Hanuš Schwaiger

Hanuš Schwaiger

Hanuš Johann Peter Paul Schwaiger (born June 28, 1854 in Jindřichův Hradec , † June 17, 1912 in Prague ) was a Czech painter, graphic artist and teacher.

Life

Aquarius (1886), Kooperativa Collection

Hanuš Schwaiger around 1911

Schwaiger was the only son of a Jewish family of six. His father was a wealthy iron trader, and his mother, who was five years his senior, also came from a family of wholesalers. As a child he was very sensitive, attended grammar school in Neuhaus (Jindřichův Hradec) from 1865, but left it after a few years because of below-average performance and switched to secondary school in Budweis . Here the performance continued to decline, but he found a supporter in his art teacher. In 1873 he began studying at the Vienna Commercial Academy at the request of his father . The love for painting that his teacher had aroused in him in the meantime was stronger, however, and he attended the local art academy. The parents then brought him back to Neuhaus and employed him in their own company. But here, too, Schwaiger continued to pursue his hobby. As soon as the father was out of the house, he retired to the attic and painted.

In 1874, despite resistance from the family, he returned to Vienna and attended the KK Academy of Fine Arts . There were always arguments with his father, who finally financed his studies. His first cycle of ink drawings was bought by Professor Hans Makart , who helped Schwaiger gain financial independence for a while. In spring 1881 he left the academy and returned to Neuhaus, indebted and penniless. He has been illustrating fairy tales since 1883. In 1888 Schwaiger visited the Netherlands . This was followed by pictures and sketches of Dutch cities and architecture. His style had also changed. Influenced by the humid sea climate, his lines took on softer shapes. In 1889 he accepted an invitation from the painter Joža Úprka to come to Moravian Slovakia . During his journey through the country in 1890 in Hroznová Lhota, he met his partner, the teacher Jožka Kučerová, whom he married on February 4, 1891. In the same year he had to leave the area again because his creditors probably tracked him down. At the suggestion of his wife, they moved to Bistritz am Hostein . For a while they were housed in a forester's lodge by Baron Loudon, but even here the income was mostly insufficient to fill an empty stomach. In 1896 Schwaiger visited Belgium and Holland again, then Italy . There he was given the task of copying frescoes from the Santuario della Madonna di Lourdes monastery in Verona . On September 19, 1899, he accepted a teaching position at the newly founded Technical University of Brno . He didn't enjoy the work. In addition, his creditors tracked him down again. The writer Josef Svatopluk Machar helped him out of the situation and paid off his debts. Before the turn of the century, Schwaiger received a major order from the Thonet brothers . He created six watercolors from life in the factory, which were presented to the public at the World Exhibition in Paris . In 1902 the Schwaigers moved to Prague and Hanuš accepted the position of professor at the AVU . His famous students included Otakar Kubín , František Xaver Naske , František Hlavica , Václav Rabas , Rudolf Kremlička , Oldřich Blažíček , Jan Pašek .

In 1906 he fell ill with a pernicious (malignant) tumor of the tongue, had a successful operation and visited the Netherlands with his wife. After a few years the disease came back, he had repeated operations and some of his tongue was cut out. After the last operation, in which his tongue was completely removed, he never left the hospital bed.

Works

Old Dutch masters had the greatest influence on Schweiger, but also the Dutch landscape, its craftsmen and daily life. The move to the village of Rusava in Moravian Wallachia motivated him to create numerous landscape oil paintings. In addition, he created numerous fairy tale and book illustrations .

• 1879 Indian ink drawings Pied Piper (Krysař).
• 1881 watercolor Eternal Jew (Věčný Žid)
• 1881 Baptist (Novokřtěnci)
• 1883 Man is there (Člověk je tu)
• 1885 Rübezahl (Krakonoš) and illustrations for fairy tales by Wilhelm Hauff.
• 1886 Aquarius
• 1892 St. George fresco at the castle in Průhonice
• 1896 lithograph Cyrill and Method
• 1897 Long, broad and sharp-sighted

literature

• V. Kratinová:  Schwaiger, Hanuš (Johann Peter). In: Austrian Biographical Lexicon 1815–1950 (ÖBL). Volume 11, Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Vienna 1999, ISBN 3-7001-2803-7 , p. 414.
• Hanuš Schwaiger. 1854-1912 . Státni Galerie, Cheb 1999, ISBN 80-85016-46-X .
• Miloš Jiránek : Hanuš Schwaiger. S podobiznou od M. Švabinského a 16 přilohami . Mánes, Prague 1912 (Zlatoroh; 13).
• Dariusz Kacprzak u. a .: The first version of the “Anabaptists of Münster” by Hanuš Schwaiger in the Muzeum Sztuki in Lodz . In: Bulletin of the National Gallery in Prague , Vol. 14/15 (2005), pp. 125-133. (Text in Czech and German).
• Miroslav Lamač : Hanuš Schwaiger . SNKL, Prague 1957 (České dějiny; 24).

Web links

Commons : Hanuš Schwaiger  - collection of images, videos and audio files