Johann Heinrich Richartz
Johann Heinrich Richartz (born May 15, 1796 in Cologne ; † April 22, 1861 there ) was a German merchant and, as the founder of the first museum building for the Wallraf-Richartz Museum, an important patron .
biography
As the son of a Cologne merchant family, Johann Heinrich Richartz took over his father's business in the leather and wild hide trade after years of apprenticeship in Mainz , Brussels and Antwerp . He expanded and intensified the business relations to North and South America through partners in the trading countries, so that his own Cologne branch JH Richartz & Co. could soon compete successfully with the main trading offices in Antwerp.
Until his retirement in 1851, Richartz was considered a "simple, sober and undemanding" citizen. The city council of Cologne was probably surprised when Mayor Stupp read out a letter from Richartz in the council meeting on August 3, 1854, in which the merchant offered "to cover the construction costs of a new city museum at the beginning of next year to the city treasury of one hundred thousand thalers to be paid in exchange for an annual pension of four per cent ”. The museum was to house the art collection of the collector Ferdinand Franz Wallraf , who died in 1824, and which he bequeathed to the city.
Further donations followed, so that the total amount of his foundation amounted to a total of 277,000 thalers and thus more than half of the construction costs of the new museum. Richartz died on April 22, 1861 after a brief illness before the museum was finished.
With his will he left another hundred thousand thalers to found a city insane asylum , but in such a way that the interest would be used for ten years to acquire paintings by older and more recent masters for the museum. For the expansion of the Cologne Minorite Church in the immediate vicinity of the museum, 9,000 thalers were allocated, the Cologne Cathedral received 2500 thalers and to endow a free space at the Rhenish music school he bequeathed 2000 thalers.
Appreciations
- Friedrich Wilhelm IV bestowed him the title of royal councilor of commerce and the Order of the Red Eagle, 3rd class .
- The Universal Society for the encouragement of arts and industry sent him a gold medal in June 1857.
- The Royal Academy of Arts in Berlin made him an honorary member in 1860.
Monuments
- Bronze seat image by Wilhelm Albermann (unveiled on April 10, 1900) in front of the Museum of Applied Arts , the former location of the Wallraf-Richartz Museum.
- Gravestone of Johann Heinrich Richartz and Ferdinand Franz Wallrafs , the namesake of the Wallraf-Richartz-Museum , in Cologne's Melaten cemetery .
- Memorial plaque on Richartz's house (on the Blaubach)
Bronze seat image by Johann Heinrich Richartz. (Wilhelm Alberman, 1900)
Common gravestone of Ferdinand Franz Wallraf and Johann Heinrich Richartz
Designations
- In 1861 the city of Cologne named the “ Wallraf-Richartz-Museum ”, built for Ferdinand Franz Wallraf's art collections and largely financed by Richartz, after the collector and the founder.
- Richartzstrasse in Cologne, connection of Wallraf-Platz and Minoritenstrasse along the former location of the Wallraf-Richartz-Museum.
literature
- Johann Jakob Merlo : Richartz, Johann Heinrich . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 28, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1889, pp. 421-423.
- Ulrich S. Soenius, Jürgen Wilhelm (Ed.): Kölner Personen-Lexikon . Greven, Cologne 2007, ISBN 978-3-7743-0400-0 .
- Werner Schäfke , Kölnischer Bildersaal: The paintings in the holdings of the Cologne City Museum including the Porz collection and the Cologne high school and foundation fund. Cologne City Museum, Cologne 2006, ISBN 392739694X
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Johann Jakob Merlo: Richartz, Johann Heinrich . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 28, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1889, pp. 421-423.
- ↑ Ceremony for the inauguration of the Wallraf-Richartz Museum , Cologne, 1861
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Richartz, Johann Heinrich |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German merchant and patron |
| DATE OF BIRTH | May 15, 1796 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Cologne |
| DATE OF DEATH | April 22, 1861 |
| Place of death | Cologne |