Friedrich Perzyński

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Cover of Perzyński's book "Of China's Gods"

Friedrich Perzyński (born August 20, 1877 in Berlin , German Empire , † August 11, 1965 in Buenos Aires , Argentina ) was a traveler to Asia, art collector and dealer and writer. He was one of the first in Germany to study Japanese woodblock prints and to publish about them. His collection results can be found in German, English and American museums.

Life

Since his father's business was ruined by an illness of his father, Perzyński had to leave the grammar school without taking the Abitur, only with the middle school leaving certificate. He first worked as a bookseller to help keep the family going.

Perzyński seems to have been interested in Asian art at an early age, but without being able to take up a corresponding degree. In 1903 he published the volume "The Japanese Color Woodcut", and in 1904 he published a monograph on the Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai . These fonts made him known as a connoisseur of Japanese woodblock prints.

In 1905 the director of the Kunsthalle Bremen , Gustav Pauli , commissioned him to buy colored woodcuts and related books for the museum in Japan. This collection is kept there today in the Kupferstichkabinett .

In 1913 Perzyński traveled independently to China, where he probably appeared as an antique dealer in Beijing . During this time he discovered Buddhist stone figures in the mountains of I chou . The specimens found went to the Metropolitan Museum in New York and the British Museum in London .

Perzyński sold valuable Asian items, including brocades and carpets , through the Berlin art dealer Paul Cassirer . The Museum of Asian Art in Berlin showed a carpet, among other things, and the wealthy publisher Alfred Walter Heymel (Insel Verlag) also acquired Japanese art objects from him, which later ended up in the Bremen Überseemuseum .

Although he did not meet the requirements, he was given the opportunity to do his doctorate at the University of Hamburg in 1924 . As a dissertation he presented the two-volume work "The Masks of the Japanese Schaubühne", which was also published in 1925. The Hamburg Japanologist Karl Florenz attested him an excellent performance.

Friedrich Perzyński traveled a lot and had extensive correspondence with museums, publishers, musicians and poets, including Rilke , Harry Graf Kessler and the English music researcher Edward Joseph Dent .

During the First World War he worked for the Intelligence Bureau for the East , a propaganda office of the Foreign Ministry, and after 1918 he was, together with Walter Gropius , Gerhard Marcks and Erich Heckel the Workers' Art at.

In 1929 Perzyński had his small but selected East Asian art collection auctioned, but the response was rather low due to the global economic crisis prevailing at the time.

After that he lived - probably mainly for health reasons - for a while on Lake Garda , in southern France and on Mallorca.

Perzyński was hostile to Nazi rule and went into exile in Buenos Aires in March 1942 , where he lived in seclusion in the Belgrano district . He tried in vain to have his writings reissued, gave lectures and maintained contact with the German colony. He had close contact with Ilse Countess Seilern-Aspang, a poet and writer.

For health reasons he was no longer able to travel later, but he kept his correspondence as close as possible. By 1962 his correspondence seemed to break off; Only at the beginning of the 21st century was another letter from 1964 discovered that helped to clarify the end of his life.

Friedrich Perzyński died of pancreatic cancer on August 11, 1965 in Buenos Aires. His body was cremated and buried in the mass grave of the Chacarita cemetery.

Works (selection)

  • The Japanese Color Woodcut: Its History - Its Influence . Volume XIII of the series "The Art - Collection of Illustrated Monographs", edited by Richard Muther. Berlin, 1903
  • Hokusai . Bielefeld and Berlin, 1904
  • Cosmopolitan souls . Munich, 1904
  • Korin and his time . Berlin, 1907
  • From China's Gods - Travel to China . Munich, 1920
  • The masks of the Japanese stage - Nō and Kyōgen . Hamburg, 1925

literature

Hartmut Walravens (Ed.): Friedrich Perzyński: Life - Work - Letters . Wagner Edition, 2005, ISBN 978-3-937283-09-8

Web links
personal data
SURNAME Perzyński, Friedrich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Author, art collector
DATE OF BIRTH August 20, 1877
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin , German Empire
DATE OF DEATH August 11, 1965
Place of death Buenos Aires , Argentina