Ernst Mollenhauer

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Ernst Mollenhauer (born August 27, 1892 in Tapiau ; † April 3, 1963 in Düsseldorf ) was a German landscape painter .

Life

The painter Lovis Corinth also came from his East Prussian hometown of Tapiau , east of Königsberg . Corinth, who was friends with Mollenhauer's father, supported his wish to attend the Königsberg art academy . In 1913 he began his studies there, u. a. with Richard Pfeiffer . Mollenhauer was a soldier in the First World War. From 1918 to 1922 he continued his studies, from 1920 as a master student with Artur Degner . In 1919 he took part in the founding of the artists' association Der Ring . He got to know the fishing village of Nida on the Curonian Spit . There he met the bridge painters Max Pechstein and Karl Schmidt-Rottluff . In 1920 he married Hedwig Blode , called Heta (1891–1973) in Nidden . She was the daughter of Hermann Blode (1862–1934), in whose inn the artists' colony Nida was founded. From 1922 to 1924 Mollenhauer lived in the USA for two years. From 1924 to 1945 Ernst Mollenhauer lived and worked in Nidden, in 1925 the daughter and later art historian Maja Mollenhauer was born. Until 1945, the inn served as a hostel and meeting place for many painters, writers, musicians and actors. There was an intensive exchange of artistic questions and problems; Ernst Mollenhauer was close friends with Paul Fechter . He defied numerous difficulties such as the annexation of the Memelland by Lithuania in order to preserve the artists' colony.

After the Memelland returned to the German Empire, his work was declared “ degenerate ” and the artist was banned from painting and exhibiting. Mollenhauer stayed in Nidden and looked after Thomas Mann's abandoned summer residence for a short time, as he had done since 1933 . The large Hermann Blodes collection was supposed to fall victim to an “iconoclasm”, which Mollenhauer was able to prevent. However, it was burned , including his own works, in a sauna in January or February 1945 by Red Army soldiers . This was also the end of the Nidden artists' colony .

Grave site in the cemetery of St. Severin (Keitum)

After Mollenhauer's release from captivity in Denmark and a British camp in Schleswig-Holstein, he built a new life in Kaarst near Düsseldorf in 1946 . In 1950 he moved into a studio in the Künstlerhaus on Sittarder Strasse in Düsseldorf , and later a second in Keitum on Sylt . Having died of a heart attack there, he was buried next to the old village church.

Honors

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Maja Ehlermann-Mollenhauer: Ernst Mollenhauer. Life path and artistic work ( Memento of the original from January 6, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed January 22, 2014. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.muziejai.lt
  2. ↑ Tanja Krombach (Red.): Cultural landscape of East and West Prussia . German Cultural Forum for Eastern Europe. Potsdam 2005. ISBN 3-936168-19-9 . P. 154.
  3. ↑ Ernst Mollenhauer: Wonderland Nidden . In: Martin Borrmann (ed.): A look back. Memories of childhood and youth, of life and work in East Prussia . Gräfe & Unzer, Munich 1961, pp. 243-250.
  4. ↑ He loved the expanse and the sea. In memory of Ernst Mollenhauer † . Ostpreußenblatt , April 13, 1963, p. 5

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Mollenhauer, Ernst
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German landscape painter
DATE OF BIRTH August 27, 1892
PLACE OF BIRTH Tapiau
DATE OF DEATH April 3, 1963
Place of death Dusseldorf