Gustav Adolf Koettgen

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Self-portrait of Gustav Adolf Koettgens 1838/1844

Gustav Adolf Koettgen , also Köttgen (born May 9, 1805 in Langenberg , † November 13, 1882 in Düsseldorf-Pempelfort ), was a German painter and member of the Communist Correspondence Committee .

Life

Gustav Adolf Koettgen was a son of the businessman, manufacturer and writer Johann Adolph Koettgen (born May 28, 1777 in Neviges ; † October 15, 1838 in Langenberg) and Helene Koettgen , née. Theegarten (* 1781 in Solingen , † 1846 in Langenberg). From 1822 he studied at the Royal Art Academy in Düsseldorf . His teachers were Peter von Cornelius and Heinrich Christoph Kolbe . Like his friend Wilhelm Kaulbach , he went to Munich to study further in 1827. On October 2, 1827, he enrolled there at the Academy of Fine Arts. Here he met Heinrich Heine , among others, at the art association and turned away from Langenberg's pietistic milieu. During his studies and also later he created many portraits of his parents and relatives. From around 1833 he worked as a successful portrait painter in Elberfeld , Solingen and Cologne . He created portraits of members of the Bergisch entrepreneurial families such as Jung , Boeddinghaus , Hecker and Pottgießer .

On February 8, 15 and 22, 1845, Koettgen applied to the Lord Mayor of Elberfeld , Johann Adolf von Carnap , for meetings in the "Zweibrücker Hof". It was the first public communist meeting in Germany. Koettgen acted as "President", Moses Hess and Friedrich Engels appeared as speakers. 40 to 200 people were present, including Hugo Wesendonk , Hermann Püttmann and Wolfgang Müller von Königswinter . Engels spoke on February 8th about competition and communist society and on February 15th about the protective tariff system. His “Description of the Communist Settlements that have emerged and still exist in recent times” was planned for a further, then forbidden meeting. The meeting also caused a sensation with the Prussian Interior Minister von Arnim .

On May 24, 1846, Koettgen wrote “On behalf of several communists in the Wuppertal” to Friedrich Engels. The Communist Correspondence Committee replied to his letter and urged him and his like-minded people to take action and to support the Brussels Committee through word and deed . According to Engels' testimony, Koettgen was still close friends with Moses Hess in 1847. In September 1845 Wilhelm Weitling wanted to visit him in Elberfeld. Koettgen remained an active member of the Communist League . Moses Hess had recruited him as a member.

In August 1845 he married Marie Auguste Adelgunde Lyra in Osnabrück . After the public appearance in Elberfeld, there were no portraits from entrepreneurs in the Rhineland. But there were job opportunities in Bremen. There Koettgen became a member of the General Workers 'Association and in April 1849 published the newspaper Association for the Representation of Workers' Interests. His wife was also politically active and founded the Democratic Women's Association in Bremen in 1849. Koettgen was arrested on May 6, 1849 at a people's meeting in Eystrup on May 6, 1849, and sentenced to two months' imprisonment because of the performance of his poem “Spring Song” with the closing line “The members are all equal and bread and work are rich in the red republic” . After serving his sentence, he was expelled from Bremen. The family went to Hamburg.

Koettgen became a popular and recognized member of the Hamburg Artists' Association from 1832 and created many portraits in Hamburg. However, he and his family were not given permanent residence permits. The third child Karl Friedrich was born in Hamburg and baptized on April 13, 1851 in the Hamburg Michel . Two of the five godparents, namely Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, were not present. Since the income from the sale of the pictures was not enough to support the growing family, Adelgunde Köttgen opened a photo studio together with Emilie Bieber in 1852. Koettgen took part in the permanent art exhibition in the casino in Elberfeld with numerous paintings in 1852 and 1853 .

On November 5, 1854, the family registered in Düsseldorf. Here Koettgen - like many other artists from the Düsseldorf School of Painting - became an active member of the Düsseldorf Paint Box . Contrary to repeated reports, Gustav Adolf Koettgen was never in Karlsbad . He is mistaken for his distant relative Gustav Köttgen from Barmen. Koettgen's painterly work remained largely unknown as it is largely in private hands. In August 1861 he painted his brother-in-law Justus Wilhelm Lyra in Düsseldorf . His copies of portraits of famous people, including Martin Luther , Johannes Calvin , Huldreich Zwingli , Philipp Melanchton , Alexander von Humboldt , Beethoven , Handel , Mozart , Heinrich von Gagern , Lajos Kossuth , Robert Blum and Wilhelm Adolph von Trützschler, caused a sensation . In 1863 he became a member of the General German Workers' Association . In 1867 Koettgen was sentenced to a fine of 20 thalers or 14 days in prison for a poem in the Social Democrat in Berlin. The only son in the family to reach adulthood became a businessman in London. In 1866 he visited Karl Marx in his apartment. Gustav Adolf Koettgen apologized for the young man who had not registered in advance in a letter to Marx. In 1879 his home was searched by the police. A letter from the well-known left-wing socialist Johann Most , which had not yet been opened , escaped the police by chance. The Socialist Law put an end to Gustav Adolf Koettgen's political activities.

family

Gustav Adolph Koettgen married Marie Auguste Adelgunde Lyra on August 17, 1845 in Osnabrück (born December 19, 1823 in Osnabrück; † April 2, 1909 in Düsseldorf ).

