Johann Wilhelm von Tscharner

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Johann Wilhelm von Tscharner

Johann Wilhelm von Tscharner (born May 12, 1886 in Lemberg , Austria-Hungary ; died June 20, 1946 in Zurich ) was a Swiss painter .

Life

Tscharner came from the Tscharner patrician family . His grandfather emigrated from the canton of Graubünden to Russia in the 19th century and became prosperous there. However, the family's connection to Switzerland never broke off. Tscharner's father commuted between Zamość in Russia and Switzerland. Most of the time he stayed in Rorschach with his wife . For the birth of her son, his mother traveled to her parents in Lemberg in Austria-Hungary.

Von Tscharner attended primary school in Rorschach and St. Gallen . In 1897 he went to a high school in Russia. Even after he had learned the Russian language perfectly, he never felt at home there. During his time at the grammar school Tscharner received lessons in drawing and painting for the first time .

Krakow, Munich and Paris

After graduating from high school, von Tscharner enrolled at the University of Cracow to study philosophy in 1904 and at the same time attended the local art school . 1905–1906 were his teachers Florian Cynk and Teodor Axentowicz . A year later, despite great interest, he gave up studying philosophy and moved to Munich. There he entered the school of the Hungarian painter Simon Hollósy . With the Hollósy school he went to Hungary every summer to practice landscape painting. In the Hungarian village of Nagybánya he met the painter Ilona Spiegelhalter (1889–1972), who spent the hot summer with her family in a small holiday home and also attended the Hollòsy school. (She signed her pictures with Jlonay ). They married the following autumn of 1908. Between 1910 and 1930 they had three daughters and a son. The couple traveled extensively until the outbreak of World War I. They spent the summers with their in-laws in Nagybánya and Felsőbánya or with von Tscharner's mother in Russia. In winter they were mostly in Paris. Tscharner attended Henri Matisse's academy there .

Return to Switzerland and the crisis

The First World War suddenly changed the life of the von Tscharner family. The agricultural holdings and family property were lost. When the First World War broke out, von Tscharner returned to Switzerland from Russia, where he was at the moment. There he settled for a short time in Geneva and Ticino. In 1916 he moved to Zurich, where the family lived in poverty.

New beginning, Dada exhibition and first successes

The gallery owner Han Coray initially helped the family make ends meet by accepting pictures instead of the rent. In 1917 Tscharner was able to exhibit his pictures in the Corray Gallery. Among other things, he took part in the first Dada exhibition, which took place in the Corray Gallery in 1917 and exhibited there when the Corray Gallery was taken over by Tristan Tzara and Hugo Ball and renamed the Dada Gallery . From then on, Tscharner's works were regularly represented at exhibitions at home and abroad and were recognized in the art scene. The appreciations of the art historians Max Raphael (1921) and Erwin Poeschel (1924) also contributed to the breakthrough .

circle of friends

In the 1920s, von Tscharner maintained close contact with the Zurich artists. From among the Dadaists , these were above all Otto van Rees and Hans Arp . The Tscharners friends also included Walter Helbig and Ernst Morgenthaler , who portrayed him, and Hermann Haller and Karl Geiser , who both created a bust of him. Von Tscharner also maintained close contact with the sculptor Hermann Hubacher and the writer Hermann Hesse .

In the 1930s, von Tscharner was traveling again more and more, especially to Paris, where he went in part on behalf of the art collector Marcel Fleischmann. During this time the first monographs about von Tscharner appeared.

World War II and death

The Second World War put an end to travel and von Tscharner increasingly suffered from depression . His images grew darker. In 1942 he received the Swiss Prize for Painting for his picture Thunderstorm Mood . Johann von Tscharner died on June 20, 1946 in Zurich . He was buried in the family grave in Rothenbrunnen , his place of residence. His friend Ernst Morgenthaler and Heinrich Müller, a representative of the Zurich section of the “Society of Swiss Painters, Sculptors and Architects”, which Tscharner had also been a member of since 1917, wrote obituaries for Tscharner in the journal Schweizer Kunst .

In 2013 and 2014 SIK-ISEA received partial estates from the artist couple. The extensive bequests allow a deep insight into Tscharner's work and life.

plant

Still life with a pumpkin

Von Tscharner mainly painted still lifes , family pictures and landscapes . His early work is shaped by the impressions of his numerous journeys. In the works of this time he dealt with Cézanne and the French Cubists .

From around 1917 Tscharner began to think back to traditional art. He found inspiration in the works of Jean-Baptiste Siméon Chardin (1699–1779). The works from this period are characterized by the search for the perfect balance of shape and color. He paints in muted colors. The people in the dark-toned portraits appear in a twilight, as if through a veil. In the still lifes, von Tscharner paints fruits, books, jugs and objects of everyday life and, above all, bread.

From 1930 a new type of picture emerged in von Tscharner's works. Instead of objects on tables, entire interiors with easels appeared. His palette lightened, but the images were more subdued.

From 1935, von Tscharner turned back to the motif of the table and the objects on it. His brushstrokes increasingly took on a life of their own and were no longer as smooth and dry as in the earlier pictures.

Publicly accessible works

  • Bündner Kunstmuseum, Chur
  • Glarus Art Museum
  • Winterthur Art Museum
  • Kunsthaus Zurich
  • Insurance company, Basel
  • Museum of the Werner Coninx Foundation, Zurich

Exhibitions (selection)

A complete record of all exhibitions by Johann von Tscharner up to 1986 can be found in Meier, Johann von Tscharner , 1986.

