Discuss JBee's answer to: Painting 1889 H. Franz

Don't know if this is the Franz your looking for since you gave very little information!

From: "H-German Ed. Norm Goda" <GODA@polaris.umpi.maine.edu>
List Editor: "H-German Ed. Norm Goda" <GODA@polaris.umpi.maine.edu>
Editor's Subject: Franz von Stuck's "Wilde Jagd"
Author's Subject: Franz von Stuck's "Wilde Jagd"
Date Written: Wed, 12 Apr 1995 07:48:34 EST
Date Posted: Thu, 12 Apr 1995 08:48:34 -0400

Submitted by: Diane S. Clemens athena1@garnet.berkeley.edu Recently in Munich I was able to revisit a compelling painting, Franz von Stuck's (1863-1928) "Wilde Jagd" (1889), which can be found in the remarkable Room 18 the of Staedtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus. I have several questions pertaining to this painting and hope might be of interest to the H-German list. I am aware of the discussion by Robert G.L. Waite of this painting and its possible relation to Adolf Hitler (along with certain other of von Stuck's paintings)--see *The Psychopathic God: Adolf Hitler* NY: Basic Books, 1977, pp. 67-69--but would like to obtain additional information. "Wilde Jagd" portrays a ghastly and ghostly eruption of corpses, ghouls, and hellhounds led by a ferocious rider on a horse, (not eight legged), about whom swirls a red cloak. Waite identifies this rider with Wotan. Only the rider's face is in clear focus (the eyes are asymmetrical and possibly one is damaged) Thing is, "Wotan" looks astonishingly like Adolf Hitler (b. 1889), down to the bangs, mustache, and fixing hypnotic eyes (here brown but a piercing blue like to that of the future Fuehrer's eyes can be detected in the eyes of the foremost hellhound pacing beside the rider). Hitler greatly admired von Stuck, obsessed over several other of his paintings (including "Die Suende" and "Medusa"), and in 1940 acquired "Siren with a Harp," a wild-eyed nude with a snake like-tale, according to Waite, who also cites Ernst Hanfstaengl as having heard Hitler declare that "the two artists who had the greatest impact on his life were Richard Wagner and Franz von Stuck," Waite p. 67). The questions I would like to pose are these: 1) Is the legend of the -Wilde Jagd- associated only with Wotan? That is, would a viewer of a painting entitled "Wilde Jagd" necessarily say, "Oh, yes, there's Wotan, for sure." Or does the legend of a wild hell hunt across the skies have multiple versions and candidates for the lead rider? 2. What were von Stuck's sources and inspiration for this painting, the first oilwork by this ascendant young Muenchener? His own inscription on it defines it as "mein erstes Oelgemaelde, 1889." In general von Stuck drew upon classical Greek and Biblical themes for his works embodying a modernist (for the time) Wilhelmine ac/dc kink and eros. (He was also an accomplished portrait painter and sculptor). But I know of only one other von Stuck painting, "Die Nibelunge Not" (1920), that taps into Germanic myth/legend. 3. Where was and who had this painting before 1929, after which time, as Waite conjectures, Hitler could easily have seen "Wilde Jagd" since it was acquired and exhibited in the Public Gallery in Munich at the Old Glass Palace, 1929-31, and, after a fire, later transfered to the Lenbachhaus? 4. Who was the model for this painting? The mustachioed Von Stuck himself as he might have looked into his mirror on a particularly bad unshaven hungover morning? (Later on he posed himself for several of his centaur paintings). Or is "Wotan" meant to resemble, say, a haggard proletarian coal miner, just up from a pit in the Saarland? In this view, one might narrowly interpret this disturbing painting as foreboding revolutionary upheaval and chaos. It is eerie that von Stuck's first painting coincides with Hitler's birthyear, powerfully resembles the future dictator, and is virtually unique among von Stuck's oevre; this is his furthest essay into a fully nightmarish realm. Given Hitler's recorded strong interest in von Stuck it seems plausible at least that he could have seen "Wilde Jagd," and been struck by the coincidence in birth date/painting date and influenced by the portrayal of the rider, especially if he identified that rider with Wotan. Waite hypothesizes that the similarity in appearance may have been the result of Hitler's having deliberately modeled himself, "--forelock, mustache, and the red cape he affected at Nuremberg party rallies--to conform to this image of the hard-riding apotheosis of brutality, power, and destruction," (Waite, p. 69), but undoubtedly many will think this is pushing an uncanny coincidence too far. Any help would be appreciated. Diane S. Clemens History UC Berkeley (athena1@garnet.berkeley.edu)