His children were:

  • Gustav Adolf August Wilhelm Julius Koettgen (born June 8, 1846 in Elberfeld, † 1924 in London)
  • Laura Adeline Adelgunde Auguste Koettgen (born August 31, 1848 in Bremen, † 1924 in Godesberg, married to the painter Johannes Gehrts )
  • Karl Friedrich Koettgen (born December 14, 1850 in Hamburg, † September 22, 1851 in Hamburg)
  • Auguste Koettgen (born May 25, 1853 in Hamburg, † 1924 in Bonn, singer)
  • Anna Mathilde Karoline Maria Koettgen (born September 19, 1855 in Düsseldorf, † June 8, 1901 in Düsseldorf, married to the painter Carl Gehrts )

Paintings and drawings

  • Luther, 1819
  • Zwingli, 1819
  • Self-portrait 1838/1844
  • Adolf Koettgen with his family
  • District Administrator Carl Theodor Graf Seyssel d'Aix
  • Lord Mayor Adolf von Carnap
  • Wedding picture by Julius Koettgen and Charlotte Müller, around 1843
  • Moses Hess, around 1844
  • Laura and Andreas, the painter's children, painting, signed and dated 1853, Focke-Museum , Bremen.

  • Johann Adolph Koettgen, the father

  • Helene Koettgen, the mother

  • Moses Hess

  • Happy round in Langenberg, with GA Koettgen, Julius F. Köttgen (front) and others

Works

  • Ed .: Association - magazine for all workers . Bremen April – June 1849 digitized
  • Poems, among others, in: The Spokesman or Rheinisch-Westphälischer Anzeiger, Wesel No. 5 from January 17, 1944 Scheidegrüße des Painter GA Köttgen; No. 29 of April 10, 1844 Nice deed; No. 44 of June 3, 1843 Courage of Faith and No. 48 of June 17, 1843 To my fellow believers
  • Poem Morgengruss in the Social Democrat from March 1, 1867, Berlin

literature

  • Eduard Koettgen (Ed.): History of the Koettgen Family 1632–1910. Düsseldorf undated
  • Hermann Püttmann (Ed.): Rhenish year books for social reform. Volume 1, Darmstadt 1945, p. 62 ff.
  • Walter Cohen : Koettgen, Gustav Adolf . In: Hans Vollmer (Hrsg.): General lexicon of fine artists from antiquity to the present . Founded by Ulrich Thieme and Felix Becker . tape 21 : Knip – Kruger . EA Seemann, Leipzig 1927, p. 195 .
  • Helmut Hirsch : Carnap's report on the Elberfeld assemblies. A document on the history of early Rhenish socialism . In: Bulletin of the IISG . Volume 8. Assen, Amsterdam 1953, pp. 104-114.
  • The League of Communists. Documents and materials 1836–1849. Volume 1. Dietz Verlag, Berlin 1970, pp. 210-211, 342-344, 351-353, 355, 1025, 1043.
  • Werner Biebusch: Revolution and coup. Constitutional struggles in Bremen 1848–1854 , Bremen 1973.
  • Michael Knieriem : Two unknown files about the Elberfeld assemblies in 1845. A contribution to the history of early Rhenish socialism . In: Mitteilungen des Stadtarchiv Wuppertal, 1 year, issue 1, April 1976, pp. 12-21.
  • Jürgen Reulecke : The first socialist meeting in Germany. An unknown eyewitness account. In: Journal of the Bergisches Geschichtsverein . 87th volume Ph. C. EW. Schmidt, Neustadt an der Aisch 1977, pp. 97-109.
  • Wolfgang Hütt : The Düsseldorf School of Painting 1819–1869. Seemann, Leipzig 1984, pp. 186, 190 and 285 f.
  • Michael Knieriem: Marx and Engels as godparents in 1851 . In: Yearbook of the IMSF 8 . Frankfurt am Main 1985, pp. 270-274, digitized .
  • Ilsetraut Lindemann: Gustav Adolf Köttgen 1805–1882. Democratic revolutionary and painter of the portrait of JW Lyra. In: Osnabrücker Mitteilungen Volume 93, Osnabrück 1988, pp. 91-102.
  • Carsten Roth: Gustav Adolf Köttgen . In: Hans Paffrath (Ed.): Lexicon of the Düsseldorfer Malerschule 1819–1918. Volume 2: Haach – Murtfeldt. Published by the Kunstmuseum Düsseldorf in the Ehrenhof and by the Paffrath Gallery. Bruckmann, Munich 1998, ISBN 3-7654-3010-2 , p. 227 f.
  • Horst Heidermann : Gustav Adolf Köttgen. A painter from Düsseldorf between art and politics . In: Düsseldorfer Jahrbuch (79). 2009, pp. 203-257.
  • Horst Heidermann: marginal notes on Gustav Adolf Köttgen. In: Düsseldorfer Jahrbuch (84) 2014. pp. 155–180.