  • Zurich, Corray Gallery: First Dada exhibition in 1917
  • Zurich, Galerie Dada 1917
  • Chur, Villa Planta, Bündner Kunstverein, (solo exhibition) 1923
  • Zurich, Galerie Neupert (solo exhibition) 1945
  • Zurich, Kunsthaus (solo exhibition) 1957
  • Chur, Bündner Kunsthaus (solo exhibition) 1957
  • Zurich, Upper Fences Gallery (50 pictures from the M. Fleischmann collection) 1964.
  • Zurich, Wolfsberg Art Salon (commemorative exhibition for the 100th birthday) 1986

Awards

  • Swiss Prize for Painting (1942)

literature

  • Georges Charensol: Jean de Tscharner. Editions Le Triangle, Paris 1932.
  • Gotthard Jedlicka: Johann von Tscharner. Niehans Verlag, Zurich 1936.
  • Johann von Tscharner, artist in the workshop. Volume 32, Architecture and Art, 1945 pp. 61–65 ( e-periodica.ch ).
  • Gotthard Jedlicka: Johann von Tscharner 1886–1946. Kunsthaus Zurich, Zurich 1957.
  • Irene Meier: Johann von Tscharner: A monograph. Werner Classen, Zurich 1986 (with further references).
  • Werner Morlang: Experiment via Tscharner. In: The literary gaze. Limmat publishing house. Zurich 2008.

Lexicon entries

  • A. Boßhard: Tscharner, Johann Wilh. von and Tscharner, Ilonay von. In: Carl Brun (Ed.): Swiss Artist Lexicon. Volume 4: Supplement AZ. Huber, Frauenfeld 1917, p. 653 ( Textarchiv - Internet Archive ).
  • Tscharner, Johann Wilhelm von . In: Hans Vollmer (Hrsg.): General lexicon of fine artists from antiquity to the present . Founded by Ulrich Thieme and Felix Becker . tape 33 : Theodotos vacation . EA Seemann, Leipzig 1939, p. 459-460 .
  • Tscharner, Johann Wilhelm von . In: Hans Vollmer (Hrsg.): General Lexicon of Fine Artists of the XX. Century. tape 4 : Q-U . EA Seemann, Leipzig 1958, p. 476-477 .
  • Jacques Busse (ed.): Dictionnaire critique et documentaire des peintres, sculpteurs, dessinateurs et graveurs de tous les temps et de tous les pays par un groupe d'écrivains spécialistes français et étrangers. Gründ, Paris 1999.
  • Biographical lexicon of Swiss art. Dictionnaire biographique de l'art suisse. Dizionario biografico dell'arte svizzera. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung. Zurich / Lausanne, 1998.
  • Jane Turner (Ed.): The Dictionary of Art. Grove, New York 1996.
  • Artist Lexicon of Switzerland. XX. Century. Huber, Frauenfeld 1958 ff.

Web links

Commons : Johann Wilhelm von Tscharner  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Irene Meier: Johann von Tscharner: A monograph. 1986, p. 14.
  2. ↑ a b Gotthard Jedlicka: Johann von Tscharner 1886–1946. P. 6.
  3. ↑ a b Gotthard Jedlicka: Johann von Tscharner 1886–1946. P. 7.
  4. ↑ Illonay Tscharner mirror holder
  5. ↑ photo
  6. ↑ Irene Meier: Johann von Tscharner: A monograph. 1986, p. 20.
  7. ↑ a b c Irene Meier: Johann von Tscharner: A monograph. 1986, p. 17.
  8. ↑ a b Irene Meier: Johann von Tscharner: A monograph. 1986, p. 19.
  9. ↑ Max Raphael: Johann von Tscharner. In: Schweizerland. Zurich, June 1920, p. 415 ff.
    Max Raphael: Wiegele and Tscharner. In: The art paper. Potsdam-Berlin, Sept. 1920, p. 264 ff.
    Max Raphael: Idea and Shape. A guide to the essence of art. Munich, 1921, p. 41 ff.
    Max Raphael: About Johann von Tscharner. In: Yearbook of Young Art. Leipzig 1923. p. 293 ff.
  10. ^ Erwin Poeschel: Johann von Tscharner. In: The work. Feb. 1924, p. 54 ff.
    Erwin Poeschel: The painter Johann von Tscharner. In: The ideal home. Zurich Dec. 1930 p. 536 ff.
  11. ↑ Hermann Hesse dedicated the poem Pain (1933) to him. Irene Meier: Johann von Tscharner: A monograph. 1986, p. 25.
  12. ↑ Georges Charensol: Jean de Tscharner. 1932.
    Gotthard Jedlicka: Johann von Tscharner. Monograph. 1936.
  13. ↑ Irene Meier: Johann von Tscharner: A monograph. 1986, p. 24 f.
  14. ↑ Ernst Morgenthaler, Heinrich Müller: Obituary: Farewell words on the occasion of Johann von Tscharner's cremation on June 24, 1946 in Zurich . In: Swiss Art . 1946, p. 58 ( [1] ).
  15. ↑ Part of the estate of the artist couple Tscharner-Spiegelhalter
  16. ↑ Irene Meier: Johann von Tscharner: A monograph. 1986, p. 49.
  17. ↑ Irene Meier: Johann von Tscharner: A monograph. 1986, pp. 49-51, p. 73.
  18. ↑ Irene Meier: Johann von Tscharner: A monograph. 1986, pp. 51-54.
  19. ↑ a b Irene Meier: Johann von Tscharner: A monograph. 1986, p. 53.
personal data
SURNAME Tscharner, Johann Wilhelm von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Tscharner, Johann von; Tscharner, Jan von
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss painter
DATE OF BIRTH May 12, 1886
PLACE OF BIRTH Lviv
DATE OF DEATH June 20, 1946
Place of death Zurich