Georg Decker
Austro-Hungarian portrait artist (1818–1894)
Georg Decker
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Born |
(
1818-12-07
)
7 December 1818
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Died |
13 February 1894
(1894-02-13)
(aged
75)
Vienna
, Austria
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Nationality | Austro-Hungarian |
Alma mater | Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna |
Known for | Portrait art |
Awards | Knight's Cross of the Order of Franz Joseph |
Patron(s) | Franz Joseph I of Austria |
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/ba/Georg_Decker_-_Kaiser_Franz_Joseph_I._von_%C3%96sterreich.jpg/170px-Georg_Decker_-_Kaiser_Franz_Joseph_I._von_%C3%96sterreich.jpg)
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/04/Georg_Decker_-_Kaiserin_Elisabeth_von_%C3%96sterreich.jpg/170px-Georg_Decker_-_Kaiserin_Elisabeth_von_%C3%96sterreich.jpg)
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/32/Portrait_of_Field_Marshal_Johann_Josef_Wenzel_Graf_Radetzky_von_Radetz_%28by_Georg_Decker%29_-_Heeresgeschichtliches_Museum.jpg/170px-Portrait_of_Field_Marshal_Johann_Josef_Wenzel_Graf_Radetzky_von_Radetz_%28by_Georg_Decker%29_-_Heeresgeschichtliches_Museum.jpg)
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3c/Georg_Decker_Archduke_Charles_-_Duke_of_Teschen.jpg/170px-Georg_Decker_Archduke_Charles_-_Duke_of_Teschen.jpg)
Georg Decker (7 December 1818 – 13 February 1894) was an Austro-Hungarian portrait artist .
Decker was born in Hungary to a German-speaking family , and grew up and made his career in Vienna, where he taught painting as well as working as a portrait and historical artist. Thanks to his teaching, he was sometimes referred to as Herr Professor Georg Decker .
Appointed as a knight of the Order of Franz Joseph , [1] Decker has been called "a renowned portraitist of Vienna's highest society". [2]
Life
Decker was one of the sons of the artist Johann Stephan Decker and the brother of the artists Albert (1817–1871) and Gabriel Decker (1821–1855). He was born in Pest , in the Kingdom of Hungary , but in 1821 the Decker family moved to the imperial city of Vienna , where he grew up and was taught to draw and paint in watercolour and miniature by his father. [3] As early as 1835, a drawing by Georg Decker of the composer Wenzel Müller was lithographed by F. Wolf. [4] He began to exhibit watercolours in 1837 and in the early 1840s was accepted as a student at the Academy of Fine Arts , where he learnt to paint in oils. After that, Decker painted portraits in oils, and then from the 1850s also in pastels , having studied the work of Mengs and Liotard in Dresden and been captivated by the medium. Great success in this field soon followed. [3] By 1860, Decker was conducting a private art school and in 1861 became a member of the Vienna Künstlerhaus . [5]
Outside the world of art, Decker was an active member of the Vienna Chess Company ( Wiener Schachgesellschaft ) while Albert Salomon Anselm von Rothschild was its driving force. [2]
In 1851 Decker married Ottilie von Sobek, who died in 1860. [5] In 1861 he married secondly Josefine Helene von Lucam (1829–1914). [6]
On his son's name day on 17 April 1869, the Emperor Franz Joseph presented the ten-year old Rudolf, Crown Prince of Austria , with a portrait of Archduke Charles, Duke of Teschen , victor of Aspern , by Decker. [7] In 1872, the Emperor rewarded Decker's achievements in art by giving him the Knight's Cross of the Order of Franz Joseph . [1]
