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Paul Cassirer (21 February 1871, in
Cassirer collection, 1906-1933
(0.5 linear ft.) is housed in th
a
Stanford University Libraries
History of the Cassirer family
Biographical details of Paul Cassirer
an
other documents related to Paul Cassirer
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cassirer, Paul German art dealers German art collectors Jewish art collectors 19th-century German Jews 19th-century art collectors 20th-century art collectors People from the Province of Silesia People from Görlitz 1871 births Suicides by firearm in Germany 1926 suicides
Paul Cassirer (21 February 1871, in Görlitz
Görlitz (; pl, Zgorzelec, hsb, Zhorjelc, cz, Zhořelec, :de:Ostlausitzer Mundart, East Lusatian dialect: ''Gerlz'', ''Gerltz'', ''Gerltsch'') is a town in the Germany, German state of Saxony. It is located on the Lusatian Neisse River, and ...
– 7 January 1926, in Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...
) was a German art dealer
An art dealer is a person or company that buys and sells works of art, or acts as the intermediary between the buyers and sellers of art.
An art dealer in contemporary art typically seeks out various artists to represent, and builds relationshi ...
and editor who played a significant role in the promotion of the work of artists of the Berlin Secession
The Berlin Secession was an art movement established in Germany on May 2, 1898. Formed in reaction to the Association of Berlin Artists, and the restrictions on contemporary art imposed by Kaiser Wilhelm II, 65 artists "seceded," demonstrating ag ...
and of French Impressionists
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open Composition (visual arts), composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating ...
and Post-Impressionists
Post-Impressionism (also spelled Postimpressionism) was a predominantly French art movement that developed roughly between 1886 and 1905, from the last Impressionist exhibition to the birth of Fauvism. Post-Impressionism emerged as a reaction aga ...
, in particular that of Vincent van Gogh
Vincent Willem van Gogh (; 30 March 185329 July 1890) was a Dutch Post-Impressionism, Post-Impressionist painter who posthumously became one of the most famous and influential figures in Western art history. In a decade, he created about 2 ...
and Paul Cézanne
Paul Cézanne ( , , ; ; 19 January 1839 – 22 October 1906) was a French artist and Post-Impressionism, Post-Impressionist painter whose work laid the foundations of the transition from the 19th-century conception of artistic endeavour to a ...
.
Starting out
Paul Cassirer started out as a student of art history, and then became a writer in 1890sMunich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...
, where he worked for the weekly magazine ''Simplicissimus
:''Simplicissimus is also a name for the 1668 novel Der abenteuerliche Simplicissimus, Simplicius Simplicissimus and its protagonist.''
''Simplicissimus'' () was a satire, satirical German language, German weekly magazine, headquartered in Munich ...
'' and published two novels.
Cassirer moved to Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...
, and he and his cousin Bruno
Bruno may refer to:
People and fictional characters
*Bruno (name), including lists of people and fictional characters with either the given name or surname
* Bruno, Duke of Saxony (died 880)
* Bruno the Great (925–965), Archbishop of Cologne, ...
, while still in their mid 20s, opened their gallery on the ground floor of Paul's house in the up-market Viktoriastrasse. The cousins came from a prominent family, whose members included the neurologist Richard Cassirer
Richard Cassirer (23 April 1868 – 20 August 1925) was a German neurologist born into a Jewish family in Breslau.
After receiving his medical doctorate in 1891, he became assistant at the psychiatric clinic in Breslau under Karl Wernicke (1848& ...
and the philosopher Ernst Cassirer
Ernst Alfred Cassirer ( , ; July 28, 1874 – April 13, 1945) was a German philosopher. Trained within the Neo-Kantian Marburg School, he initially followed his mentor Hermann Cohen in attempting to supply an idealistic philosophy of science.
Aft ...
. Paul was born into a Jew
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""Th ...
ish family. His father, Louis, was an engineer and businessman, whose company — Kabelwerke Dr. Cassirer & Co. — manufactured telegraphic cables, and was eventually taken over by Siemens
Siemens AG ( ) is a German multinational conglomerate corporation and the largest industrial manufacturing company in Europe headquartered in Munich with branch offices abroad.
