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Friedrich Wilhelm Kuhnert (September 18, 1865 – February 11, 1926) was a German
Richard Lydekker's ''The Royal Natural History'', with 72 colour plates and 1600 engravings by Kuhnert & othersDiese Site ist vom Enkel Wilhelm Kuhnerts erstellt worden und zeigt einige seiner interessantesten Arbeiten
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Kuhnert, Wilhelm 1865 births 1926 deaths People from Opole People from the Province of Silesia Animal artists German illustrators 19th-century German painters 19th-century German male artists German male painters 20th-century German painters 20th-century German male artists German male writers
Friedrich Wilhelm Kuhnert (September 18, 1865 – February 11, 1926) was a German painter
Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ai ...
, author
An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states:
"''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...
and illustrator
An illustrator is an artist who specializes in enhancing writing or elucidating concepts by providing a visual representation that corresponds to the content of the associated text or idea. The illustration may be intended to clarify complicat ...
, who specialized in animal images. After illustrating the books of Alfred Brehm, he travelled to German East Africa to observe animals in their habitat and produced numerous paintings that defined Africa for many Germans of the period.
Life and work
Kuhnert was born in Oppeln in 1865. After the end of his technical-commercial apprenticeship at the age of 17, Kuhnert was a scholarship student at theBerlin University of the Arts
The Universität der Künste Berlin (UdK; also known in English as the Berlin University of the Arts), situated in Berlin, Germany, is the largest art school in Europe. It is a public art and design school, and one of the four research universiti ...
from 1883 to 1887. From his home 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 ...
, he embarked on travels to Scandinavia
Scandinavia; Sámi languages: /. ( ) is a subregion#Europe, subregion in Northern Europe, with strong historical, cultural, and linguistic ties between its constituent peoples. In English usage, ''Scandinavia'' most commonly refers to Denmark, ...
, Egypt
Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...
, East Africa
East Africa, Eastern Africa, or East of Africa, is the eastern subregion of the African continent. In the United Nations Statistics Division scheme of geographic regions, 10-11-(16*) territories make up Eastern Africa:
Due to the historical ...
and India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
to make landscape and animal studies. His favorite motif was the African lion. In 1901 Kuhnert was the illustrator for zoologist Johann Wilhelm Haacke's book ''Animal Life on Earth''. In 1903, he became one of the many artists selected to provide illustrations and design trading card
A trading card (or collectible card) is a small card, usually made out of paperboard or thick paper, which usually contains an image of a certain person, place or thing (fictional or real) and a short description of the picture, along with other ...
s for the Cologne chocolate company, Stollwerck. He also provided some illustrations for the 1900 edition of Brehms Tierleben
''Brehms Tierleben'' (English title: ''Brehm's Animal Life'') is a scientific reference book, first published in the 1860s by Alfred Edmund Brehm (1829–1884). It was one of the first modern popular zoological treatises. First published in ...
.
Contrary to the practice of his peers, Kuhnert distinguished himself by sketching tropical animals in the wild, not in zoos. He made pictures by sketching, etching, watercolor
Watercolor (American English) or watercolour (British English; see spelling differences), also ''aquarelle'' (; from Italian diminutive of Latin ''aqua'' "water"), is a painting method”Watercolor may be as old as art itself, going back to t ...
, and oil painting
Oil painting is the process of painting with pigments with a medium of drying oil as the binder. It has been the most common technique for artistic painting on wood panel or canvas for several centuries, spreading from Europe to the rest of ...
. Kuhnert is considered one of the most important German animal painters of his time. Kuhnert was a keen and skilled hunter himself; he returned to Africa year after year in the hunt for both game and subjects for his art.
Personal life
In 1894, he married 18-year-old Emilie Caroline Wilhelmine Ottilie Alvine Herdikerhoff. They had a daughter, Emilie. The couple divorced in 1909 while Emilie was a student inCeylon
Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...
. Kuhnert married for the second time to Gerda Jankowski in 1913. In 1925, on his 60th birthday, she died. Kuhnert died on February 11, 1926 during a recovery stay in Flims, Switzerland. His grave is in the Südwestkirchhof Stahnsdorf in Berlin.
Books by Kuhnert
* ''Animal Portraiture'' (Text byRichard Lydekker
Richard Lydekker (; 25 July 1849 – 16 April 1915) was an English naturalist, geologist and writer of numerous books on natural history.
Biography
Richard Lydekker was born at Tavistock Square in London. His father was Gerard Wolfe Lydekker, ...
). Frederick Warne & Co. London 1912
* '' Im Lande meiner Modelle'' (In the Land of My Models). Leipzig 1918. Reissued by HardPress (2013)
* ''Meine Tiere: die Radierungen Wilhelm Kuhnerts'' (My Animals: The Etchings of Wilhelm Kuhnert). Berlin 1925
Books about Kuhnert
* Angelika Grettmann-Werner: ''Wilhelm Kuhnert (1865-1926). Tierdarstellung zwischen Wissenschaft und Kunst''. Hamburg 1981 * Hansjörg Werner: ''Wer war Wilhelm Kuhnert. Der grosse deutsche Tiermaler''. *''Vollständiger Katalog der Originalradierungen des Künstlers'' (Full Catalog of Original Etchings by the Artist). Berlin 1927References
External links
Richard Lydekker's ''The Royal Natural History'', with 72 colour plates and 1600 engravings by Kuhnert & others
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Kuhnert, Wilhelm 1865 births 1926 deaths People from Opole People from the Province of Silesia Animal artists German illustrators 19th-century German painters 19th-century German male artists German male painters 20th-century German painters 20th-century German male artists German male writers