Johann Frank Kirchbach (2 June 1859,

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

– 19 March 1912,

Schliersee Schliersee is a small town (Markt) and a municipality in the district of Miesbach in Bavaria in Germany. It is named after the nearby Lake Schliersee. It comprises the districts Schliersee (town), , , , Josefsthal and Spitzingsee. Among the p ...

), was a German historical-, portrait-, genre- and landscape-painter; who also operated as a graphic designer and illustrator.

Biography

His father was the artist, Ernst Kirchbach, who was in exile at the time of his birth. He received his first education at the

Dresden Academy The Dresden Academy of Fine Arts (German ''Hochschule für Bildende Künste Dresden''), often abbreviated HfBK Dresden or simply HfBK, is a vocational university of visual arts located in Dresden, Germany. The present institution is the product o ...

(1878) then, as a student of the

Munich Academy The Academy of Fine Arts, Munich (german: Akademie der Bildenden Künste München, also known as Munich Academy) is one of the oldest and most significant art academies in Germany. It is located in the Maxvorstadt district of Munich, in Bavaria, ...

, exhibited for the first time in 1881, in Munich and Berlin. In 1882, He won first prize for his painting "Duke Christoph the fighter, on the corpse of the last Abensberger" Between 1882 to 1883, he traveled to Italy, France, and England. When he returned, he took part in the painting of the

Schloss Drachenburg Schloss Drachenburg or Drachenburg Castle is a private villa styled as a palace and constructed in the late 19th century. It was completed in only two years (1882–84) on the Drachenfels hill in Königswinter, a German town on the east bank of ...

near Bonn, with scenes from the

Nibelungenlied The ( gmh, Der Nibelunge liet or ), translated as ''The Song of the Nibelungs'', is an epic poetry, epic poem written around 1200 in Middle High German. Its anonymous poet was likely from the region of Passau. The is based on an oral tradition ...

. The primary image, "The Quarrel of the Queens" was his work. He then studied in Paris, with

Mihály Munkácsy Mihály Munkácsy (20 February 1844 – 1 May 1900) was a Hungarians, Hungarian Painting, painter. He earned international reputation with his Genre works, genre pictures and large-scale Christian art, biblical paintings. Early years Munk� ...

, and created a monumental painting of " Ganymede". Between 1884 to 1886, he was in Munich and created the colossal painting, "Christ Drives the Money Changers Out of the Temple."Gr. Christus vertreibt die Wechsler aus dem Tempel He was, however, primarily busy with illustrations, such as for the works of

Goethe Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German poet, playwright, novelist, scientist, statesman, theatre director, and critic. His works include plays, poetry, literature, and aesthetic criticism, as well as treat ...

and

Paul Heyse Paul Johann Ludwig von Heyse (; 15 March 1830 – 2 April 1914) was a distinguished German writer and translator. A member of two important literary societies, the '' Tunnel über der Spree'' in Berlin and ''Die Krokodile'' in Munich, he wrote n ...

, ''

Gulliver's Travels ''Gulliver's Travels'', or ''Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. In Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of Several Ships'' is a 1726 prose satire by the Anglo-Irish writer and clergyman Jonathan ...

'' by

Jonathan Swift Jonathan Swift (30 November 1667 – 19 October 1745) was an Anglo-Irish Satire, satirist, author, essayist, political pamphleteer (first for the Whig (British political party), Whigs, then for the Tories (British political party), Tories), poe ...

, ''

The Last Days of Pompeii ''The Last Days of Pompeii'' is a novel written by Edward Bulwer-Lytton in 1834. The novel was inspired by the painting '' The Last Day of Pompeii'' by the Russian painter Karl Briullov, which Bulwer-Lytton had seen in Milan. It culminates in ...

'' by

Edward Bulwer-Lytton Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton, PC (25 May 180318 January 1873) was an English writer and politician. He served as a Whig member of Parliament from 1831 to 1841 and a Conservative from 1851 to 1866. He was Secret ...

, and various youth literature. In 1889 he was appointed as Head of Department at the

Städelschule The Städelschule (), Staatliche Hochschule für Bildende Künste, is a tertiary school of art in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. It accepts about 20 students each year from 500 applicants, and has a total of approximately 150 students of visual a ...

(Institute of Frankfurt), where he worked seven years before returning to Munich in 1896 as a teacher of life drawing at the

. In his last years, he painted mostly portraits.

Notes

Sources

* Frank Church Bach . In: Ulrich Thieme and Felix Becker, ''General Encyclopedia of Artists of the antiquity to the present'', Volume 20, EA Seemann, Leipzig, 1927, pg.348 * Hans Ries: ''Illustrations and illustrators of children's book in German-speaking 1871-1914'', Osnabrück 1992, pp. 635 et seq

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kirchbach, Frank 1859 births 1912 deaths 19th-century German painters 19th-century German male artists German male painters 20th-century German painters 20th-century German male artists