Gerhard Löbenberg

Gerhard Löbenberg (born September 14, 1891 in Gemkenthal ; † August 19, 1967 ) was a German hunting and game painter . He studied at the art academies in Königsberg (Prussia) and Berlin . His father was the forester Luis Adolf Löbenberg. He found his first motifs as a child, as he grew up in a forester's house in Gemkenthal, a district of Altenau in the Harz Mountains. He published his first drawing at the age of 18 in the magazine Wild und Hund . In addition to bears and wild boars , red deer in particular were the game species he liked to paint. On the website of the East Prussian State Museum , which dedicated an exhibition to him in 2004, it can be read that he “knew like no other how to work out the individual physiognomy of the deer. Numerous other animal species give an impression of his great attention to detail and power of observation ”.

But shadows also fell on the work of Löbenberg, who made a name for himself as the “house and court painter” of the Reichsmarschall and Reichsjägermeister Hermann Göring during the National Socialist era . Göring is said to have been particularly enthusiastic about the idealized portrayal of himself as a portrait (1939) and gave Löbenberg further commissions. In the Rominter Heide , which had become the state hunting ground, Löbenberg painted most of the deer motifs, mostly based on the trophies. However, he always depicted the animals in their natural habitat. For this, the prostrate animals were sometimes attached to wooden supports in order to be able to reproduce them in a natural position. The famous Göring portrait, which was often sent in postcard form in the German Reich, also comes from Löbenberg. Göring made Löbenberg a consultant for the art of hunting and exhibition at the Reichsjagdamt. In this function he organized the International Hunting Exhibition in Berlin in autumn 1937. In recognition of his services in this regard, Gerhard Löbenberg was awarded the title of honorary professor on January 30, 1938 .

Löbenberg was expropriated in 1945 and fled to the west. There he was able to move into a forester's house with the support of friends and continue his artistic work. When Gerhard Löbenberg died on August 19, 1967, his oeuvre comprised around 2,000 works.

literature

• Christoph Hinkelmann , Jörn Barfod, Hartmut MF Syskowski: Nature and hunting in the painting of Gerhard Löbenberg , based on an exhibition in the East Prussian State Museum (March 6th - October 24th, 2003). Neumann-Neudamm, Melsungen 2004. ISBN 3-7888-0901-9

Web links

• Portrait of Reichsjägermeister Goering, 1939
• Portrait and pictures
• Literature by and about Gerhard Löbenberg in the catalog of the German National Library