Franz Xaver Messerschmidt

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Franz Xaver Messerschmidt
Pozsony, Hungary (today Bratislava
, Slovakia)

Franz Xaver Messerschmidt (February 6, 1736 – August 19, 1783) was a German-Austrian sculptor most famous for his "character heads", a collection of busts with faces contorted in extreme facial expressions.

Early years

Born February 6, 1736, in the southwestern town of thence Bavarian Wiesensteig, located in the region of (now) Baden-Württemberg in Germany. Messerschmidt grew up in the

Maria Theresa of Austria
and executed between 1764 and 1766. Besides some other portraits he also made works with a religious subject. A number of statues commissioned by the Princess of Savoy have survived as well.

Maturity

Character Study Strong Smell, circa 1770-1781 AD. From Austria, Pressburg, now Slovakia, Bratislava. By Franz Xaver Messerschmidt. The Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Der Glaube, from a tomb monument

The Baroque period of his oeuvre ended in 1769 with a bust of the court physician

Count Kaunitz
praised Messerschmidt's abilities, but suggested that the nature of his illness (referred to as a "confusion in the head") would make such an appointment detrimental to the institution.

It is later suggested he suffered from Crohn's disease, chronic inflammation of the gastrointestinal tract that may provoke pains severe enough to cause hallucinations.[1]

Later years

Bitter, he left Vienna, moving to his native village, Wiesensteig, and from there in the same year, following an invitation, to Munich. Here he waited two years for a promised commission and for a permanent employment at the Court. In 1777 he went to Pressburg (now Bratislava) where his brother, Johann Adam worked as a sculptor. He spent the last six years of his life there. Being able to rebuild his career and to buy a house with a studio, he dedicated himself primarily to his character heads.

Character heads (Charakterköpfe )

Lithograph by Matthias Rudolph Toma depicting Messerschmidt's “Character Heads” (1839)

In 1781, German author

lower rib. Observing the resulting facial expressions in a mirror, Messerschmidt then set about recording them in marble and bronze. His intention, he told Nicolai, was to represent the 64 "canonical grimaces"
of the human face using himself as a template.

During the course of the discussion, Messerschmidt went on to explain his interest in necromancy and the arcane—not at all alien to Nicolai—and how this also inspired his character heads. Messerschmidt was a keen disciple of Hermes Trismegistus (Nicolai noted that among the few possessions that littered Messerschmidt's workshop was a copy of an illustration featuring Trismegistus) and abided by his teachings regarding the pursuit of "universal balance": a forerunner to the principles of the Golden ratio. As a result, Messerschmidt claimed that his character heads had aroused the anger of "the Spirit of Proportion", an ancient being who safeguarded this knowledge. The spirit visited him at night, and forced him to endure humiliating tortures. One of Messerschmidt's most famous heads (The Beaked[1]) was apparently inspired by one of these encounters.

  • The Laughter Kept Back
    The Laughter Kept Back
  • A Grievously Wounded Man
    A Grievously Wounded Man
  • The Satirist
    The Satirist
  • The Yawner
    The Yawner
  • A Hypocrite and Slanderer
    A Hypocrite and Slanderer
  • The Ultimate Simpleton
    The Ultimate Simpleton
  • Afflicted with Constipation
    Afflicted with Constipation
  • An Intentional Wag
    An Intentional Wag

Sources

References

  1. ^ https://www.thecollector.com/franz-xaver-messerschmidt-heads/

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Franz Xaver Messerschmidt.
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