Ernst Schönzeler

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Ernst Bernhard Schönzeler (born November 24, 1923 in Kleve ; † March 29, 1981 there ) was a German painter and graphic artist .

life and work

Ernst Schönzeler grew up in Kleve on the Lower Rhine as the son of high school teacher Dr. Heinrich Schönzeler , Joseph Beuys ' English teacher at Freiherr-vom-Stein-Gymnasium in Kleve. Beuys first met Hans and Franz Joseph van der Grinten in the Schönzeler household . Together with Beuys, Ernst Schönzeler prepared for admission to the Düsseldorf Art Academy . There he studied graphics, painting and art history from 1946 to 1950 . He was a student of Ewald Mataré .

He began to exhibit publicly in the late 1940s. He participated several times in the exhibitions of the Niederrheinischer Künstlerbund eV (1947–50, 1967–73 and 1976). Solo exhibitions took place in the gallery "Haus im Park" in Emmerich am Rhein in 1969 and in "Marstall Kleve" in 1970. At the end of 1969 an exhibition with landscape paintings, still lifes and animal motifs was shown on the Hessischer Rundfunk in Frankfurt am Main , inspired by the concertmaster Klaus Speicher, a school friend of the painter. The shown motifs from Lake Geneva came from regular vacation trips that the artist took with his father and sister. Schönzeler had his first comprehensive, posthumous solo exhibition in 2007 in the BC Koekkoek House in Kleve.

In 1977 Ernst Schönzeler was involved in the almost three-hour documentary by Lutz Mommartz "The Garden of Eden" as an actor together with Franz Joseph van der Grinten , Henning Brandis and Friedrich Gorissen . The film, which is about the Lower Rhine Plain, won a Silver Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival (Berlinale) in 1977.

His work consists primarily of drawings, watercolors and prints, in which he captured panoramas of his homeland in drawings and pictures with great attention to detail. His works have titles such as Gruftstraße in Kleve , Am Annaberg or Windmühle am Niederrhein . Especially the old Rhine between Griethausen and Keeken with the neighboring villages and the dike at the ferry to Schenkenschanz were his favorite places and, as a contrast, the heights of " Materborn Switzerland ". His depictions of animals received recognition. Little is known about his still lifes and portraits.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Website of the Mommartz-Film ( Memento from November 13, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
personal data
SURNAME Schönzeler, Ernst
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Schönzeler, Ernst Bernhard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German art historian and artist
DATE OF BIRTH November 24, 1923
PLACE OF BIRTH Kleve
DATE OF DEATH March 29, 1981
Place of death Kleve