Web links

Commons : Gustav Adolph Koettgen  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Koettgen's place of death, Nordstrasse 100, is now part of the Pempelfort district of Düsseldorf . For information on house numbers, see Michael Knieriem: Marx and Engels as godparents in 1851. p. 274.
  2. ↑ The spelling of first names and surnames is based on the spellings in church records.
  3. ^ Matriculation AdBK Munich
  4. ^ Wolfgang Hütt: Die Düsseldorfer Malerschule 1819–1869. Seemann, Leipzig 1984, pp. 186, 190 and 285 f.
  5. ^ GA Koettgen to JA v. Carnap February 8, 1845. Printed in: Michael Knieriem: About Friedrich Engels. Private, public and official. Statements and testimonies from contemporaries . Wuppertal 1979, p. 106 ( News from Engels House 2)
  6. ↑ Jürgen Reuleke, p. 102.
  7. ^ "The first 40, the second 130, the third at least 200 people strong" Friedrich Engels to Karl Marx, February 22nd - March 7th, 1845. Marx-Engels complete edition . Department III. Volume 1, p. 267.
  8. ↑ Two speeches in Elberfeld . In: Marx-Engels-Werke Volume 2. pp. 536-548. Digitized version ( memento of the original from November 3, 2014 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. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.dearchiv.de
  9. ^ Marx-Engels works. Volume 2, pp. 549-557.
  10. ^ Marx-Engels works. Volume 2, pp. 521-535. Digitized version ( memento of the original from November 3, 2014 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. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.dearchiv.de
  11. ^ Letter from Armins dated May 15, 1845, printed by Jürgen Reulecke, p. 104.
  12. ↑ Marx-Engels Complete Edition. Department III. Volume 2, p. 814.
  13. ↑ Marx-Engels Complete Edition. Department III. Volume 2, p. 224.
  14. ^ Karl Marx , Friedrich Engels, Philippe-Charles Gigot and Wilhelm Wolff to Gustav Adolf Koettgen June 15, 1846. (Marx-Engels complete edition. Department III. Volume 2, pp. 12-16).
  15. ^ "Only Gustav Adolf Köttgen has remained loyal to him." (Friedrich Engels to Karl Marx January 15, 1847. In: Marx-Engels-Gesamtausgabe. Department III. Volume 2, p. 82).
  16. ^ Wilhelm Weitling to Moses Heß September 2, 1845 ( Edmund Silberner : Moses Hess. Briefwechsel . Mouton, s'Gravenshage 1959, p. 141 f.)
  17. ^ Wolfgang Hütt : Die Düsseldorfer Malerschule 1819–1869 . VEB EA Seemann Buch- und Kunstverlag, Leipzig 1984, p. 186
  18. ↑ Edith Laudowicz : Köttgen, Marie Auguste Adelgunde, b. Lyre . In: Frauen Geschichte (n) , Bremer Frauenmuseum (ed.). Edition Falkenberg, Bremen 2016, ISBN 978-3-95494-095-0 .
  19. ^ Association . Newspaper for all workers / general workers' association in Bremen ZDB -ID 1457788-4 , published from April 1 to June 30, 1849, then discontinued.
  20. ↑ Hamburg State Archives, Diary of the Hamburger Künstler-Verein inventory no. 614-1 / 34 (57) 1 volume 4 and 1 volume 5
  21. ↑ Michael Knieriem: Marx and Engels as godparents in 1851 , p. 273.
  22. ^ Heike Foth, photography as a woman's job, in: Rolf Herz and B. Bruns (eds.), Hof-Atelier Elvira 1887–1928, Munich 1985, pp. 153–170
  23. ↑ So z. B. Egon Erwin Kisch : Karl Marx in Karlsbad . Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 1953.
  24. ^ Gustav Lewy to Ferdinand Lassalle July 25, 1863.
  25. ^ International Institute for Social History Amsterdam, not yet published.
  26. ↑ City Archives Dusseldorf 6918 III: The social democratic 1878-1895 , Volume 1, pp 24, 32, 41..
  27. ↑ Eduard Köttgen: History of the Köttgen Family , Düsseldorf undated, p. 70.
  28. ↑ Bremer Frauenmuseum - portraits of women ( Memento of the original dated November 3, 2014 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. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.bremer-frauenmuseum.de
  29. ^ Ingrid Bosch (ed.), Sabine Schroyen: Carl Gehrts 1853, Hamburg - 1989 Bonn . Exhibition catalog Kunstmuseum Bonn 1994
personal data
SURNAME Koettgen, Gustav Adolf
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Koettgen, Gustav Adolph (baptismal name); Köttgen, Adolph; Koettgen, Adolf
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German painter, communist and social democrat
DATE OF BIRTH May 9, 1805
PLACE OF BIRTH Langenberg
DATE OF DEATH November 13, 1882
Place of death Düsseldorf-Pempelfort