Hans Wilhelm Auer

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Hans Wilhelm Auer

Hans Wilhelm Auer , also Hans Auer (born April 26, 1847 in Wädenswil , † August 30, 1906 in Constance ) was a Swiss architect . The son of a businessman studied at the Zurich Polytechnic with Gottfried Semper and at the Vienna Academy with Theophil von Hansen . From 1874 to 1883 he was in charge of the construction of the Vienna parliament building on behalf of Hansen , and from 1885 he was himself a professor. By far Auer's most famous building is the Bundeshaus in Bern : the east wing was built according to his plans from 1888 to 1892, and then from 1894 to 1902 the parliament building, which he designed as a Swiss national monument . In addition, Auer designed several buildings on behalf of the post office and railways, including the Lucerne train station . His daughter Grethe Auer (1871–1940) was a writer.

biography

Youth and Studies

Auer's parents were the businessman Johannes Auer from Sennwald and Emma Elisa Auer (née Henking), daughter of the silk and chemical manufacturer Heinrich Henking from Heidelberg . Hans Wilhelm was the oldest son and spent his childhood in Zurich . When he was 14 years old, his parents divorced. Two years earlier, the mother had moved to St. Gallen with her two sons . Hans Wilhelm Auer attended grammar school there , which he graduated from in 1863. He then completed an internship with a master builder in Riesbach near Zurich.

From 1865 Auer studied architecture at the Polytechnic, today's ETH Zurich . His lecturers included Wilhelm Lübke and Gottfried Kinkel , but the greatest influence was exercised by Gottfried Semper . Hans Konrad Pestalozzi was one of his fellow students . Auer joined the student union Neu-Zofingia , which was presided over by the later Federal Councilor Ludwig Forrer . In August 1868 he finished his studies as the best of his class, his diploma thesis was the design of a spa hotel in Bad Ragaz .

After completing his studies, Auer worked for a few months in the Schaffhausen City Planning Department . He moved to Vienna in October 1869 and enrolled at the Academy of Fine Arts . He decided to get further training from Theophil von Hansen , who ran a master school for ancient architecture. In doing so, he made a conscious decision against Friedrich von Schmidt , whose neo-Gothic style was viewed by the Semper students as outdated. Heinrich Henking, Auer's maternal grandfather, who was married to a Hungarian woman for the second time, also lived in Vienna. Auer fell in love with Maria Elisa Henking, his step-aunt, who was only four years older. After she became pregnant, he married her in early 1871.

From assistant to professor in Vienna

Hans Auer (approx. 1885)

Shortly after Auer had taken up his studies again, Hansen received by Emperor Franz Joseph I. the planning contract for several buildings, including the Parliament Building . In the spring of 1870, after just one semester, Auer joined Hansen's studio as an employee to support him. In addition, he wrote several articles on behalf of the art historian Karl von Lützow about the representative buildings under construction on Vienna's Ringstrasse , including those by other architects. In 1874 Hansen Auer took over the construction management for the parliament building and also made him a teaching assistant. He carried out these tasks over the next nine years. In 1877 Auer received the Golden Cross of Merit with Crown for his services , and in 1884 the Franz Joseph Order . Since Carl von Hasenauer was given preference in the appointment of Hansen's successor as a professor, Auer had to increasingly take part in architectural competitions, especially since he did not yet have a building of his own. With his designs, including the development of the Museum Island in Berlin , he initially had no success.

In 1885 Auer took second place behind Alfred Friedrich Bluntschli in the competition for the extension of the Federal Palace in Bern . While Bluntschli carried out a hierarchical weighting of the building parts according to the architectural theory prevailing at the time , Auer designed a symmetrical building complex, based on the Capitol in Washington, DC . The jury criticized the symmetry as functionally incomprehensible and particularly criticized the dome. In 1887, however, parliament overrode this decision and awarded the building contract to Auer. From 1885 to 1888 Auer worked as a professor at the State Trade School in Vienna. In 1886/87 the first building was built according to his plans, the Fürth sanatorium in Vienna-Josefstadt .

Activities in Switzerland

Letter from Hans Auer to the director of federal buildings (on the opening of the Federal Palace)

In March 1888, Auer moved his residence to Bern, and construction work began on the East Federal Palace six months later. Since Auer was not busy with this task, he took on numerous other obligations. He was a member of the Academic Art Committee of the Canton of Bern and the Bernese Art Society, was a member of the board of directors of the Bern City Theater and, from 1890, Associate Professor of Art History at the University of Bern . In 1891 he was elected by the Federal Council to the Federal Art Commission , to which he was a member until 1898, the last two years as President. Also in 1891 he built the fixed structures for the celebrations for the 700th anniversary of the founding of Bern.

Although the Bundeshaus Ost was completed in 1892, another two years passed before construction began on the parliament building. To bridge this waiting time, Auer carried out several orders for the post office and the railways. The station post office in Liestal was completed in 1892, and the main post office in Solothurn two years later (canceled in 1975). In 1896, after three years of construction, the Lucerne railway station was added, which he built for the Swiss Central Railway . The station burned down almost completely in 1971 and was replaced by a new building in 1990.

From 1894 onwards, Auer was largely involved in the construction of the parliament building, the central part of the Federal Palace. Auer's intention was to symbolically create all of Switzerland in the parliament building and thereby create a national monument . He enforced the almost exclusive use of Swiss building materials and obliged the artists he selected to adhere to the iconographic program. After eight years of construction, Auer's main work was completed. The University of Basel honored him with an honorary doctorate and the city of Bern as an honorary citizen for his services .

After the completion of the Federal Palace, Auer suffered increasingly from severe depression . One reason for this may be that the neo-renaissance style of the parliament building was increasingly seen as out of date and it therefore had to put up with some severe criticism. Apart from an extension to his house in Bern and taking part in the competition for the Peace Palace in The Hague , Auer did not find the strength for further projects. In April 1906 he was admitted to a sanatorium in Konstanz , where he died four months later at the age of 59.

Auers buildings

literature

  • Andreas Müller: The embittered federal building architect . Orell Füssli, Zurich 2002, ISBN 3-280-02822-1 .

Web links

Commons : Hans Wilhelm Auer  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Andreas Hauser: The Swiss Capitol. Neue Zürcher Zeitung , March 23, 2002, accessed on April 25, 2019 .
  2. ^ Andreas Hauser, Peter Röllin, Berchtold Weber: Bern . In: Inventory of modern Swiss architecture , 1850-1920: Cities . tape 2 . Orell Füssli, Zurich 1986, p. 390 .
personal data
SURNAME Auer, Hans Wilhelm
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss architect
DATE OF BIRTH April 26, 1847
PLACE OF BIRTH Waedenswil
DATE OF DEATH August 30, 1906
Place of death Constancy