sheets by Weitbrecht, which are not on display. The Landesmuseum Württemberg in Stuttgart has at least 4 reliefs by Weitbrecht. In 1877 the Württemberg Arts and Crafts Association organized a Weitbrecht retrospective, the “Exhibition of the works left behind by Professor Conrad Weitbrecht in the halls of the Königsbrecht”. In the more than 140 years that followed, there was no longer a solo exhibition dedicated to a comprehensive appreciation of the great Württemberg artist.

Honors

• 1830: appointed professor.
• 1896: Conrad Weitbrecht's portrait relief adorns the Landesgewerbemuseum Stuttgart as one of 20 portraits of prominent Württemberg citizens (portrait medallion number 12).
• The Weitbrecht School in Wasseralfingen was named after Conrad Weitbrecht.

Museums

• Stuttgart, Landesmuseum Württemberg, at least 4 reliefs by Weitbrecht.
• Stuttgart, State Gallery, 4 reliefs and around 1000 sheets of drawings by Weitbrecht.

Fonts

• Conrad Weitbrecht: [Letters from Rome, 1828–1829]. In: #Bieg 1996 , pages 17-43.
• Conrad Weitbrecht: Ornaments drawing school in 100 sheets for artists, manufacturers and tradespeople. Drawn and edited by the sculptor Conrad Weitbrecht, modeler for the Königlich Württembergische Eisengiesserei, and professor of ornamentation at the Königliche Gewerbeschule in Stuttgart. Stuttgart: Schweizerbart, 1833. Further editions: 1853 and 1878.

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  Ornaments drawing school, sheet 25.
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  Sheet 57.
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  Sheet 69.
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  Sheet 79.

• Conrad Weitbrecht: The housewife as a bas-relief frieze: in seventeen representations. Invented and drawn by Professor Weitbrecht, with an explanatory text by FL Bührlen. Stuttgart: Brodhag, 1838.
• Conrad Weitbrecht: The four seasons: a series of rural representations / composed and, for the most part, executed in bas-relief as a frieze in the royal Württemberg country house Rosenstein by Conrad Weitbrecht. Stuttgart: Cotta, 1850.
• Hermann Baumhauer: Conrad Weitbrecht, Wasseralfinger Studies: 1823–1832. Wasseralfingen: Schwäbische Hüttenwerke, 1961.

literature

Biographical articles

• Weitbrecht, Konrad . In: Hans Vollmer (Hrsg.): General lexicon of fine artists from antiquity to the present . Founded by Ulrich Thieme and Felix Becker . tape 35 : Libra-Wilhelmson . EA Seemann, Leipzig 1942, p. 347-348 .
• Georg Kaspar Nagler : Weitbrecht, Conrad. In: Neues Allgemeine Künstler-Lexicon, Volume 21. Munich: Fleischmann, 1851, pages 264–266, pdf .
• Adolf Schahl: Konrad Weitbrecht, a sculptor of late classicism, 1736–1836. In: Robert Uhland (editor): Life pictures from Swabia and Franconia, Volume 15, 1983, pages 224-238. - With bibliography and portrait index.
• August Wintterlin:  Weitbrecht, Georg Konrad . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 41, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1896, pp. 620-622.
• August Wintterlin: The sculptor Georg Konrad Weitbrecht: a contribution to the history of the Württemberg arts and crafts, 1796–1836. In: Württemberg Quarterly Books for State History, New Series, Volume 5, 1896, pages 333–359. - Separately printed: Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1896.

