Peter Rindisbacher

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Peter Rindisbacher (born April 12, 1806 in Eggiwil ; † August 12, 1834 in St. Louis , Missouri) was a Swiss watercolorist and draftsman .

Life

Peter Rindisbacher, the third child of Peter and Anna-Barbara Rindisbacher, spent childhood and youth on the Luchsmattli farm in Eggiwil. Even at this time he liked to draw and often. In 1818 the family moved to Wichtrach in the Aare valley , and in 1820 to Münsingen . Rindisbacher received his first brief training in painting when he accompanied the Bernese miniature painter Samuel Weibel to the Bernese Oberland and Ticino .

In 1821 the Rindisbacher family emigrated to the colony on the Red River near what would later become Winnipeg . From this arduous journey comes a first series of pictures by Peter Rindisbacher, in which he accurately depicts ships, the Arctic Ocean, people ( Inuit , Cree ) and animals. In Fort Douglas , Rindisbacher worked at the Hudson's Bay Company trading post .

His pictures, which he also drew and painted, met with great approval, so that he was able to sell several of them. He painted popular subjects such as hunting and war scenes by the Indians in different variations. In 1826 the family moved to Gratiots Grove, Wisconsin. In 1829, Rindisbacher separated from the family and moved to St. Louis, Missouri. He opened a painting studio and portrayed people. In addition, he made trips to members of various Indian tribes and maintained friendly contacts with them ( Cree , Ojibwa , Assiniboine , Sioux , Sauk and Fox ).

In St. Louis, his artistic creation reached its peak. Rindisbacher's pictures were in demand, but he still did not achieve prosperity. Some of them ended up in Europe, where they were copied and sold again without his knowledge. In 1833 on a visit to North America he met Karl Bodmer and Prince Maximilian zu Wied-Neuwied ; He sold three works to the latter. Rindisbacher died unexpectedly in 1834, the cause of his death has not been clarified.

Artistic estate

Today 187 watercolors and drawings by Peter Rindisbacher are known, paintings are hardly preserved. Most of it is in Canadian or US museums, some are privately owned. According to the current state of knowledge, there is no original Rindisbacher picture available in Switzerland.

Meaning and reception

Rindisbacher is a forerunner of today's more well-known "Indian painters" Karl Bodmer and George Catlin . As the first European painters introduced Rindisbacher the life of the white border guards and the Plains Indians in Midwest of the USA . Many pictures show its people and landscapes in the genre style .

Rindisbacher's descriptions of the Indian way of life make their developments clear. B. the hunt of men, which at the beginning still took place on foot with bows and arrows, later on horses with the weapons of the whites. Further scenes are negotiations in the fort, the custom of scalping and scalp dancing, as well as a drinking bout of the Indians. In addition, Rindisbacher drew various animals such as bison , bears , deer , prairie wolves , gray squirrels and wild birds in a lifelike manner . The numerous variations of Rindisbacher's pictures clearly reveal his stylistic development. While the early work is reminiscent of naive painting , the later work takes on an academic character. Typical of Rindisbacher's work are its documentary value and great attention to detail.

In Canada and the United States Rindisbachers oeuvre became known in the 1940s and found - especially as a source of historical and ethnographic research - with great interest. His work only found recognition in Switzerland twenty years later, but this cannot be compared with the level of awareness and appreciation that it is known in Canada and the USA.

  • Cold night camp on the inhospitable shores of Lake Winnipeg , 1821

  • Winter Fishing on the Ice of the Assynoibain and Red River , 1821

  • Colonists on the Red River in North America , 1822

  • Individual of the Sautaux First Nation, standing in a winter landscape, wearing a winter cape, and holding a bow and arrows , 1822

  • The Red Lake Chief making a speech to the Governor of Red River at Fort Douglas , 1825

literature

  • Tapan Bhattacharya: Rindisbacher, Peter. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
  • John Francis McDermott: Peter Rindisbacher: frontier reporter . In: The Art Quarterly , 12, 1949, pp. 129-144.
  • John Francis McDermott: Further Notes on Peter Rindisbacher . In: The Art Quarterly 26, 1963, pp. 73-76.
  • Fred Lindegger: brother of the red man. The adventurous life and unique work of the Indian painter Peter Rindisbacher (1806–1834) . Aare, Solothurn 1983, ISBN 3-7260-0204-9 .
  • Otto Lüthi, Josef Buntschu (ed.): Peter Rindisbacher, 1806–1834, Indian painter: collection of images from: the Swiss homeland, the long sea voyage to the new homeland, the grueling river and sea voyage to the Red River settlement, life in the Red River Settlement and the Indians living there as well as the new animal species living there and from his painting studio in St. Louis, USA . O. Lüthi, Münsingen 2007.
  • Otto Lüthi, Josef Buntschu: Peter Rindisbacher, 1806–1834, Indian painter (exhibition Münsingen September 20 - October 27, 2001) . O. Lüthi, Münsingen 2001.

Web links

Commons : Peter Rindisbacher  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Ylva Gasser: Rindisbacher, Peter. In: Sikart , accessed on May 3, 2014.
personal data
SURNAME Rindisbacher, Peter
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss painter and draftsman
DATE OF BIRTH April 12, 1806
PLACE OF BIRTH Eggiwil
DATE OF DEATH August 12, 1834
Place of death St. Louis