The principal divisions of the corporation are ''Industry'', '' ...
.
In 1895 he married Lucie Oberwarth.
In 1901 Cassirer visited Julien Leclercq's retrospective of Van Gogh's work, and later that year he organized the inclusion of five Van Gogh canvases in the May show of the Berlin Secession.
On 21 May 1904, Cassirer and Lucie divorced.
Second marriage
In 1910 he married Ottilie Godefroy (18 August 1880, Vienna – 21 February 1971, Berlin), the actress well-known under her pseudonymTilla Durieux
Tilla Durieux (born Ottilie Godeffroy; 18 August 1880 – 21 February 1971) was an Austrian theatre and film actress of the first decades of the 20th century.
Early Years
Born Ottilie Helene Angela Godeffroy
on 18 August 1880, she was the daug ...
. Tilla had very briefly been married to the painter Eugen Spiro
Eugene Spiro, born Eugen Spiro (April 18, 1874 in Breslau, Silesia – September 26, 1972 in New York City) was a German and American painter.
He was born to a Jewish family in Breslau. In 1904 Spiro was briefly married to the famous actre ...
six years earlier. She and Cassirer were married for sixteen years, but the union was to end tragically.
In 1910 Cassirer also resurrected the periodical ''Pan''.
Art dealing and collecting
On April 11, 1900, Paul Cassirer purchased "Rue St. Honoré, après midi, effet de pluie", by French ImpressionistCamille Pissarro
Jacob Abraham Camille Pissarro ( , ; 10 July 1830 – 13 November 1903) was a Danish-French Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist painter born on the island of Saint Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands, St Thomas (now in the US Virgin Islands, but t ...
(the “Painting”). from Durand-Ruel. Julius Cassirer acquired it from him, passing it to Lilly Cassirer Neubauer, after his death. The painting has been the object of a claim for restitution for Nazi-looted art by the Cassirer family
Death
On 7 January 1926, Cassirer met his wife in a lawyer's office to finalize the divorce proceedings. He excused himself and walked into another room, where he shot himself. Like that of Van Gogh, the artist he had done so much to promote, Cassirer's suicide was not immediately successful. He died from the injury a few hours later.Resources
Notes
References
* Brühl, Georg: ''Die Cassirers: Streiter für den Impressionismus'',Edition Leipzig
Edition Leipzig was a publisher in the German Democratic Republic (GDR/DDR), which, for the most part, placed books on Western markets as an export publisher. This was intended to serve representative purposes as well as to procure foreign curr ...
, Leipzig 1991,
* Feilchenfeldt, Rahel E., & Brandis, Markus: ''Paul Cassirer Verlag, Berlin 1898-1933. Eine kommentierte Bibliographie'', K. G. Saur, München 2002,
* Paret, Peter: ''The Berlin Secession. Modernism and its enemies in Imperial Germany'', Harvard University Press
Harvard University Press (HUP) is a publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University, and focused on academic publishing. It is a member of the Association of American University Presses. After the retirem ...
1980
* Saltzman, Cynthia: ''Portrait of Dr Gachet'', Viking Penguin
Viking Press (formally Viking Penguin, also listed as Viking Books) is an American publishing company owned by Penguin Random House. It was founded in New York City on March 1, 1925, by Harold K. Guinzburg and George S. Oppenheim and then acquire ...
, 1998,
Research resources
Cassirer collection, 1906-1933
(0.5 linear ft.) is housed in th
a
Stanford University Libraries
External links
History of the Cassirer family
Biographical details of Paul Cassirer
an
other documents related to Paul Cassirer
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cassirer, Paul German art dealers German art collectors Jewish art collectors 19th-century German Jews 19th-century art collectors 20th-century art collectors People from the Province of Silesia People from Görlitz 1871 births Suicides by firearm in Germany 1926 suicides