When Decker died in 1894, the city of Vienna acquired a large number of sketches and portrait lithographs from his estate. [8] He was buried in the Vienna Central Cemetery , and in 1909 a street in the Meidling district of Vienna was named Deckergasse in his honour, the mayor's year-book describing him as "the outstanding Viennese painter ( hervorragenden Wiener Maler ) Georg Decker" and noting that Deckergasse was near Canalettogasse . [9] The Deckergasse crosses the Wilhelmsdorfer Park, which is also known as the Decker Park. [10]
Selected works
- Portrait of Wenzel Müller , 1835, drawing printed as lithograph [4]
- Portrait of Admiral Wilhelm von Tegetthoff , later than 1866, pastels on card, Heeresgeschichtliches Museum, Vienna [11]
- Portrait of Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian , c. 1857, pastels on card, Heeresgeschichtliches Museum, Vienna [12]
- Lottery on the Brandstätte , watercolour, Vienna Museum
- Portrait of Radetzky , in pastels, c. 1850, Vienna Museum [13]
- Portrait of Radetzky, 1850, oil on canvas, Museum of Military History, Vienna [14]
- Portrait of Archduke Charles, Duke of Teschen , after Anton Einsle , later than 1847, oil on canvas, Albertina , Vienna
- Portrait of Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor , pastels, Albertina, Vienna [15]
- Portrait of Leopold von Rauch , c. 1842, lithograph, Regional Museum, Most , Czech Republic [16]
- Portrait of Empress Elisabeth of Austria , 1869, after Winterhalter
- Portrait of Archduchess Margarethe, daughter of Ferdinand IV, Grand Duke of Tuscany , as a child, pastels on card, 1883
- Portrait of Archduke Leopold Ferdinand of Austria as a child, pastels on card
References
- 1 2 Morgen-Post Wien , 27 November 1872 ( p. 579 )
- 1 2 Fabrizio Zavatarelli, Ignaz Kolisch: The Life and Chess Career (2015), p. 280
- 1 2 "Decker, Georg", in Ulrich Thieme, Felix Becker, eds. Allgemeines Lexikon der Bildenden Künstler von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart , vol. 8: (Leipzig: Coutan–Delattre, 1912), p. 522
- 1 2 Constantin von Wurzbach , Biographisches Lexikon des Kaiserthums Oesterreich: Moll—Mysliveczek (1868), p. 413
- 1 2 Führer durch die Gemälde-galerie Volume 3 (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, 1897), p. 209
- ↑ Heinz Schöny, Wiener Künstler-Ahnen: Genealogische Daten u. Ahnenlisten Wiener Maler , Volume 2, Selbstverl. d. Heraldisch-Genealog. Ges. "Adler," 1975, p. 12
- ↑ "Wien, 20 April", in Neues Wiener Tagblatt: demokratisches Organ , 20 April 1869 ( p. 241, column 1 ) [in German]
- ↑ Die Gemeindeverwaltung der Stadt Wien (Vienna, 1898), p. 604
- ↑ Die Gemeinde-Verwaltung der k.k. Reichshaupt- und Residenzstadt Wien (Vienna Bürgermeister, 1910), p. 119
- ↑ Maria Auböck, Gisa Ruland, Grün in Wien: ein Führer zu den Gärten, Parks und Landschaften der Stadt (Falter, 1994), pp. 187–188
- ↑ Ulrich A Schöndorfer, Wilhelm von Tegetthoff (1958), p. 74
- ↑ Das Heeresgeschichtliche Museum in Wien (Vienna: H. Böhlaus. 1960), p. 57
- ↑ Die Österreichisch-ungarische Monarchie in Wort und Bild , Volume 3 (K.K. Hof- und Staatsdruckerei, 1887), p. 251
- ↑ Manfried Rauchensteiner, Manfred Litscher, Das Heeresgeschichtliche Museum in Wien (Vienna: Verlag Styria, 2000, ISBN 3-222-12834-0 ), p. 48
- ↑ John P. Evans, A Quite Remarkable Man (2014), p. 288
- ↑ Adolf Kirschner, Erinnerungen an Goethes Ulrike und an die Familie von Levetzow-Rauch (1904)
Further reading
- Constantin von Wurzbach : "Decker, Georg", in Biographisches Lexikon des Kaiserthums Oesterreich , Part 3 (Vienna, 1858), p. 194
- Felix Czeike , ed. "Decker Georg" in Historisches Lexikon Wien , vol. 2, De—Gy (Vienna: Kremayr & Scheriau, 1993, ISBN 3-218-00544-2 ), pp. 1 & 2
- Franziska Schmid, "Decker, Georg" in Neue Deutsche Biographie , vol. 3 (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1957, ISBN 3-428-00184-2 ), p. 545
See also
External links
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