Hildegard Domizlaff

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Hildegard Domizlaff (born January 26, 1898 in Erfurt , † February 22, 1987 in Cologne-Müngersdorf ; full name Hildegard Natalie Martha Helene Domizlaff ) was a German sculptor , medalist , woodcut and jewelry artist who lived and worked in Cologne . Her mostly religious works of art and works created for the religious rite have been created since 1927.

family

Hildegard Domizlaff's father was Georg Domizlaff (born June 14, 1854 in Soest ; † October 28, 1937 in Leipzig ), President of the Leipzig Post Office , field postmaster in the First World War , her mother Anna Catharina Domizlaff née. Boeter (born December 10, 1866 in Hamburg-Eppendorf , † 1944 in Murnau am Staffelsee ). She had two brothers: Hans Domizlaff (1892–1971), advertising consultant and writer in Hamburg , and Helmuth Domizlaff (1902–1983), antiquarian in Munich .

biography

Hildegard Domizlaff's first artistic works - initially drawings - were created in Leipzig around 1916 . One of the first portrait busts depicts one of her brothers. She began to grapple with Catholicism and in Leipzig joined the circle around Ilse von Stach and Martin Wackernagel . Immediately after the First World War, Domizlaff made a portrait bust of Stachs. Wackernagel, who was head of the Leipziger Kunstverein at the time , saw the busts and took them up in exhibitions. Max Klinger appraised her first work and advised her to pursue an artistic career.

In the middle of 1918 she began training at the Academy in Weimar in the sculpture class of Richard Engelmann , a Rodin student. She belonged to the first generation of female artists in Germany who were officially allowed to attend an art college. Hildegard Domizlaff experienced her stay at the Weimar Academy in a phase of upheaval: Walter Gropius took over the management of the University of Fine Arts, including the former School of Applied Arts in Weimar and the "Staatliche Bauhaus" . Her studies in Weimar were short-lived.

After she came of age at the age of 21, she converted to the Catholic faith in the spring of 1919, whereupon her parents withdrew her financial basis for further studies. Max Klinger helped her get a place at the Hamburg School of Applied Arts with Richard Luksch , who came from the Vienna Secession . His wife Elena Luksch-Makowsky was a well-known Hamburg sculptor herself. Domizlaff received a studio there as an exceptional student.

At the beginning of 1922 she moved to Soest , her father's hometown , where a small community of Expressionist painters had settled. Her first successes at exhibitions gave her economic independence.

After a short stopover in Leipzig, Hildegard Domizlaff moved to Münster in 1923 . Martin Wackernagel was full professor of art history at the Westphalian Wilhelms University . In Münster, Theodor Däubler , who was already a friend of the Domizlaff family in Leipzig, joined the circle around Wackernagel and his wife, the writer Ilse von Stach. In the years from 1919 to 1924 she made several trips through Germany, Italy and later to Greece. In 1924 she stayed in Paris for a long time.

In the mid-1920s, Hildegard Domizlaff made contact with Franz Xaver Münch and his friend Peter Wust , the “Philosopher of Münster”, and with them began a long-term, fruitful discussion, particularly on questions of liturgy design. The first large artistic works for church clients date from this time: the war memorial for the church in Esch near Cologne from 1925 and the Sacred Heart Altar in the church in Weiler near Cologne from 1926.

In 1927 Hildegard Domizlaff finally moved the center of her life to Cologne, where she first moved into an apartment with Helen Wiehen . From 1929/1930 she and Helen Wiehen settled in the residential and studio house in Cologne-Müngersdorf, designed by Theodor Merrill according to the needs of the two artists. With Gerhard Marcks they had an intensive friendship and a lively correspondence since 1938, which lasted until 1953 when Marcks and his wife settled in a studio in Müngersdorf due to the constant efforts of Hildegard Domizlaff.

From the beginning of the Second World War she lived secluded in her house in Müngersdorf and devoted herself to her work on woodcuts for the Bible. A large part of Hildegard Domizlaff's works was lost in the Second World War. She got her first orders after the war from the Catholic Church. She designed and created liturgical equipment, episcopal insignia and designed interiors of churches, e.g. B. from St. Engelbert in Cologne-Riehl , St. Stephan in Cologne-Lindenthal and the Münsterkirche in Essen .

She turned to ivory carving and the design and execution of jewelry and ecclesiastical insignia. By the early 1980s she had created numerous small-format reliefs , the motifs of which she drew from her studies of nature. One of her last works was an eagle sculpture made from cast bronze for the ambo of the Mater Dolorosa parish church in Berlin-Lankwitz .

Hildegard Domizlaff died in February 1987 at the age of 89 in her studio house. She was buried in the Müngersdorf cemetery.

In a memory of Hildegard Domizlaff, Joachim Cardinal Meisner wrote : "Her profound theological knowledge and her keen perception of the often hidden causes for the ecclesiastical and social present made the encounters with Hildegard Domizlaff interesting, often uncomfortable, but always positive."

The studio house is now a listed building and was acquired in 1989 by the Cologne auctioneer Henrik Hanstein, who had it renovated in order to make it available to an artist - according to Hildegard Domizlaff's will.

literature

  • Ingrid Leonie Severin: Hildegard Domizlaff 1898–1987. Archbishop's Diocesan Museum, Cologne 1998.
  • Peter Sumerauer, Carmen Zotta: Hildegard Domizlaff. An artist in the field of tension between Catholic faith and self-assertion. In: Mühlrad, Schulbank and Carrière. History and family traditions of the Domizlaff from Pomerania and Prussia. Tübingen 2003, ISBN 3-89308-360-X , pp. 475-484.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f Eduard Prüssen (linocuts), Werner Schäfke and Günter Henne (texts): Cologne heads . 1st edition. University and City Library, Cologne 2010, ISBN 978-3-931596-53-8 , pp. 82 .
  2. ^ Hans Jürgen Brandt, Karl Hengst : History of the Archdiocese of Paderborn. Vol. 4: The Diocese of Paderborn 1930–2010. Bonifatius-Verlag, Paderborn 2014, ISBN 978-3-89710-004-6 , p. 412.
  3. ↑ Ambo , Mater Dolorosa (Berlin-Lankwitz) , accessed on March 17, 2017.
  4. ^ Hans M. Schmidt : The last signature. Graves of German artists of the 20th century. (=  Writings on art history . Volume 53 ). Publishing house Dr. Kovač , Hamburg 2015, ISBN 978-3-8300-8156-2 , p. 102 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Domizlaff, Hildegard
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Domizlaff, Hildegard Natalie Martha Helene (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German sculptor, woodcut and jewelry artist
DATE OF BIRTH January 26, 1898
PLACE OF BIRTH Erfurt
DATE OF DEATH February 22, 1987
Place of death Cologne-Müngersdorf