Roland Paris
Friedrich Richard Roland Paris (born March 18, 1894 in Vienna , Austria-Hungary ; † May 4, 1945 in Swinoujscie , German Empire ) was a German caricaturist , writer of satirical verses , graphic artist , painter and sculptor of Art Deco .
Life
family
Roland Paris was the second of five children of Richard Paris (1849–1934) and Therese, nee Teufel (1868–1942). His father came from a wealthy family with a porcelain factory in Oberköditz in the Principality of Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt (today Thuringia ) and tried his hand at producing sparkling wine in Guraro , Transylvania, for a while , together with his brother, and worked as a writer in Weimar from 1900. Therese Paris opened a daughter boarding school here . As a teenager, Roland Paris occupied himself with his mother's maiden name, which, like his own surname, he executed as an elaborate family coat of arms in water colors.
Over the years the family ran into financial difficulties. Therese began to work as a writer and wrote several plays and novels for young girls. Roland Paris contributed to the family income in the early 1920s by depicting his father's German national poems in calligraphy . After the death of his father, he made a bas-relief plaque made of bronze for the grave in the Weimar cemetery. There is also a 45 cm high bust of his father on a marble plinth in private ownership.
His siblings were Hertha (* 1892), Batikerin ; Carolin Justus Siegfried (* 1899); Rupprecht (* 1902), singer and actor; and Wulf Eberhard (* 1910). Roland Paris was the uncle of the painter Ronald Paris . His brother-in-law was the painter Wilhelm Facklam .
Career
Roland Paris attended the Grand Ducal Realgymnasium in Weimar from 1905 . From 1909 he was a student at the Grand Ducal Saxon School of Applied Arts in Weimar . Here he received second and third prizes in 1912, as well as 25 marks in a competition to design emblems for student associations, which he made for another two to three years. Some of this work showed the influence of Art Nouveau , others involved more modern approaches. In 1912 Paris took a sculpture course at the Grand Ducal Saxon Art School in Weimar with the sculptor Gottlieb Elster . He then traveled to Munich, where he took up internships with several sculptors. In 1913 he returned to the art school in Weimar and studied painting with Walther Klemm .
In June 1915 he received his draft order for the Eastern Front of the First World War and served first in a command unit , later in the inspection of the air troops (IdFlieg) . After his return in 1919 he moved to Berlin . In 1924 he married Elisabeth Lisl Austen (* 1897), a dancer at the Theater des Westens , who was the model for most of his female characters; he portrayed himself for the facial parts of his male figures. The marriage remained childless. Their shared apartment, consisting of a room in the back courtyard of Xantener Straße 11 in Berlin-Wilmersdorf, was also Paris' studio, in which he designed and produced a large number of his sculptures, but also graphics and paintings, newspaper caricatures, posters, postcards and functional art such as light objects, Bookends or knobs for walking sticks. Central figures among his sometimes grotesque sculptures were mostly characters from the Commedia dell'arte such as Pierrot , Colombina , Mephisto , Harlequin or the Fool . The sculptor Ernst Kraas (1852–1935), with whom Paris had a friendly, if not fatherly relationship, produced his metal statuettes. Some of his figures were produced in porcelain by the Unterweißbach workshops for porcelain art and the doll manufacturer Ernst Heubach .
His Roland Paris Verlag was also at the address of his apartment . Graphics and art, literature registered, which he founded in 1919 with a share capital of 10,000 marks. He appointed his brother Siegfried as an authorized representative in 1937. With this publisher he published, among other things, his woodcut series Dancers , Carnival and Hell Dance as well as his etchings and lithographs with the titles Leichtes Blut and Gespenster . Paris exhibited his sculptures in 1921 in the Schöneberg Town Hall (Tempelhof), in 1924 in his studio, in 1933 ( Trollpilz -Warbeiten) with his brother-in-law Wilhelm Facklam in the Marienpalais Schwerin and in 1934 both in the Bergwaldtheater Weißenburg (Egon Schmid) and in the Haus der Kunstfreunde (Wilmersdorf) , graphic works and paintings. He also regularly took part in the arts and crafts fair in Leipzig.
