Franz Cižek (12 June 1865 – 17 December 1946) was an
Austria
Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...
n
genre
Genre () is any style or form of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other fo ...
and
portrait
A portrait is a painting, photograph, sculpture, or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face is always predominant. In arts, a portrait may be represented as half body and even full body. If the subject in full body better r ...
painter
Painting is a Visual arts, visual art, which is characterized by the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called "matrix" or "Support (art), support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with ...
, who was a
teacher
A teacher, also called a schoolteacher or formally an educator, is a person who helps students to acquire knowledge, competence, or virtue, via the practice of teaching.
''Informally'' the role of teacher may be taken on by anyone (e.g. w ...
and reformer of
art education
Visual arts education is the area of learning that is based upon the kind of art that one can see, visual arts—drawing, painting, sculpture, printmaking, and design in jewelry, pottery, weaving, fabrics, etc. and design applied to more practi ...
. He began the Child Art Movement in Vienna, opening the Juvenile Art Class in 1897.
Life
Franz Cižek was born František Čížek on June 12, 1865 in
Litoměřice
Litoměřice (; ) is a town in the Ústí nad Labem Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 23,000 inhabitants. The historic town centre is well preserved and is protected as an urban monument reservation.
The town is the seat of the Roman C ...
(
Leitmeritz in German), in northern
Bohemia
Bohemia ( ; ; ) is the westernmost and largest historical region of the Czech Republic. In a narrow, geographic sense, it roughly encompasses the territories of present-day Czechia that fall within the Elbe River's drainage basin, but historic ...
, now in the
Czech Republic
The Czech Republic, also known as Czechia, and historically known as Bohemia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the south ...
. He came to Vienna at the age of 19.
He died there on December 17, 1946.
Career

In 1885, Cižek entered the
Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. He was a student of the German painters
Franz Rumpler,
Josef Mathias von Trenkwald, and
Siegmund L'Allemand. While a student, he lived with a family and the children visited him in his room, where he allowed them to use his art supplies and encouraged them to express themselves. He was impressed by their creativity and showed the work to fellow artists at the university, who encouraged him to start an art school for children. The Juvenile Art Classes were free of charge to children of Vienna. The children were interviewed and selected by Cizek. His teaching method had limited structure, and imagination and free expression were encouraged.
[Franz Cizek: Liberating the Child Artist](_blank)
/ref>
In 1904, he was appointed director of the Department of Experimentation and Research at the Vienna School of Applied Arts. Some of his students became teaching assistants for the children's art classes. One assistant was Erika Giovanna Klien, who later emigrated to the United States
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
and employed Cizek’s teaching methods at Stuyvesant High School and the Dalton School
The Dalton School, originally the Children's University School, is a private, coeducational college preparatory school in New York City and a member of both the Ivy Preparatory School League and the New York Interschool. The school is located in ...
. Another artist, Emmy Lichtwitz Krasso, was an assistant from 1933 to 1935, and later went to India
India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...
where she started a children's art movement in the Mumbai
Mumbai ( ; ), also known as Bombay ( ; its official name until 1995), is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra. Mumbai is the financial capital and the most populous city proper of India with an estimated population of 12 ...
schools.
In November 1920, the children's art was exhibited at the British Institute for Industrial Art in Kingsbridge, England
England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...
, and then toured the country. In 1921 Francesca Wilson, a Birmingham teacher, exhibited the child art in London. This exhibition and those for the Save the Children
The Save the Children Fund, commonly known as Save the Children, is an international non-governmental organization. It was founded in the UK in 1919; its goal is to improve the lives of children worldwide.
The organization raises money to imp ...
Fund raised interest in the Child Art Movement. They are also early examples of featuring art in raising funds and awareness for humanitarian causes.
Among those Cižek influenced was a Swiss painter and Bauhaus leader Johannes Itten. Arthur Lismer
Arthur Lismer, LL.D. (27 June 1885 – 23 March 1969) was an English-Canadian painter, member of the Group of Seven and educator. He is known primarily as a landscape painter and for his paintings of ships in dazzle camouflage.
Early life
...
, a Canadian artist, was also inspired by Cizek and John Dewey
John Dewey (; October 20, 1859 – June 1, 1952) was an American philosopher, psychologist, and Education reform, educational reformer. He was one of the most prominent American scholars in the first half of the twentieth century.
The overridi ...
to found a Children's Art Centre at the Art Gallery of Toronto
The Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO; ) is an art museum in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Located on Dundas Street, Dundas Street West in the Grange Park (neighbourhood), Grange Park neighbourhood of downtown Toronto, the museum complex takes up of phys ...
in 1933, and at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA) is an art museum in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is the largest art museum in Canada by gallery space. The museum is located on the historic Golden Square Mile stretch of Sherbrooke Street west.
The MMFA ...
in 1946. At the University of Applied Arts, Cižek taught Gertrude Hirsch who later migrated to India to pursue a life of art education and textile art. Cižek's life was described by Dr. Wilhelm Viola, his former student who became a lecturer at the Royal Drawing Society.[Kelly, Donna Darling. ''Uncovering the History of Children's Drawing and Art''. Greenwood Publishing Group, 2004:84.] Alice Mavrogordato was a former student, who became a recognized abstract painter.
References
Further reading
* Stasny, Peter
"Cižek, Franz."
In Grove Art Online. Oxford Art Online, (accessed February 4, 2012; subscription required).
* Viola, Wilhelm. ''Child Art and Franz Cizek'' (New York: Reynal and Hitchcock), 1936.
The classes of Franz Cizek, article by Mary V. Gutteridge
External links
Artist Summary at artfact.com
History of Art Education, Wikispaces
Entry for Franz Cižek
on the Union List of Artist Names
The Union List of Artist Names (ULAN) is a free online database of the Getty Research Institute using a controlled vocabulary, which by 2018 contained over 300,000 artists and over 720,000 names for them, as well as other information about artist ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cizek, Franz
1865 births
1946 deaths
19th-century Austrian painters
Austrian male painters
20th-century Austrian painters
19th-century Czech painters
19th-century Austrian male artists
Czech male painters
20th-century Czech painters
Austrian genre painters
Austrian people of Czech descent
People from Litoměřice
Academy of Fine Arts Vienna alumni
20th-century Austrian male artists
19th-century Czech male artists
20th-century Czech male artists
Painters from the Russian Empire