Otto Gentil

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Otto Rudolph Gentil (born August 7, 1892 in Aschaffenburg ; † July 26, 1969 there ) was a German sculptor and painter of the 20th century.

Life

Gentil was born the son of the Aschaffenburg pump manufacturer and art collector Anton Gentil (nickname: Pumpen-Anton ). In the years 1905 to 1914 he completed an apprenticeship in metalworking with a view to later work in his father's company. After the First World War he studied from 1918 to 1924 at the School of Applied Arts in Munich , first sculpture and then goldsmithing. From 1923 he worked as a freelance artist in Munich and Aschaffenburg. Study trips took him through Germany, Italy and Dalmatia. From 1925 to 1939 he headed the stonemasonry workshop of the Aschaffenburg master schoolfor builders under director Otto Leitolf . A number of sculptural works were created, some of which were lost in a bomb attack on Aschaffenburg on November 21, 1944.

Atelier house, Grünewaldstrasse 20

Otto Gentil's father built the “Haus Gentil” (Gentil House) in Aschaffenburg for his extensive art collections in 1922/1923 according to his own designs and had his son's own studio built next to it. This was rebuilt by Otto after the war damage in 1946 and he lived there until the end of his life. From then on he dealt with abstract artistic expression possibilities and color studies.

Gentil married Johanna Gretel Niedermeier on March 8, 1931 in Landau (Palatinate) .

Works

Monument to Father Bernhard von Trier 1931
  • 1925: Expressionistically designed bronze deer with Hubertus cross on a wall console decorated with coat of arms at the Jäger Memorial in the Aschaffenburg castle courtyard. The ten-sender was melted down during World War II . A model of it remained in the artist's possession.
  • 1929: The figure of St. Joseph (shell limestone, originally above the main portal, today in front of it) and the font in the Catholic Church of St. Josef in Aschaffenburg-Damm
  • 1929: The terracotta figures hll. Petrus and Paulus on the west facade of the Sacred Heart Church in Aschaffenburg, destroyed in the war, replaced by works by Willibald Blum.
  • 1931: Stele in memory of the legendary figure Father Bernhard von Trier in the Kleiner Schönbuschallee in Aschaffenburg (shell limestone)
  • 1931: Bronze Christ on the cross at the corner of Würzburgerstrasse and Hofgartenstrasse (replaced in 1953 by a sandstone cross designed by Kathi Hock.)
  • 1931: Copy of the memorial to Johann Walter von Kerpen in Aschaffenburg (red sandstone), erected in 1628, moved to Kleine Schönbuschallee in 1775
  • 1931: Figure of Johannes Nepomuk Willigisbrücke / Am Floßhafen (shell limestone)
  • Medallions at the main entrance of the Aschaffenburg Municipal Hospital (destroyed in the war).
  • 1935 bust of Hitler, made by Georg Schäfer and cast in bronze by Otto Gentil in the Anton Gentil pump factory
  • 1935: "National emblem" (Reich eagle with swastika), red sandstone relief on the balcony parapet above the portico of the "Hitler Youth Home" in Aschaffenburg - carved away. Today the building houses the Aschaffenburg Municipal Music School . The traces of similar work in red sandstone can also be seen on the observation towers on the Stengerts in the Schweinheim district (1938) and on the Geishöhe near Dammbach (1937).
  • 1936: Together with Ferdinand Keilmann, award-winning design for a war memorial (shell limestone) on the site of a flora statue in the magnolia grove of Schöntal Park , the so-called Hunters Memorial. Implementation of the plans after revision by Kurt Schmid-Ehmen for the hunters' day of the 2nd Jäger Battalion (at Whitsun 1936). In the center of the complex, accessible via stairs from Würzburger Strasse, a fully sculpted imperial eagle over a wreath of acorns with a swastika. Two hunter figures designed by Gentil were not executed there until the memorial was demolished in 1946. Before the Second World War, however, the gate system of the Jägerkaserne was renewed and provided with stronger pillars. The two pillars at the entrance to Würzburger Strasse showed in relief a soldier with a helmet standing with his legs apart, with the detached rifle in front of him. The pillars no longer exist.
  • 1937/38: Eagle at the fountain of the forest school in Lohr am Main.
  • 1939: War memorial for soldiers who fell in World War I on the market square of Großostheim .

Exhibitions

  • 1941: Otto Gentil , Städtisches Heimatmuseum, Aschaffenburg
  • 1978: Otto Gentil , Jesuit Church, Aschaffenburg
  • 1993: Otto Gentil (1892–1969): sculpture and painting , Jesuit Church Aschaffenburg, gallery of the city of Aschaffenburg

literature

  • Exhibition catalog: Texts: Alexander Bruchlos et al .: Otto Gentil (1892–1969): Sculpture and Painting , Volume 6: Forum Aschaffenburg

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Curriculum vitae for the September 1941 exhibition in the Aschaffenburg Municipal Museum of Local History
  2. ↑ A wood sculptor moves into the studio house in: FAZ of February 14, 2012, page 44


personal data
SURNAME Gentil, Otto
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Gentil, Otto Rudolph (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German sculptor and painter
DATE OF BIRTH August 7, 1892
PLACE OF BIRTH Aschaffenburg
DATE OF DEATH July 26, 1969
Place of death Aschaffenburg