Fritz von Uhde | Genre painter | Tutt'Art@

Fritz von Uhde (born Friedrich Hermann Carl Uhde; 1848-1911) was a German painter of genre and religious subjects.

His style lay in-between Realism and Impressionism, he was once known as "Germany's outstanding impressionist" and he became one of the first painters to introduce plein-air painting in his country.

Biography

Uhde was born in Wolkenburg, Saxony.

His family, moderately wealthy civil servants, had artistic interests.

His father was actually a part-time painter and his maternal grandfather was director of the Royal Museums in Dresden.

Uhde found art appealing while studying at the Gymnasium at this city, and in 1866 he was admitted to the Academy of Fine Arts in Dresden.

Totally at variance with the spirit prevailing there, later that year he left his studies to join the army.

He became horsemanship instructor to the regiment of the assembled guard, and was promoted to Lieutenant in 1868.

After meeting the painter Makart in Vienna in 1876, Uhde left the army in 1877 with the intention to become an artist.

He moved to Munich in that year to attend the Academy of Fine Arts.

There, he particularly came to admire the Dutch old masters, especially Rembrandt.

He also taught Lilla Cabot Perry, influencing her use of color.

Unsuccessful in his attempts to gain admittance to the studios of Piloty, Lindenschmit, or Diez, in 1879 he traveled to Paris where his studies of the Dutch painters continued under Mihály Munkácsy's supervision.

He worked for a short time in that master's studio, but principally studied from nature and his old Netherland models.

As a late starter in his art studies, he was determined to succeed quickly.

The final work he painted at Munkácsy's school, The Singer, was exhibited in the Paris Salon of 1880, where it was awarded an honorable mention.

In 1882 a journey to the Netherlands brought about a change in his style, as he abandoned the dark chiaroscuro he had learned in Munich in favor of a colorism informed by the works of the French Impressionists.

Encouraged by his contemporary Max Liebermann, whose portrait he painted, Uhde painted Fishermen's Children in Zandvoort (1882) as an experiment in plein-air painting, but chose to exhibit a more conventional version of the composition, the Arrival of the Organ-Grinder (1883; Kunsthalle Hamburg).

This conflict between innovation and caution characterized the greater part of his career.

In about 1890, Uhde became a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich.

He was, with Max Slevogt, Ludwig Dill and Lovis Corinth, one of the founding members of the Verein Bildender Künstler (Society of Fine Artists), better known as the Munich Secession.

He later joined the Berlin Secession as well.

Uhde became an honorary member of the academies of Munich, Dresden and Berlin.

He became the first President of the Secession, and progressing in his naturalistic conception, he came to develop his own "unacademic" syle.

He gave rise to a complete change in German art, and counted among his followers most of the younger generation.

Adolf Hölzel was influenced by him in his early work.

He became less active in the art world after 1900, but continued to paint until his last days.

This was the time when, in the opinion of Charles and Carl, he created "the most vivid and artistic paintings of his career", so that he can be considered "one of the most important artists of the 20th century".

He died in Munich in 1911.

Style

In general, Uhde was an unconventional naturalist, as he said: "many of the French artists wished to find the light in Nature.

I wished to find the light within the figure that I was presenting. In Christ I grasped the embodiment of the outward and the inward light".

Like Dostoyevsky, Uhde's concept of beauty and standard of perfection was the figure of Christ, a reason why he considered himself the "first Idealist of Naturalism".

In The Sermon on the Mount (Hungarian National Gallery), Christ addresses a crowd of 19th-century harvesters, whereas in Christus Predigt am see (Sermon at the Sea), Christ preaches to a group of modern youngsters.

Similar in conception are Suffer Little Children to come unto Me (1884; Leipzig Museum), The Last Supper, The Journey to Bethlehem (Munich Pinakothek), and The Miraculous Draught of Fishes.

Other works of his in public collections are: Christ Among the Peasants (the Musée d'Orsay, Paris); Christ at Emmaus and Road to Emmaus (the Staedel Institute, Frankfort); The Farewell of Tobias (the Liechtenstein Gallery, Vienna), Noli me tangere (1894; New Pinakothek, Munich), The Wise Men from the East (1896; Magdeburg Museum), and Woman, Why Weepest Thou? (1900; Vienna Museum).

After his wife's death in 1886, Uhde was very involved in the lives of his three daughters, whom he painted in numerous works such as Nursery (1889; Kunsthalle, Hamburg) and In the Bower (1896; Kunstmuseum, Düsseldorf).

Works he painted during summers spent at Dachau and Starnberg in the 1890s show an increasingly Impressionistic rendering of sunlight, which is also evident in paintings Uhde made after the late 1890s of his daughters in the garden.

