Julius Meier-Graefe
| Meier-Graefe, Julius | |
|---|---|
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| Born |
Julius Meier, June 10, 1867 Pesitza, Banat, Hungary, now Romania |
| Died | June 5, 1935 (aged 67) Vevey, Switzerland |
| Nationality | German |
| Occupation | Art critic, novelist |
Julius Meier-Graefe (June 10, 1867 – June 5, 1935) was a German art critic and novelist.
His writings on Impressionism, Post-Impressionism as well as on art of earlier and more recent generations, with his most important contributions translated into French, Russian and English, are considered to have been instrumental for the understanding and the lasting success of these artistic movements.
Meier-Graefe was born in Reschitz, Banat, Hungary, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and now located in modern Romania. He was the son of Eduard Meier, a government civil engineer, and Marie Graefe, (d. 1867) who died giving birth to him. The family, including his brother Max Meier, moved to a small town near Düsseldorf, Germany. He chose the hyphenated surname Meier-Graefe to honour the mother he never knew.
After studying engineering in Munich in 1888 and marrying Clotilde Vitzthum von Eckstädt (who was related to the art historian Georg Vitzthum von Eckstädt), he moved to Berlin, where, in 1890, he took up the study of history in general and art history in particular. He began his literary career as a fiction writer with two novellas, "Ein Abend bei Laura" (1890) and "Nach Norden" (1893), His first work of art criticism was published in 1894; the topic was Edvard Munch. In 1895 he was among the founders of the arts and literary periodical Pan, but he left the magazine after a year and founded the Jugendstil (Art Nouveau) magazine Dekorative Kunst in 1897 and soon thereafter opened La Maison Moderne, a gallery that showcased Art Nouveau works.. The gallery closed in 1903.
The centennial exhibition of German art in the National Gallery in Berlin in 1906 featured Meier-Graefe's presentation of previously little-known works, and through his efforts, the art of Caspar David Friedrich was first introduced to a wider audience. Similarly, his 1910 book "Spanische Reise" ("Spanish Journey") led to the "rediscovery" of El Greco and the positioning of the artist as a forerunner to the Expressionists.
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