Heinz Schubert (artist)

Portrait of Heinz Schubert. In the background there are paintings on the wall that depict the castle and hood lock in Kempten.

Heinz Schubert (born October 7, 1912 in Zwettnitz, Austria-Hungary [today Světice, municipality Bystřany , Czech Republic]; † August 26, 2001 in Kempten (Allgäu) , Germany ) was a German-Bohemian , Czechoslovak and German painter, graphic artist and draftsman. After being a prisoner of war, Schubert came to Kempten as a freelancer in 1947 and worked there as such until the end of his life. Numerous books contain hundreds of illustrations by Schubert using different techniques. His repertoire includes pencil drawings, lithographs , zinc etchings , watercolors, pen drawings and works made of tempera and chalk, some of which are mixed media.

Life

In 1930, Schubert graduated from high school . He then studied architecture at the German Technical University (DTH) and the fine arts at Karl Ferdinand University in the Czechoslovak capital, Prague . After the first state examination, Schubert initially remained an employee at the DTH and then taught as a drawing teacher at a Prague high school. In 1939 he married Josefine (1911–2009), who had a doctorate in prehistory , whom he met in the city they were studying. In 1941 daughter Ulrike was born.

In 1942 he was called up for military service and was wounded in US captivity in 1944, during which he was forced to work underground in a Belgian coal mine for two years . After his release, he came to Kempten (Allgäu) in 1947 through his war comrade Engelbert Albrecht from the pilgrimage site of Heiligkreuz , who was a teacher . Schubert's wife, who meanwhile lived in Thuringia , learned through an earlier contact from Prague that her husband was still alive. In Kempten he reunited with his family and found a new place of work as a freelance artist. Schubert's family lived in a small wooden house on Mariaberg near the Kalbsangsttobel near Kempten, initially in a confined space with the Scholz family. The teacher and draftsman Udo Scholz was a former student colleague of the Schubert family in Prague. He was the father of the future geologist Herbert Scholz, the main author of the standard work Bau und Werden der Allgäuer Landschaft , to which Udo Scholz also contributed numerous drawings. In 1948, Heinz Schubert met the historian and book author Alfred Weitnauer and introduced him directly to his work from his new home in the Allgäu .

At times he was employed there as an art teacher at various schools. In 1954, Schubert was elected honorary chairman of the professional association of visual artists Schwaben-Süd, which he co-founded and based in Kempten. He held this honorary position until 1979, that is for 25 years. During this time Schubert set up a social fund for artists, whose statutes served as a model for other similarly oriented institutions in Bavaria.

The illustrator died in Kempten in the summer of 2001 at the age of 89. Schubert was buried in the central cemetery in Kempten , the place where he was involved in the artistic design of the funeral hall until 1970. In 2007 his widow Josefine Schubert gave 113 of his works to the Heimatverein Kempten .

In 2012 an exhibition of his works in Kempten commemorated his 100th birthday. A committee of the Kempten City Council decided in 2015 to name the square ( Zumsteinwiese ) south of the Zumsteinhaus as Heinz-Schubert-Platz .

Works

Heinz-Schubert-Platz: The water basin at the Zumsteinhaus in April 2015

Water basin on Heinz-Schubert-Platz

Schubert painted architecture and city views. As a graphic artist, he illustrated a large number of books, sound carriers ( records and CD covers) as well as postcards and greeting cards . He was still drawing Prague in the 1980s, and most of his drawings in Prague were lost. Schubert also made motifs from Switzerland . One of his favorite motifs was the St. Lorenz Basilica in Kempten. He documented numerous historical, meanwhile demolished buildings in Kempten. For this reason, his drawings are seen as valuable contemporary documentation.

The illustrated books include those by Alfred Weitnauer , Else Eberhard-Schobacher , Peter Dörfler and Arthur Maximilian Miller . Furthermore, 200 postcard views, which appeared in several series from 1980, are part of his work. They cover a wide range of places, besides Kempten and the Allgäu, other corners of Swabia are captured in these postcards. Schubert did not produce any photographic work.

