Walther Meyerspeer

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Walther Bernhard Meyerspeer , also Meyer-Speer (born May 27, 1905 in Freiburg-Zähringen ; † September 27, 1979 there ), was a German painter and book illustrator . He worked several times as a wall painter in the sacred area.

family

Walther Bernhard Meyerspeer, son of Friedrich Meyer (1856–1942) and Berta, b. Speer (1873–1922), was born under the name "Meyer". At the end of the 1920s, he temporarily used the surname Meyer-Speer and officially had the surname Meyerspeer since April 20, 1934. He married Hadwig Basler (1897–1964) on May 12, 1934. The marriage remained childless and was divorced after six years.

education

After attending elementary school and secondary school (today Kepler-Gymnasium Freiburg ), Meyerspeer completed an apprenticeship as a painter from 1922 to 1924. He studied from 1925 to 1930 at the Badische Landeskunstschule in Karlsruhe with Georg Scholz and Hans Adolf Bühler .

Works

As a 16-year-old, he was able to work on the ceiling painting The Heavenly Jerusalem in his home church of St. Blasius in Zähringen with his eight years older brother Paul Meyer-Speer (1897–1983) . With his brother, who made a name for himself as a church restorer and color space designer, he also worked in the cathedrals in Mainz, Fulda and Breslau. Mainly in the Archdiocese of Freiburg , Walther Meyerspeer designed various church rooms with paintings or large-scale wall mosaics, as in 1933 in St. Barbara (Freiburg im Breisgau) . This was done in close cooperation with the artists Angelika Khan-Leonhard and her mother Gertrud Leonhard. For the parish church of the Holy Family in Freiburg, he created the central image of the "Holy Family" on the choir wall from 1939, the side altar paintings and finally the Stations of the Cross, which were completed in 1949. In 1955 he painted the Stations of the Cross for the parish church of St. Remigius in Viersen .

He published copies of his mainly Christian-oriented paintings on postcards and prints through the Freiburg photo studio Carl Gehl, the Karlsruhe publishing house Badenia and the art publishing house Franz Hanfstaengl. In 1930, for example, a picture of St. Elisabeth by Walther Meyer-Speer was used for a poster campaign by the Caritas Association's winter aid .

From 1929 to 1952 Walther Meyerspeer illustrated numerous children's and school books.

Book illustrations (selection)

  • Paul Franz Pfister (ed.); Karl J. Winter: Dear Nightingale. A little book about games and singing for our boys and girls. Publishing house of the Catholic school organization in Germany, Düsseldorf 1929.
  • Hadwig Meyerspeer-Basler: Red crown wedding ball. A mushroom fairy tale. Caritasverlag, Freiburg im Breisgau 1932.
  • Elisabeth Basler: Juniper. A fairy tale. Caritasverlag, Freiburg im Breisgau 1932.
  • Josef Zimmermann: At table with God: A first communion book. Benziger, Einsiedeln et al. 1933.
  • Hadwig Meyerspeer-Basler: Gispele in the rest house to the golden key to the sky. A fairy tale that tells of medicinal herbs. Caritasverlag, Freiburg im Breisgau 1949.
  • Hermann Schrempp: Everyone is counting on it. Arithmetic primer. Lehrmittel-Verlag, Offenburg 1950.
  • Badisches reading book for the 2nd school year. Lehrmittel-Verlag, Offenburg 1951.
  • Gustel Ehrmann-Bretzing: ... because every little animal has a heart: a book in verse. Alsatia, Colmar 1951

Exhibitions

Group exhibition
  • 1949: "Christian Art of Our Time", Catholic Working Group Freiburg im Breisgau, Augustinermuseum Freiburg

Web links

Commons : Walther Meyerspeer  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Death register No. 1915/1979, Freiburg
  2. ^ A b Death message in: Das Münster , Volume 33, 1980, p. 90; limited preview in Google Book search.
  3. ↑ Birth certificate No. 41/1905, Zähringen
  4. ↑ Freiburg Diocesan Archive , Volume 68 (1941), p. 7; limited preview in Google Book search
  5. ↑ Parish Church HI. Family - History , website of the pastoral care unit Freiburg Northwest of the Archdiocese of Freiburg, accessed on April 29, 2019
  6. ↑ St. Remigius - Kreuzweg , website of the Catholic parish of St. Remigius in Viersen, accessed on April 29, 2019.
  7. ↑ Catherine Maurer: The Caritas Association between the Empire and the Weimar Republic: On the social and mental history of charitable Catholicism in Germany. Lambertus-Verlag, Freiburg im Breisgau 2008, ISBN 978-3-7841-0970-1 , p. 242; limited preview in Google Book search
  8. ^ Hanns Kreisel : Well-known personalities as mushroom lovers. In: Zeitschrift für Mykologie 68 (1), 2002, pp. 3–30, here p. 8 f .; PDF online
  9. ^ Friedrich Schneider : Catholic family education. Herder, Freiburg 1941, p. 191.
  10. ↑ Martin Papenbrock: “Degenerate Art”, exile art, resistance art in West German exhibitions after 1945: an annotated bibliography. VDG Verlag and database for the humanities, Weimar 1996, ISBN 978-3-932124-09-9 , p. 216; limited preview in Google Book search
personal data
SURNAME Meyerspeer, Walther
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Meyerspeer, Walther Bernhard (full name); Meyer-Speer Walther Bernhard; Meyer, Walther Bernhard (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German painter and book illustrator
DATE OF BIRTH May 27, 1905
PLACE OF BIRTH Zähringen
DATE OF DEATH September 27, 1979
Place of death Zähringen