Otto Grashof

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Otto Ernst Friedrich Grashof , also Grashoff (born June 12, 1812 in Prenzlau , † April 23, 1876 in Cologne ) was a German portrait , history , genre , animal and landscape painter from the Düsseldorf School . As a travel painter he visited the Russian Empire from 1838 to 1845 and South America from 1852 to 1857 .

Life

Otto Grashof was born as the child of the married couple Karl Friedrich August Grashof (1770–1841), a Protestant theologian and Prussian school council, and his wife Dorothea in Prenzlau ( Uckermark ). At the Prenzlaus Lyceum, the father held the post of vice principal before taking part in the Battle of the Nations near Leipzig . The family had lived in Aachen since 1814 , where the father supervised the reorganization of the teaching system in the Prussian- occupied Rhineland at the Generalgouvernement Nieder- und Mittelrhein . In 1815 or 1816 the family moved to Cologne. There the father received a position as consistorial and school councilor and in 1820 the management of the Carmelite School , which was elevated to a grammar school in 1825 and was named Friedrich Wilhelm grammar school in 1830 .

Studio scene, painting by Johann Peter Hasenclever , 1836 - left: Otto Grashof as the draftsman of the scene

After taking painting and drawing lessons from Franz Katz and Christian Kuntze (1761–1832) in Cologne , Grashof studied painting at the Düsseldorf Art Academy from 1826 to 1837 , interrupted from 1829 to 1832 by a stay in the painter's studio Karl Wilhelm Wach in Berlin . In Düsseldorf his most important teacher was the history painter Theodor Hildebrandt . In the city's painting milieu he liked to socialize with the genre painter Johann Peter Hasenclever , who portrayed him in the painting atelier scene in 1836 .

In 1838 Grashof traveled to Saint Petersburg . From 1841 to 1843 he lived in Moscow , where he painted portraits of the upper class. Then he lived again in Saint Petersburg. Several of his pictures ended up in the collection of Tsar Nicholas I. In 1845 he moved back to Berlin. There, through Peter von Cornelius, he came into contact with the highly respected scientist Alexander von Humboldt , who had traveled to Latin America around 1800 . This inspired him to take a trip to South America . In 1848, at the Berlin Academy exhibition, Grashof presented some pictures that reflected experiences from his trip to Russia.

In 1852 Grashof went to Spain and from there to Buenos Aires . The war of independence raging in Argentina disappointed him. In 1853 he went to Montevideo , where he met the discoverer Paul Wilhelm von Württemberg , who encouraged him to visit Chile . He traveled there in October 1853. After a year and three months in which he had spent time in the company of German business people and diplomats as well as personalities of the country, he set out for Brazil in 1855 , whose nature and culture fascinated him. He was particularly impressed by the culture of the black slaves , their music, their dances, their clothing and their religious celebrations. His interest in painting also aroused the landscapes of the jungle and the native Indian population. He climbed the Corcovado in Rio de Janeiro three times and also captured the beach of Botafogo with drawings. In Rio de Janeiro he met Ferdinand Pettrich , the court sculptor of the Brazilian Emperor Peter II. In 1857 Grashof returned to Cologne after having visited Madeira, Lisbon, Paris, Brussels and Antwerp on the return trip. He was deeply disappointed when he realized that his pictures with South American motifs were not getting much interest. After going blind in 1861, he then devoted himself to writing, with varying degrees of success. His wife Luise Lambertine, b. Kaulhausen (1840-1894), wrote down what he dictated to her. In 1864 Grashof's South American travelogues with illustrations based on his original drawings appeared in the magazine Globus published by Karl Andree .

Grashof carried the title "Imperial Russian and Brazilian court painter". Grashof's nephew was the engineer and university professor Franz Grashof .

