Hanns Hubertus Count von Merveldt

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Hanns Hubertus Graf von Merveldt (born March 24, 1901 in Coesfeld , † October 6, 1969 in Hamburg ) was a German painter .

After graduating from high school and a year-long apprenticeship as a painter, Hanns Hubertus Graf von Merveldt began studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in Karlsruhe in 1921 , where he was a master student of August Babberger (1885–1936), whose basic artistic attitude was influenced by his teacher Augusto Giacometti by orienting himself towards Ferdinand Hodler , Cuno Amiet and the artists of the bridge , in particular Ernst Ludwig Kirchner .

In terms of art history, von Merveldt belongs to the Lost Generation and Expressive Realism .

Berlin years

After graduating, Merveldt settled in Berlin as a freelance artist. He quickly got the opportunity to exhibit one of his works, and he made the acquaintance of Franz Hartmann (1886–1955), the secretary of the Berlin Secession , who supported him financially from 1927.

In 1926 and 1927 the artist made two trips to Italy and then settled in Paris for four years. In 1930 he returned to Berlin for a short time and was represented with three works at the autumn exhibition of the Berlin Secession. After participating in an exhibition in the Künstlerhaus in Bellevuestrasse in January 1931, Merveldt took part in the annual exhibition of the Prussian Academy of the Arts . This participation in the exhibition and many others helped the artist to become increasingly well known in the near future. In 1932 he finally won the “Great State Prize” of the Berlin Academy. 1932/33 stay in the Villa Massimo in Rome, which he had to break off prematurely because of an assault on his painter colleague Felix Nussbaum .

At the autumn exhibition of the Prussian Academy of the Arts in 1935 , Merveldt was represented with the picture “Night on the Quay”. For this work he received the art prize in the same year on the occasion of the annual exhibition of the Westphalian Art Association in Münster. In addition, an invitation came from Pittsburgh to take part in the International Exhibition of Contemporary Painting at the Carnegie Institute, which placed him in line with the artists Otto Dix , Karl Hofer , Max Pechstein , Georg Schrimpf and Werner Scholz , who were also invited . Merveldt was represented at this international exhibition for another four years and then again in 1950. In 1944, as a major, Merveldt fulfilled the task of recording naval stations on the West Wall on canvas. During the Nazi era, Merveldt's art was sometimes referred to as degenerate from 1937 onwards .

post war period

In the summer of 1948 Merveldt moved to Hamburg. In the period that followed, a series of pictures with motifs from the Port of Hamburg was created there. In the same year, his first solo exhibition after the war took place in the “Galerie der Jugend” in Hamburg. This was followed by exhibitions at the Secession in Munich and, again in Hamburg, a group exhibition with post-expressionist art, among others. a. with Hofer, Pechstein, Heckel, Mueller and Hagedorn.

Between 1958 and 1964, Merveldt took part in numerous exhibitions. During this time he stayed frequently in Spain and finally withdrew from the exhibition business, which was now dominated by abstract painting.

Merveldt Gallery in Lembeck Castle

A new gallery with pictures of the painter was set up in the basement of the manor house of Lembeck Castle ; Hans Hubertus Graf von Merveldt comes from a branch line of the castle owners' family. The permanent exhibition shows a cross-section of his work. Merveldt, like others before him, was fascinated by the abundance of light and the colors of the south, which can be found in many of his still lifes, figurative compositions and portraits and which contrast with the subdued colors of the north.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Rainer Zimmermann: Expressive Realism. Painting of the Lost Generation , Hirmer, Munich 1994, p. 415
  2. ↑ The Villa Massimo scholarship holders from 1913 to 2014 ( memento of the original from November 21, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been 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.villamassimo.de
  3. ↑ s. Jobst Knigge : The Villa Massimo in Rome 1933–1943. Struggle for artistic independence. Humboldt University, Berlin 2013, p. 29f ( online , PDF; 26.3 MB)
  4. ↑ Temporary Art Calendar Online (accessed on January 2, 2012)

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Merveldt, Hanns Hubertus Graf von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Merveldt, Hanns Hubertus von
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German painter
DATE OF BIRTH March 24, 1901
PLACE OF BIRTH Coesfeld
DATE OF DEATH October 6, 1969
Place of death Hamburg