In his later years, he made paintings of a woman with wings of angels, and he reproduced some biblical scenes like Abraham's Trial (1897), The Last Supper (1897, Stuttgart Museum - which includes a portrait of the unworldly composer Anton Bruckner as one of the disciples), The Ascension of Christ (1898, New Pinakothek, Munich), Nicodemus and Christ, Die Bergpredigt, The Sermon (Die Predigt Christi, 1903), Tobias and the Angel, The Holy Night (1911, Dresden Gallery), and Christ Healing a Sick Child (1911). | Source: © Wikipedia

Fritz von Uhde, nato Friedrich Hermann Carl Uhde, (Wolkenburg, 1848-1911), è stato un pittore Tedesco che predilesse la pittura di genere e quella di argomento religioso.

Il suo stile oscillò fra il realismo e l'impressionismo.

Biografia

Nel 1866 fu ammesso all'Accademia di Belle Arti di Dresda.

Totalmente in disaccordo con lo spirito che vi regnava, in quello stesso anno lasciò gli studi per il servizio militare, e dal 1867 al 1877 fu professore di equitazione al reggimento della guardia a cavallo.

Si trasferì a Monaco di Baviera nel 1877 per frequentare l'Accademia di Belle Arti dove ebbe modo di apprezzare particolarmente la pittura degli antichi maestri Olandesi.

Fallito il tentativo di ottenere l'ammissione agli studi nella classe di Carl von Piloty od Wilhelm von Diez, nel 1879 si recò a Parigi dove studiò i pittori Olandesi con Mihály Munkácsy.

Lavoro per breve tempo presso lo studio del suo maestro, ma studiò principalmente la natura ed i vecchi maestri olandesi.

Nel 1882, un viaggio in Olanda rappresentò un cambiamento determinante nel suo stile pittorico; abbandonò il chiaroscuro che aveva appreso a Monaco di Baviera per il colorismo che imperava nella pittura impressionista francese.

I nuovi principi coloristici da lui adottati emergono in “Arrivo del suonatore di organetto” (1883).

Il suo lavoro venne spesso rifiutato dalla critica d'arte ufficiale, e dal pubblico, perché le sue rappresentazioni erano considerate volgari o brutte.

Il critico Otto Julius Bierbaum fu più simpatico; nel 1893 scrisse: "Come pittore di bambini, per esempio, Uhde è straordinariamente bravo.

Egli non li descrive dolcemente come avviene normalmente; in altre parole non come divertenti o graziose bambole, ma con estrema e molto rigorosa naturalezza".

Intorno al 1890, Uhde divenne professore all'Accademia di Belle Arti di Monaco di Baviera.

Fu, con Max Slevogt e Lovis Corinth, una delle figure preminenti della Secessione, e successivamente aderì alla Secessione di Berlino.

Uhde divenne poi membro onorario delle Accademie di Monaco di Baviera, Dresda e Berlino.

Progredendo nella sua concezione naturalistica, Uhde ha dato luogo a un cambiamento completo nell'arte tedesca, annoverando tra i suoi seguaci le più giovani generazioni.

Morì a Monaco di Baviera nel 1911.

Opere

L'inclinazione di Uhde fu in principio orientata verso i soggetti religiosi.

Riprese la pratica di trattare realisticamente gli episodi biblici trasferendoli ai giorni nostri.

Così, in Vieni, Signore Gesù, sii nostro ospite, sito alla Galleria Nazionale di Berlino, Cristo appare nel salotto di una famiglia contadina riunita per il pasto in una moderna fattoria tedesca, e nel Discorso della montagna (Berlino, collezione privata), si rivolge a una folla di mietitori del XIX secolo.

Simile nella concezione sono Lasciate che i pargoli vengano a me (Museo di Lipsia), La notte santa (Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister a Dresda), L'ultima cena, Il viaggio a Betlemme (Pinakothek di Monaco di Baviera), e La pesca miracolosa.

Altre sue opere in collezioni pubbliche sono: Rendere grazie, al museo d'Orsay a Parigi, Cristo in Emmaus, presso lo Städelsches Kunstinstitut, Francoforte; L'addio di Tobia, presso il Castello di Liechtenstein, Vienna ed un ritratto dell'attore Wohlmuth presso il Museo Nazionale di Danimarca.

Fra le sue opere più tarde Noli me tangere (1894, New Pinakothek, Monaco), I re magi (1896, Magdeburg Museum), L'ultima cena (1897, Stuttgart Museum), Ascensione (1898, New Pinakothek, Munich), e Donna, perché piangi? (1900, Vienna Museum).

Onorificenze