Henri Oedenkoven

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Henri Oedenkoven and his lover Ida Hofmann (1903)
Ida Hofmann-Oedenkoven, Lotte Hattemer, Henri Oedenkoven in the winter of 1902/1903

Henri Oedenkoven (* 1875 in Antwerp , † 1935 in São Paulo ) was a co-founder of the alternative settlement project Monte Verità in Ascona .

Life

Henri Oedenkoven was the son of a wealthy industrialist, Louis Oedenkoven, from Antwerp and a businessman by profession. In 1899 he met the pianist Ida Hofmann during a stay at Arnold Rikli's naturopathic facility in Veldes and then lived with her in free marriage . Together with five other people, they founded “Monte Verità” in Ascona in 1900, which was expanded into a vegetarian center, mainly with Oedenkoven's family fortune . The spiritually interested Oedenkoven managed the sanatorium. From 1914 he took part in the meetings of the Ordo Templi Orientis founded by Theodor Reuss . During the first years of the war he met his future wife, the Englishwoman Isabelle Adderley, with whom he had three children. In 1920 he, his wife Isabella and Ida Hofmann left Monte Verità and tried to set up another vegetarian colony in Spain, later in Brazil, but this failed after a short time due to the poor climatic conditions.

His grandfather of the same name Henri Oedenkoven (1823–1871) was an industrialist and politician.

literature

  • Andreas Schwab: Monte Verita. Sanatorium of longing. Orell Füssli Verlag, Zurich, 2003.
  • Robert Landmann: Ascona - Monte Veritá. In search of paradise. Huber Verlag, 2009.
  • Ulrike Voswinckel: Free love and anarchy: Schwabing - Monte Verita. Drafts against the established life. Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-86906-027-9 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ulrike Voswinckel, 2009, pp. 13-14.
  2. ↑ Ulrike Voswinckel, 2009, p. 148.
  3. ↑ Stefan Bollmann: Monte Verità - 1900, the dream of an alternative life begins. 2017. Preview (pdf)
personal data
SURNAME Oedenkoven, Henri
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Founder of the Monte Verità artists' colony
DATE OF BIRTH 1875
PLACE OF BIRTH Antwerp
DATE OF DEATH 1935
Place of death São Paulo