Adam Adolf Oberländer (1 October 1845, Regensburg29 May 1923,

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...

) was a German

caricaturist A caricaturist is an artist who specializes in drawing caricatures. List of caricaturists * Abed Abdi (born 1942) * Al Hirschfeld (1903–2003) * Alex Gard (1900–1948) * Alexander Saroukhan (1898–1977) * Alfred Grévin (1827–1892) * Alf ...

, illustrator, cartoonist and early

comics artist A cartoonist is a visual artist who specializes in both drawing and writing cartoons (individual images) or comics (sequential images). Cartoonists differ from comics writers or comic book illustrators in that they produce both the literary a ...

Biography

He was born at Regensburg, but after 1847 lived in

. He studied painting at the Munich Academy under

Karl von Piloty Karl Theodor von Piloty (1 October 1826 – 21 July 1886) was a German painter, noted for his historical subjects, and recognised as the foremost representative of the realistic school in Germany. Life and work Piloty was born in Munich. His fa ...

beginning in 1861, but found that

historical painting History painting is a genre in painting defined by its subject matter rather than any artistic style or specific period. History paintings depict a moment in a narrative story, most often (but not exclusively) Greek and Roman mythology and Bible ...

did not suit his particular talent. He soon discovered that the true expression of his genius was in the field of caricature and comic drawings, revealed in a humorous cartoon published in 1863 in the ''

Fliegende Blätter The ' ("Flying Leaves"; also translated as "Flying Pages" or "Loose Sheets") was a German weekly humor and satire magazine appearing between 1845 and 1944 in Munich. Many of the illustrations were by well-known artists such as Wilhelm Busch, Co ...

''. He joined the staff of the ''Fliegende Blätter'', to which he became a constant contributor and leading artist. Unlike

Wilhelm Busch Heinrich Christian Wilhelm Busch (14 April 1832 – 9 January 1908) was a German humorist, poet, illustrator, and painter. He published wildly innovative illustrated tales that remain influential to this day. Busch drew on the tropes of f ...

, whose aim was the utmost simplicity of line, and whose drawings form a running commentary on the caption, Oberländer's work is essentially pictorial, and expressive in itself, without the extraneous aid of the written line. Among his best drawings are his parodies on the style of well-known painters, such as the ''Variations on the Kissing Theme''. Other subjects are taken from mythology, fairy lore, fables, animal life and the customs and habits of the German middle class. His works were collected in the ''Oberländer-Album'', published by Braun and Schneider in Munich (1879–1901), and reprinted a number of times, most recently by Rosenheimer in 1982 (). He was also a painter of some note, and pictures of his are in the galleries of Munich, Berlin, Dresden and other cities of Germany and in private collections.

Selected drawings from ''Fliegende Blätter''

File:Fliegende Blaetter 85 37 b1.jpg File:Fliegende Blaetter 85 36 b1.jpg File:Fliegende Blaetter 85 36 b2.jpg File:Fliegende Blaetter 85 35 b2.jpg

Notes

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External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Oberlander, Adolf German caricaturists German cartoonists German editorial cartoonists German comics artists 1845 births 1923 deaths Academy of Fine Arts, Munich alumni