Melchior Wyrsch

This article describes the painter Melchior Wyrsch; for the politician of the same name, see Melchior Wyrsch (politician) .

Statue of Melchior Wyrsch in Buochs

Johann Melchior Wyrsch (born August 21, 1732 in Buochs ; † September 9, 1798 there ) was a Swiss portrait painter of the 18th century .

Life

Johann Melchior Wyrsch began his training as a painter in 1745. He did this with Johann Michael Suter in Lucerne and Franz Anton Kraus in Einsiedeln . Between 1753 and 1754 he was on a study tour in Italy , mainly in Rome and Naples . He then returned to Switzerland and started working as a portrait and church painter. In 1768 he moved to Besançon , where he painted many portraits of distinguished people. Together with the sculptor Luc Breton , whom he met in Rome, he founded an academy for painting and drawing ( Académie de peinture et de dessin ) in Besançon in 1773 . In 1777 he traveled to Paris and returned to Besançon, where he was made an honorary citizen in 1784 . In the same year he moved to Lucerne and there again founded a school for painters. As a result of increasing blindness, which he attributed to cataracts , he withdrew to Buochs, where he was murdered by Napoleon Bonaparte's troops during the conquest of Nidwalden .

In the transition from Baroque and Rococo, on the one hand, to Classicism and Romanticism, on the other hand, Wyrsch developed from a professional portrait to a differentiated characterization of an individual. He was anchored in the “enlightened patriarchalism” of the Old Confederation , but his work already points to the liberal bourgeois age. As a sacred painter - numerous altars in Central Switzerland and Franche-Comté are still adorned with his paintings - the Central Swiss painter remained stuck with the late Baroque tradition. Nevertheless, in his home country no contemporary church painter can be placed at his side as being of equal value.

Honors

As an honorary citizen of the city of Besançon, a street was named after him (Rue Jean Wyrsch).

literature

• Tapan Bhattacharya: Melchior Wyrsch. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland . January 22, 2018 , accessed August 13, 2018 .
• Paul Fischer: The painter Johann Melchior Wyrsch von Buochs, 1732–1798. His life and work. Commission publishing house, C. Bachmann bookstore, Zurich 1938.
• Johann Kaspar Fuessli : Johann Melchior Joseph Würsch. In: History of the best artists in Switzerland. Orell, Gessner, Füsslin, Zurich 1779, pp. 102-109.
• Karl Jost (Ed.): Biographical Lexicon of Swiss Art. Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Zurich 1998, p. 1150 f.
• Johann Melchior Wyrsch. Exhibition catalog, Nidwaldner Museum, Stans 1998, ISDN 3-7965-1085-x
• Matthias Vogel, Regine Helbling, Marianne Baltensperger (eds.): Powdered and cleaned. Johann Melchior Wyrsch 1732–1798. Portraitist and church painter. Schwabe, 1998, ISBN 3-79651085-X .

Web links

• Hans-Peter Wittwer: Wyrsch, Johann (Jean) Melchior Joseph (Josef). In: Sikart