Wilhelm Focke

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Wilhelm Heinrich Focke (born July 3, 1878 in Bremen ; † December 15, 1974 there ) was a German painter, sculptor, aircraft pioneer, inventor, poet and football pioneer and co-founder of FC Bayern Munich .

Live and act

Wilhelm Focke, painter and inventor born in Bremen in 1878 as the first son of the Council Syndicate and Focke Museum founder Johann Focke and his wife Louise (niece of the French painter Souchay de la Duboissière), had long been forgotten. By chance, his estate was rediscovered and exhibited in Bremen. It was he who, as one of the first German aviation pioneers , successfully took to the air in 1909 on the Bornstedter Feld parade ground in Potsdam with his self-designed aircraft, the "Ente", built in Edmund Rumpler's workshops . At this time, his 18-year-old brother, who later became famous aircraft builder, helicopter inventor and founder of the Focke-Wulf works, Henrich Focke (1890–1979), was just graduating from high school. Focke helped his brother Henrich to design the first "Bremer ENTE", with which the first flight attempts were made on the Neuenlander Feld in Bremen in 1910 , but which failed due to underpowering. In 1927 Henrich Focke's partner, Georg Wulf , fell fatally with the further developed F 19 duck . The aircraft had been developed until it was ready for series production and continued to fly successfully until World War II without any technical problems.

During the First World War , he first fought in Turkey on the Dardanelles against the landing attempt by the English and, after a serious injury, was deployed as a reconnaissance aircraft and rescue pilot over the North Sea in 1916 . During this time he constantly invented new types of aircraft, especially seaplanes (documented in design drawings and sketches) and met his long-time painter friend Poppe Folkerts in the neighboring Malerturm while working at the Norderney sea ​​flight station.

Wilhelm Focke studied painting and sculpture at various art academies (chronologically) in Düsseldorf (with Peter Janssen ), Munich (with Heinrich Marr ), Weimar (with Ludwig von Hofmann ) and Berlin (master class from Arthur Kampf ). He took an active part in the artists' round tables in Berlin, especially those with his friends Oskar Kokoschka , Max Slevogt , Hans Thoma and Olaf Gulbransson . His fatherly friend Max Liebermann said of Focke's impressive horse pictures: “… no Focke, I can't do that…!” (Authentic quote from W. Focke). He had his first major exhibition of horse pictures from the Berlin zoo around 1909–1910 in one of the Cassirers' salons through the mediation of Max Liebermann. It has not yet been clarified whether in Paul Cassirer's art salon or in the publishing house and salon of Bruno Cassirer , who was also a horse lover, owner of a riding stable and involved in a Berlin racetrack. Focke also took an active part in the clashes of the Berlin Secession . The closeness to the Brücke painters such as Max Pechstein , Ernst Ludwig Kirchner , Karl Schmidt-Rottluff or Otto Mueller can be clearly seen in his pictures, which at the time still had strong impressionistic features . He too distanced himself from academic painting and turned to the representation of the naked human body in the great outdoors.

After the war he taught nude, animal and landscape painting for ten years until 1929 at the Bremen School of Applied Arts . During this time he was able to turn to his many inventions again, such as sand yachts (which he himself called sailing scooters) on his favorite East Frisian island of Juist , ice sailors in the outskirts of Bremen, first drafts of double hulled boats ( catamarans ), tidal and wind power plants . As he himself said, the wind was his “friend”.

Since the teaching post did not suit him and he felt restricted by it, Focke worked as a freelance and independent artist from 1930 until the end of his life in 1974.

He distanced himself from the National Socialists and went into inner emigration , that is, he spent a lot of time in the countryside and rarely went into the city. His landscape and animal pictures became more expressive, he spent a lot of time on the Mecklenburg maternal "Gut Mechow ", where he found the ideal conditions for his pictures as an absolute horse lover in the horse breeding of this estate with the idyllic Mechow lake . But his naturalistic island and lake images are also an expression of his closeness to nature. He had a large circle of friends in northern Germany and his expressive northern German sea, landscape, nude and animal pictures sold well. This group of friends also helped him survive during and after the Second World War and provided him with food. He painted constantly, was still learning to ski at the age of 70 and was skiing every winter in the Black Forest, painting the landscapes of the Black Forest. His many inventions such as He further developed the forerunner of the catamaran, the "double boat", as well as many of his other sailing devices. In this late period of his career he still had many exhibitions and honors for his birthday anniversaries and found a quiet death at the age of 96.

Commitment to football

In Bremen, Focke belonged to the Bremen sports club before he joined MTV Munich in 1879 after moving to Munich . Here he was one of the players who campaigned for the footballers from MTV to leave the club and thus for the establishment of FC Bayern Munich in 1900 . Together with Franz John and Paul Francke, he was one of the founding members ( see charter ). After founding the independent football club, Focke was appointed second team captain . In 1903 he left the association to continue his art studies at the Weimar Art School and the Berlin School of Fine Arts.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Wilhelm Focke on erfolgsfans.com

Sources and literature

personal data
SURNAME Focke, Wilhelm
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Focke, Wilhelm Heinrich (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German painter, sculptor, aircraft pioneer, inventor, poet and football pioneer
DATE OF BIRTH July 3, 1878
PLACE OF BIRTH Bremen
DATE OF DEATH 15th December 1974
Place of death Bremen