Paris was a member of the Wilmersdorf Artists' Association and - like all practicing artists during the Nazi era - a member of the Reich Chamber of Fine Arts , but not a member of the NSDAP . Before the 1936 Summer Olympics, the weekly newspaper Die Grüne Post published his comic- strip- like series of caricatures with the title Hoppel , an amiable, pointed-headed little man with a protruding rear, who pretends to be a great sportsman, but in reality is a skimp and only tries again and again end in disaster. Paris' only published book, a humorous collection of poems with caricatures from 1939, was entitled Strange People (from yesterday and ...) and was subliminally critical of the system. He left behind some unfinished manuscripts such as comical truths , bizarre characters or Moortüpfels lyrical poems .
Paris' works did not fit into the prevailing trend in art during National Socialism , and although his sculpture Segelflugzeug , cast by Ernst Kraas, was commissioned by Hermann Göring as a challenge and awarded annually for the best performance among the gliders of the National Socialist Fliegerkorps Mitte his artistic success in the course of the 1930s and came to a standstill in 1942 when he had to close his publishing house.
In August 1943, despite his age of 49, he was called up for military service in World War II . He was initially assigned to a training division for warship newbuildings of the Navy in Swinoujscie. He then did duty at the incoming goods department, then with the construction team of the local marine vocational school “Nest”. He was promoted twice, in 1943 freed to the naval artillery , then in September 1944 to the naval artillery . On May 4, 1945, three days before the end of the war, Roland Paris was killed in an air raid on the "Lützow camp" in Swinoujscie.
Works (selection)
Bronze statuettes
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Woodwork
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porcelain
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Gouaches, water colors, temperas, lithographs
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reception
The Jenaische Zeitung wrote about Roland Paris' characters in 1914:
“The pearls rise in the champagne glass, pearl by pearl, and someone who understands enjoys the delicate game. Dreams rise up in the artist's imagination, dream after dream. They are airy, fleeting structures, dreams, and yet one can sometimes dissolve their fabric and guess the origin from the nature of their structures; for no spirit creates the world anew out of itself. […] And like rising pearls entertain, they excite us when we look at these daring drawings and these extremely characteristic figurines. How bold are caves shown in this poor artist, in the asylist, where bones and meat were to be expected and how these ghost-like creatures hold on to their poor feet. What a swing in the clothes and limbs of these dancers! How loud and yet how harmonious these colors are! Here is mastery of the latest fashion and the ability to give it an artistic appeal too. Sin and mystery, sickness of body and soul, death and perdition are around these maddened figures; but they captivate. From the eyes of this tall lady in green and purple it sounds towards us: If you love me, it no longer helps to be careful, and the girl rising from the champagne cheers: Life is beautiful! "
literature
- Paris, Roland . In: Hans Vollmer (Hrsg.): General lexicon of fine artists from antiquity to the present . Founded by Ulrich Thieme and Felix Becker . tape 26 : Olivier – Pieris . EA Seemann, Leipzig 1932, p. 236 .
- Paris, Roland . In: Hans Vollmer (Hrsg.): General Lexicon of Fine Artists of the XX. Century. tape 3 : K-P . EA Seemann, Leipzig 1956, p. 547 .
- Alberto Shayo : Roland Paris. The Art Deco Jester King. Antique Collectors Club Art Books, 2016, ISBN 1-85149-823-0 ( issuu.com ).
- Alberto Shayo: Statuettes art deco period. Antique Collectors Club Art Books, 2016. ISBN 1-85149-824-9 ( issuu.com ).
Web links
- Roland Paris (German, 1894-1915 ) on artnet , with pictures of Roland Paris' work.
Individual evidence
- ^ DB Lenck: Plastic by Roland Paris. February 13, 2012.
- ^ Caricatures by Roland Paris. In: Jenaische Zeitung . Official, community and daily newspaper from February 16, 1913.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Paris, Roland |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Paris, Friedrich Richard Roland (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German sculptor of Art Deco |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 18, 1894 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Vienna , Austria-Hungary |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 4, 1945 |
| Place of death | Swinoujscie , German Empire |