Wilhelm Ritterbach (painter, 1878)

Möhnetal with Gutshof Moosfelde (1912), oil on canvas

Altarpiece in the church of St. Johannes Baptist Neheim. The painter depicted himself as a man with a black mustache.

Wilhelm Caspar Heinrich Ritterbach (born May 24, 1878 in Neheim ; † November 24, 1940 in Düsseldorf ) was a German painter.

Life

Ritterbach was the tenth of twelve children of the painter Heinrich Ritterbach (* 1836) and their mother Clara Francisca Carolina (née Cöppicus, * 1839). He showed artistic interests early on. In Neheim he attended the rectorate school . At the age of fourteen he began an apprenticeship with a decorative painter in Arnsberg . Then he attended the Düsseldorf School of Applied Arts . Around 1898 he worked in various cities in the Rhineland. From 1899 he attended the Düsseldorf Art Academy . His teachers included Johann Peter Theodor Janssen , Eduard von Gebhardt and Heinrich Lauenstein .

In 1903 he finished his studies as a master student with a free studio until 1907. He became a successful commissioned painter with a focus on portraits, landscapes and head studies. In addition to oil painting, he also devoted himself to drawing and watercolor. At the Düsseldorf art exhibition of 1904 , his picture Neheimer Möhnewehr am Wiedenberg received a lot of attention. The work was acquired by the Art Association for the Rhineland and Westphalia . In the same year a first long stay in Italy followed . He also traveled to Paris , Holland and Belgium . He also visited numerous German art institutions. Another trip to Italy in 1911 lasted about half a year.

As a student he was a member of the Malkasten artists' association in Düsseldorf. He later appears in the membership directory as an "academic painter". Between 1911 and 1922 and from 1924 to 1939 he was registered there as a full member with no time limit. As a member of the association, he also used the studio on Jacobistraße. He took part in club life by organizing artist festivals and pageants. Ritterbach was also a member of the Laetitia artists' association, also in Düsseldorf. In their anniversary exhibition in 1914 he took part with four pictures.

Despite the center of his life in Düsseldorf, he still remained connected to his hometown with regard to the motifs of many of his works. The Neheim art and antiquity exhibition organized an exhibition of his works in 1910. His pictures were also shown in exhibitions in Munich and Berlin .

From 1915 on, Ritterbach took part in the First World War as a soldier in Russia and France. In addition to his normal wartime use, he could also continue to paint.

In 1922 he married the daughter of a manufacturer from Neheim, Elisabeth Prünte. The marriage had four children. The family lived in Düsseldorf-Rath . Ritterbach was shaped by religion and closely associated with the Catholic Church, which was also reflected in his art. The National Socialism has no doubt why exercised appears to be little attraction for him. In 1937 he suffered a first stroke, followed by a second in 1940, from which he did not recover.

The master locksmith, author and illuminator Eberhard Aloys Ritterbach (1882–1962) was his younger brother.

plant

Ritterbach's work can partly be assigned to the local art movement , is partly based on historicism , but also shows impressionistic influences. A first focus of his painting were landscape paintings mainly from his home in the Sauerland. Pictures were taken from the Neheim area, such as the area around the Fürstenberg chapel , the Oelinghausen monastery , the Möhnetal with the Moosfelde estate . The latter belonged to his wife's family at the time. Other landscapes show motifs from his travels, particularly from Italy. There were also works that he painted during his military service in Russia, Poland and France.

Later he was also a sought-after portrait painter. During the war, for example, he created paintings by high military personnel such as Paul von Hindenburg . During the Weimar Republic he created a portrait of the Reich Chancellor Wilhelm Marx on behalf of the state . In addition, numerous pictures were taken of their own family members.

Portrait of Chancellor Wilhelm Marx by Wilhelm Ritterbach, Düsseldorf 1924

Another focus of his work were religious motifs and images on behalf of Catholic organizations. For the hospital in Neheim he created a picture of the "Good Samaritan", for the local church of St. Johannes Baptist he created an altarpiece. He created other religious pictures and frescoes for clients a. a. in Düsseldorf, Ratingen , Fröndenberg , Wuppertal , Glessen (near Cologne ) and Essen . A painting in the building of the Catholic school organization and one in the Caritashaus in Essen were known at the time. He created a series of Madonna portraits on a private commission. He created a picture of the interior of the Himmelpforten monastery church for Cardinal Karl Joseph Schulte from Cologne . He also created church decorations in Elberfeld , Rath and other places. Some of his religious pictures were distributed as reproduced devotional pictures or school murals.

reception

In 1995, the Neheim-Hüstener Heimatbund organized the first exhibition of his works after the artist's death. As a result, a "Ritterbachzimmer" existed in the Fresekenhof for a time to display some pictures. He also tried to compile the works of Ritterbach and to search for unknown pictures. He thus followed up on the preparatory work on a catalog raisonné that was developed between 1986 and 1988 on behalf of the city.

literature

• Ritterbach, Wilhelm . In: Hans Vollmer (Hrsg.): General lexicon of fine artists from antiquity to the present . Founded by Ulrich Thieme and Felix Becker . tape 28 : Ramsden-Rosa . EA Seemann, Leipzig 1934, p. 390 .
• Our Sauerland artists. In: Heimwacht. Homeland papers for the Sauerland in the Electorate of Cologne. Issue 6/7 1930, p. 218.
• Werner Saure: Wilhelm Ritterbach, a Neheim painter. In: Sauerland. Issue 4/1995, p. 142 f.
• Werner Saure: Wilhelm Ritterbach in the Ortmann Collection. In: To Möhne, Röhr and Ruhr. 51/2012, pp. 5-9.
• Werner Saure: The Art of Wilhelm Ritterbach. In: To Möhne, Röhr and Ruhr. 7/1995, pp. 33-45.
• Wilhelm Ritterbach jun .: biography of the painter Wilhelm Ritterbach. In: To Möhne, Röhr and Ruhr. 7/1995, pp. 27-32.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Wilhelm Ritterbach junior: biography of the painter Wilhelm Ritterbach. Pp. 27-32.
2. ↑ Helmut Heinz Welke: urban history by hand . In: Westfälische Rundschau . November 25, 2009 ( wr.de ).
3. ^ Werner Saure: Exhibition Ritterbach of the Neheim-Hüstener Heimatbund in the main office of the Sparkasse. In: To Möhne, Röhr and Ruhr. 8/1996, pp. 75-77.