life and work

• Werner Bieg: Conrad Weitbrecht: 1796–1836; Life and work. For the special exhibition of the Museum Wasseralfingen on the occasion of the 200th birthday of Conrad Weitbrecht, October 20 to November 17, 1996. Aalen, 1996.
• Ulrike Gauss: The drawings and watercolors of the 19th century in the graphic collection of the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart. Inventory catalog until December 1975. Stuttgart: Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, 1976, pages 221–224, illustrations number 1621–1627.
• Adolf Haakh : Contributions from Württemberg to recent German art history. Stuttgart: Bruckmann, 1863, pages 347-348, 355-356, 357-359, pdf . - Letters from Eberhard Wächter about Conrad Weitbrecht to Karl Friedrich Emich von Uexküll-Gyllenband .
• Christian von Holst (editor): Swabian classicism between ideal and reality, catalog. Stuttgart 1993.
• Franz Hellwag: Cast iron reliefs in Wasseralfingen. In: Kunstgewerbeblatt, Volume 24, 1913, Pages 1–2, pdf .
• Christian von Holst (editor): Swabian classicism between ideal and reality, catalog. Stuttgart 1993, page 68, 430-437.
• August Lämmle : The heart of home; a trousseau from the Swabian household for our sons and daughters at home and outside. With [33] pictures by Conrad Weitbrecht. Stuttgart: Steinkopf, 1942.
• Landesmuseum Württemberg: The Kingdom of Württemberg 1806–1918, monarchy and modernity. Ulm: Süddeutscher Verlag, 2006, pages 306-307.
• Fritz Mayer: Life sketch by Conrad Weitbrecht. In: #Weitbrecht 1877 , pages 1–12.
• Bertold Pfeiffer: The Hoppenlau cemetery in Stuttgart. A study on homeland security .. Stuttgart 1912, number 97, 262, 265.
• Adolf Schahl: The good land: life and work in Wuerttemberg in the cyclical series of images by Konrad Weitbrecht (1796-1836). Stuttgart: Steinkopf, 1980.
• Hans Otto Schaller: Weitbrecht and Plock. (Exhibition by L. Schaller). In: Württemberger Zeitung , 5th volume, number 217, September 16, 1911, pages 2–3, number 223, September 23, 1911, page 2.
• Hans Otto Schaller: Georg Konrad Weitbrecht: 1796–1836. In: Kunst und Künstler, Volume 10 1912, Pages 595–601, pdf .
• Adolf Spemann: Dannecker. Berlin: Spemann 1909, pages 99-100, appendix: 180.
• Conrad Weitbrecht: Exhibition of the works left behind by Professor Conrad Weitbrecht in the halls of the Royal Building: June and July 1877 / Württembergischer Kunstgewerbe-Verein. Stuttgart: Kirn, 1877.

Web links

Commons : Conrad Weitbrecht  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Works by and about Conrad Weitbrecht  in the German Digital Library

Footnotes

1. ↑ #Baumhauer 1961 .
2. ↑ #Wintterlin 1896.2 , page 334.
3. ↑ #Wintterlin 1896.2 , pp. 343-344.
4. ↑ #Landesmuseum 2006 .
5. ↑ #Weitbrecht 1833 .
6. ↑ #Bieg 1996 , page 10, #Wintterlin 1896.2 , page 349, pdf .
7. ↑ #Pfeiffer 1912 .
8. ↑ #Pfeiffer 1912 .
9. ↑ # Schahl 1980 , pp. 99-105.
10. ↑ #Baumhauer 1961 , #Schahl 1980 , pp. 52-80.
11. ↑ #Schahl 1980 , pages 11-59, #Holst 1993 , pages 430-433.
12. ↑ # Schahl 1980 , pp. 80-98.
13. ↑ #Weitbrecht 1838 , # Schahl 1980 , pp. 106-123, # Holst 1993 , pp. 435-436.
14. ↑ Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, digital collection .
15. ↑ #Bieg 1996 , page 23, 35, #Holst 1993 , page 434-435.
16. ↑ #Bieg 1996 , pages 37, 39, 41, 42 (“counterpart”).
17. ↑ #Nagler 1851 .
18. ↑ #Nagler 1851 .
19. ↑ #Holst 1993 , page 68.
20. ↑ #Bieg 1996 , page 41.
21. ↑ #Baumhauer 1961 .
22. ↑ # Gauss 1876 .
23. ↑ #Landesmuseum 2006 .
24. ↑ #Weitbrecht 1877 .
25. ↑ #Landesmuseum 2006 .
26. ↑ # Gauss 1876 .
27. ↑ #Bieg 1996 , page 24.