Max Slevogt (8 October 1868 – 20 September 1932) was a German

Impressionist Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...

painter and illustrator, best known for his

landscape A landscape is the visible features of an area of land, its landforms, and how they integrate with natural or man-made features, often considered in terms of their aesthetic appeal.''New Oxford American Dictionary''. A landscape includes the ...

s. He was, together with Lovis Corinth and Max Liebermann, one of the foremost representatives in Germany of the plein air style.

Biography

250px, Slevogthof Neukastel He was born in

Landshut Landshut (; bar, Landshuad) is a town in Bavaria in the south-east of Germany. Situated on the banks of the River Isar, Landshut is the capital of Lower Bavaria, one of the seven administrative regions of the Free State of Bavaria. It is also t ...

, Germany, in 1868. From 1885 to 1889 he studied at the Munich Academy, and his early paintings are dark in tone, exemplifying the prevailing style in Munich. In 1889 Slevogt visited Paris, where he attended the

Académie Julian The Académie Julian () was a private art school for painting and sculpture founded in Paris, France, in 1867 by French painter and teacher Rodolphe Julian (1839–1907) that was active from 1868 through 1968. It remained famous for the number a ...

. In 1896, he drew caricatures for the magazines '' Simplicissimus'' and ''Jugend'', and the next year he had his first solo exhibition in Vienna. Toward the end of the 1890s his palette brightened. He travelled again to Paris in 1900, where he was represented in the German pavilion of the world exhibition with the work ''Scheherezade'', and was greatly impressed by the paintings of Édouard Manet. In 1901 he joined the Berlin Secession. A trip to Egypt in 1914 resulted in 21 oil paintings in a fresh bright style, as well as numerous watercolors and drawings; on the return journey he stopped off in Italy. In June he acquired the country seat Neukastel. After the outbreak of World War I he was sent as official war painter to the western front. The war experience brought about a search for new style appropriate to the expression of the horrors of war. In the same year he became a member of the Prussian Academy of Arts in Berlin. He designed scenery for the performance of

Mozart Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 17565 December 1791), baptised as Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period (music), Classical period. Despite his short life, his ra ...

's ''

Don Giovanni ''Don Giovanni'' (; K. 527; Vienna (1788) title: , literally ''The Rake Punished, or Don Giovanni'') is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. Its subject is a centuries-old Spanis ...

'' in the Dresdner state opera in 1924. His work was part of the painting event in the art competition at the

1928 Summer Olympics The 1928 Summer Olympics ( nl, Olympische Zomerspelen 1928), officially known as the Games of the IX Olympiad ( nl, Spelen van de IXe Olympiade) and commonly known as Amsterdam 1928, was an international multi-sport event that was celebrated from ...

. In 1929 he was given a large 60th birthday exhibition in the Prussian academy of the arts in Berlin. During the last year of his life he worked on the religious mural ''Golgatha'' in the peace church in Ludwigshafen on the Rhine. It was destroyed by bombing raids during World War II. Max Slevogt died in

Leinsweiler Leinsweiler is a municipality in Südliche Weinstraße district, in Rhineland-Palatinate, western Germany. With other small villages, it forms the “Verbandsgemeinde” (‘collective municipality’) Landau-Land. (Named after the city of Landa ...

(at that time in the Rheinpfalz part of Bavaria) in 1932. He is buried in the burial place of the family Finkler east of his house, the so-called Slevogthof (with wall paintings) at Neukastel.

Restitutions of artworks

In 2020 the Saarland Cultural Heritage Foundation announced the return of the following Max Slevogt works to the heirs of

Julius Freund Julius Freund (18 April 1869 in Cottbus – 11 March 1941 in Wigton, Borough of Allerdale, United Kingdom) was a German entrepreneur and art collector persecuted by the Nazis because he was Jewish. Life The Cottbus-born textile manufacturer Ju ...

, whose family was racially persecuted as Jews after 30 January 1933 and forced to sell under the Nazis. * ''Francisco d'Andrade (Head Study)'', 1902, oil on canvas. * ''The Port of Brindisi'', 1914, watercolor * ''Li-Hung-Tschang'', 1900, ink drawing * ''Scheherezade tells her story to the Caliph'', 1901, pen drawing * ''Mungos'', 1901, watercolor pen drawing * ''Lamenting Women (Lamenting Women in front of a House)'', ca.1898–1903, pen and ink drawing

Selected paintings

File:Slevogt, Max - Danae - Google Art Project.jpg, '' Danaë'' (1895) File:Max Slevogt - Portrait of the dancer Marietta di Rigardo - Google Art Project.jpg, ''Portrait of the Dancer Marietta di Rigardo'' (1904) File:Max Slevogt - Grape harvest - M.Ob.2561 - National Museum in Warsaw.jpg, ''Grape Harvest'' (ca. 1900–1909) File:Max Slevogt - Der Sänger Francisco d'Andrade als Don Giovanni in Mozarts Oper - Google Art Project.jpg, ''

Francisco d'Andrade Francisco Augusto D'Andrade, or De Andrade, (11 January 1856 – 8 February 1921) was a Portuguese baritone who sang leading roles in opera houses throughout Europe, including five years as the principal baritone at the Royal Italian Opera in Lo ...

'' (1912) File:1913 Slevogt Unter den Linden anagoria.JPG, ''Under the Linden Trees'' (1913) File:Sudanese Women in Egypt by Max Slevogt (1914), Albertinum, Dresden.jpg, ''Sudanese Women in Egypt'' (1914), Albertinum

References

External links

Max Slevogt-Galery Schloss Villa Ludwigshöhe in Edenkoben
*
works by the artist at "Museumsportal Schleswig-Holstein"
* Slevogthof Neukastel (at Leinsweiler)
''German masters of the nineteenth century: paintings and drawings from the Federal Republic of Germany''
a full text exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, which contains material on Max Slevogt (no. 83–86)

{{DEFAULTSORT:Slevogt, Max 19th-century German painters 19th-century German male artists German male painters 20th-century German painters 20th-century German male artists 1868 births 1932 deaths Académie Julian alumni Impressionist artists German Impressionist painters Recipients of the Pour le Mérite (civil class) Orientalist painters People from Landshut Olympic competitors in art competitions