Mosaic basin on the later Heinz-Schubert-Platz

The water basin on Heinz-Schubert-Platz at Zumsteinhaus in Kempten was designed by Schubert and executed as a mosaic with thousands of pieces of glass by Helmut Görsch (1909–1991) . The year 1957 commemorates the foundation year of the 1959 basin. Shortly beforehand, the Kempten waterworks had developed a new water supply system. This largely halted the water supply bottleneck in the growing city that had been identified years earlier. The mosaic shows amphoras , drinking vessels and Roman coins with portraits of the Roman emperors Nero , Vespasian , Mark Aurel , Antoninus Pius and Publius Aelius Hadrianus . The Roman theme builds a bridge to Cambodunum , the ancient predecessor city. The statement "Aqua civitas principium" ( Latin for "water is the beginning of every community") is written on an amphora . The mosaic basin on the square is complemented by eight round fountain basins. The water comes from the Calgeerpark .

Etched zinc plates as a book illustration

The Zinkätzung was an art technology and classic printing, with the modern offset printing is extinct. Etching in zinc plates resulted in a printing form with which illustrations in books were possible in larger editions. Only single-color motifs were possible for zinc etchings, which initially limited Schubert's artistic diversity, as he later reflected: “Working with the completely new material, which was brittle and tough and focused more on improvisation than attention to detail, required a corresponding topic , which was in the bizarre-fantastic range. [...] The relentless black and white, which knew no half or quarter tones, was the basic substance of every sheet on which something had to be emphasized again and again. "

Schubert continued to deal with zinc etchings until he finally succeeded in practical application in 1969. The historian and district administrator Alfred Weitnauer was initially skeptical when it came to illustrations in this production process for his new history book trilogy Allgäuer Chronik . Schubert was later able to convince him, so that the first volume from 1969 contained over 200 pictures etched in zinc. In the second volume from 1971 there are 224 and in the third volume from 1972 exactly 223 illustrations using this technique.

In 1980 Schubert finished his work with etched zinc plates. The Kösel-Verlag , founded in Kempten in 1593 , where numerous publications with Schubert's participation had been printed, discontinued the classic printing technique with lead letters that year . In future, Kösel only used offset printing to reproduce. A large part of these plates was destroyed in the 1999 flood of the Iller .

Books with graphics and illustrations

A selection of illustrated publications in which Schubert played a key role. This also includes book and dust jacket.

• Cherubin and the lieutenant. A novella from Prague. (by Emil Franzel ) Steirische Verlagsanstalt, Graz 1941. (10 text illustrations)
• Allgäu legends. (by Hermann Endrös and Alfred Weitnauer ) Verlag des Heimatpflegers von Schwaben, Kempten 1954 (126 illustrations)
• The Bavarians and the Swabians. (by Alfred Weitnauer ) various editions
• Swabians are people too. (by Alfred Weitnauer ) various editions
• Allgäu trilogy (3 volumes by Peter Dörfler 1934–1936 published, various editions, from the 1950s with works by Schubert)
  • The necessary
  • The master
  • The alp king
• The papal trip through Swabia. (by Peter Dörfler ) various editions
• Carlsbad . Callwey-Verlag, Munich 1980, ISBN 978-3-7667-0509-9
• Images, graphics, texts. (Catalog on the occasion of the Hofgartensaal exhibition of the professional association of visual artists) Allgäuer Zeitungsverlag, Kempten 1987
• Kempten: Colored drawings and sketches. Brack-Verlag, Altusried 1997, ISBN 3-930323-10-9
• 77 illustrations: From Swabian books and the "Beautiful Allgäu". Allgäuer Zeitungsverlag, Kempten, without a year

Fonts

• Art in the Allgäu after 1945. In: Allgäuer Geschichtsfreund , No. 90, Kempten 1990.
• Obituary for a graphic technique: zinc etching. In: Allgäuer Geschichtsfreund , No. 102, Kempten 2002.