Works (selection)

The founders of Chile ( José Miguel Carrera , Bernardo O'Higgins , José de San Martín and Diego Portales Palazuelos ), 1854
Family on the terrace above Valparaíso , 1854
Magellan

photos

  • Portrait of the artist's parents in the arbor , oil on canvas (86.5 × 71 cm), 1832, Museum Kunstpalast
  • Franz Ittenbach , oil on canvas (36 × 29 cm), around 1833
  • Vasily the Great
  • Horses pursued by wolves
  • Cossacks on horseback , oil on canvas (146.5 × 103 cm), 1840
  • Winter landscape with fallen soldiers and wolves , oil on canvas (102.5 × 86.5 cm), Moscow 1843
  • Bear baiting , oil on canvas (109 × 148 cm), Moscow 1843
  • The founders of Chile , 1854
  • Family on the terrace above Valparaíso , 1854
  • Cuesta del prado, Valparaiso (Landscape with Cordilleras) , oil on canvas (41.5 × 68 cm), November 1854
  • Brazilian landscape near Rio de Jainero , oil on canvas (66 × 100 cm), 1856
  • Magellan (Retrato de Fernando Magalhães) , exhibited in the Salon de Paris in 1859

Fonts

  • Grashoff's journey from Buenos Ayres through the Argentine pampas and over the Cordillere to Copiapo in Chile . In: Karl Andree (Ed.): Globus. Illustrated magazine for country and ethnology . Fifth volume, Verlag des Bibliographisches Institut, Hildburghausen 1864, p. 1 ( digitized version )
  • Grashof's journey from Rio Janeiro via Bahia to Madeira . In: Karl Andree (Ed.): Globus. Illustrated magazine for country and ethnology . Fifth volume, Verlag des Bibliographisches Institut, Hildburghausen 1864, p. 201 ( digitized version )

literature

  • Grashof, Otto . In: Friedrich von Boetticher : painter works of the nineteenth century. Contribution to art history . Volume I, Dresden 1895, p. 406.
  • Kölnischer Kunstverein (ed.): Forgotten Cologne: Otto Grashof (1812–1876). Exhibition at the Cologne Art Association . Cologne 1934 (with foreword by Otto H. Förster )
  • Eugenio Pereira Salas: Un pintor viajero: Otto EF Grashof (1812–1876) . In: Boletín de la Academia Chilena de la Historia , Año XXV, Segundo Semestre de 1958, No. 59
  • Renate Löschner: Otto Grashof. The painter's travels in Argentina, Uruguay, Chile and Brazil 1852–1857 . Gebr. Mann Verlag, Berlin 1987, ISBN 3-78611-491-9

Web links

  • Otto Grashof , biography in the portal artistasplasticoschilenos.cl
  • Otto Grashof , auction results on the portal artnet.de

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Atanazy Raczyński : History of modern German art . Third volume, Berlin 1841, p. 88 ( Google Books )
  2. ↑ Otto Grashof (1812–1876): Portrait of the artist's parents in the arbor, 1832 , website in the portal smpk.de , accessed on December 5, 2015
  3. ↑ Roswitha Oschmann: Heimatverein presented a portrait of Franz Ittenbach . Article from January 18, 2014 in the portal general-anzeiger-bonn.de , accessed on December 5, 2015
  4. ↑ Otto Grashof (1812 Prenzlau - 1876 Cologne) , website for the picture Bärenhetze (1843) in the portal liveauctioneers.com , accessed on December 5, 2015
  5. ^ Agnes Lugo-Ortiz, Angela Rosenthal (Ed.): Slave Portraiture in the Atlantic World . Cambridge University Press, New York City 2013, ISBN 978-1-107-00439-9 , p. 426 ( Google Books )
  6. ↑ Erico J. Siriuba Stickel: Uma Pequema Biblioteca Particular. Subsídios para o Estudo da Iconografia no Brasil . São Paulo 2004, p. 263 ( Google Books )
personal data
SURNAME Grashof, Otto
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Grashof, Otto Ernst Friedrich (full name); Grashoff, Otto
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German portrait, history, genre, animal and landscape painter
DATE OF BIRTH June 12, 1812
PLACE OF BIRTH Prenzlau
DATE OF DEATH April 23, 1876
Place of death Cologne