Emil Otto Grundmann Oil Painting Portrait of a Seated Male, Antwerp 1869

Item Details

Emil Otto Grundmann (German, 1844 – 1890)
Untitled (seated male), Antwerp 1869
Oil painting on canvas
Signed “Grundmann” to lower left
“Antwerp 1869” inscribed below signature to lower left

Grundmann, originally from Meissen, was important in the history of American art as a teacher in the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, where Joseph DeCamp was his colleague. Several of his students received a solid academic training from him and would later develop an impressionist style. Grundmann himself underwent academic training (1861-64); in addition, he took lessons from Julius Hübner (1806-1882). Sources vary on the years that he studied in Antwerp and then Düsseldorf (1868 to 1873) and in the winter of 1869 he was in Paris. His mural executed for the Hôtel de Ville at Ypres was a casualty of World War I.

Grundmann arrived in Boston in December 1876, after having been recommended by Francis Millet, who was his fellow student in Antwerp. He headed the Museum of Fine Art’s School until his unexpected death in Dresden on 27 August 1890, when Benson and Tarbell took over his duties.

Grundmann’s long hair, ‘very wide-brimmed hat, and marked foreignness, conformed to the current stereotype of a painter’ (Whitehill, 1970, p. 52). Pierce (1980, p. 8) believes his ‘quiet unostentatious power,’ and his love of music and poetry inspired ‘an appreciative student following.’ He taught both drawing and painting; according to Buckley (1995, p. 32), Grundmann emphasized portraiture and the nude figure, following his own academic background. Who Was Who in American Art (1999, vol. 2, p. 1395) relates how Grundmann required what he called ‘systematic memory training.’ Students were to execute drawings of the nude at home from memory. Besides Walter Griffin and many others, seven members of the Ten American Painters studied under Grundmann. Dewing worked as Grundmann’s assistant and Benson recalls drawing after the Antique (plaster casts) and stumping in red chalk in Grundmann’s drawing class (Bedford, 1994, p. 19).

It was Grundmann who encouraged Benson to exhibit, and to further his studies in the Académie Julian. Grundmann promoted Tarbell by offering him the position of student-teacher in drawing. Tarbell left for Paris with Joseph Lindon Smith in 1883. Grundmann would have given them a solid background in drawing, which was a characteristic quality of American impressionism. In painting, as well, Grundmann was influential: he advocated a Belgian method of painting small areas on the canvas without mixing transitional areas on the canvas itself.

Condition

- scattered inpainting throughout; repair across mid-section of subject; canvas relined.

Dimensions

- measures frame; canvas size 37" W x 45.5" H.

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Item #

ITMG385345