Awards (selection)

In his more than 50 years of creative time in Kempten, Schubert received numerous prizes. Heinz Schubert received the Federal Cross of Merit with ribbon on the proposal of the Bavarian Prime Minister Franz Josef Strauss on July 22, 1986 by the Minister of Education, Hans Maier . In 1997 Schubert received the Johannes Medal from the Friends of the Kempten Museums , which purchases works from the region internationally for local museums .

• 1953: Art Prize of the City of Kempten (Allgäu)
• 1968: Art Prize of the District of Swabia (on the occasion of the Great Swabian Art Exhibition in Augsburg)
• 1986: Federal Cross of Merit on ribbon
• 1987: Merit Medal of the Swabian District
• 1992: Great Golden Residence Medal of the City of Kempten (Allgäu)
• 1997: Merkur bust of the city of Kempten (Allgäu)

Exhibitions (selection)

• 1981: book graphic
• 1987: Solo exhibition in the Kempten residence
• 1992: Scriptures in the Irsee Monastery
• 1998: Pictures from the moon drawer in Kempten
• 2002: 24th Ostallgäu art exhibition in Marktoberdorf ( posthumous )
• 2007: known and unknown in Kempten (posthumously)
• 2012: 100 years of Heinz Schubert in Kempten (posthumous)
• 2017: Picturesque forays through Kempten in Kempten (posthumous)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Susanne Kustermann: Strolling with Heinz Schubert: A visit to the gallery in Kempten's city history. In: Kreisbote.de, October 11, 2017 (accessed March 11, 2018)
2. ↑ ^{a b} Andrea Kiechle, Jochen König: A valuable person and a wonderful artist. In: The beautiful Allgäu. AVA-Verlag, Kempten 2007. Note: Journal, exact edition unknown.
3. ^ Rudolf Musik: Biographical Notes. In: Heinz Schubert. Images, graphics, texts. (Catalog Schwäbische Kulturtage), 1987, no p.
4. ^ Ralf Lienert : Schubert works for Heimatverein. In: all-in.de, August 3, 2007 (accessed April 19, 2018)
5. ↑ Irmgard Rampp: Furious variety In: Allgäuer Zeitung, October 2, 2012.
6. ↑ Naming of the square south of the Zumsteinhaus in "Heinz-Schubert-Platz" In: ratsinfo.kempten.de (accessed on March 11, 2018)
7. ^ Bernard Kühling: Allgäuer Künstlerlexikon . 1st edition. Kempten 2012, p. 324.
8. ↑ Thomas Schafroth: Kemptener Brunnen. Declaration of love to a city. Dannheimer, Kempten 2015, ISBN 978-3-88881-076-3 .
9. ↑ ^{a b c} Heinz Schubert †: Obituary for a graphic technique: zinc etching. In: Allgäuer Geschichtsfreund , No. 102, Kempten 2002, pp. 11-14.
10. ^ Information from the Ordenskanzlei of the Federal President's Office in March 2018.
11. ↑ Michael Dumler: Great artist, hardworking chronicler. In: Lindauer Zeitung, September 16, 2017, p. 23.
12. ↑ It's still a long way from imagining itself. In: all-in.de, October 7, 2002 (accessed March 11, 2018)

literature

• Ulrich Netzer as Lord Mayor: Heinz Schubert - an obituary. In: Allgäuer Geschichtsfreund , No. 101, Kempten 2001.
• Heinz Schubert. Images, graphics, texts. (Catalog Schwäbische Kulturtage), 1987.
• Rudolf music: Heinz Schubert: painter, graphic artist and illustrator. Agrar-Verlag, Kempten 1977.

Web links

• Holdings “Heinz Schubert” in the catalog of the Kempten City Library
• Catalog of works by Heinz Schubert until 1987 on Wikimedia Commons (illustrations, dust jackets, bindings, artist cards)