Amazon attacked by Panther by August Kiss 1839

October 20, 2022

Amazon attacked by Panther by August Kiss 1839

"For thee [Artemis], too, the Amazons, whose mind is set on war, in Ephesos (Ephesus) beside the sea established an image beneath an oak trunk, and Hippo performed a holy rite for thee, and they themselves, O Oupis (Opis) Queen, around the image danced a war-dance--first in shields and armour, and again in a circle arraying a spacious choir. And the loud pipes thereto piped shrill accompaniment, that they might foot the dance together--for not yet did they pierce the bones of the fawn [i.e. to make flutes] . . . And the echo reached unto Sardis and to the Berekynthian range. And they with their feet beat loudly and therewith their quivers rattled. And afterwards around that image was raised a shrine of broad foundations [i.e. the Ephesian shrine]. That it shall dawn behold nothing more divine, naught richer. Easily would it outdo Pytho [Delphoi]."

-Callimachus, Hymn 3 to Artemis 240 ff (trans. Mair) (Greek poet C3rd BCE)

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"Karl Friedrich Schinkel, the designer of the museum originally wanted to place here the equestrian statues of the two Prussian kings donating the museum, Frederick William III and IV. In fact, the museum, built between 1823 and 1830 as Königliches Museum, housed the royal private collections, and aimed at sharing their antique heritage with the educated bourgeoisie. However, Frederick William IV did not want royal statues here. Nevertheless, the idea was already on its way, and the stair railings cried out after equestrian statues.

The first equestrian statue, the Amazon killing a tiger or simply Amazon by the Silesia-born but Berlin-educated sculptor August Kiss was placed on the right rail in 1843. The September 30 issue of Illustrirte Zeitung reported in detail about its set-up and also provided art criticism. According to the author monogrammed L. R., the greatest merit of the work is that it was cast from public donation. The artist “was bold enough” to model the sculpture in life size in his studio, and only later a “large association of enthusiastic friends of art, led by the King” (of which Schinkel was also a member) collected the sum necessary to casting. This is, then, the first – albeit not visible – link between the museum and the sculpture: the active participation – “sacrifice” – of the educated burgeoisie in the enrichment of the new center of bourgeois culture – or, in the vocabulary and conception, its “temple”.

The prolific critic Karl August Varnhagen also praises the sculpture for this reason: “It is a great, bold, expressive and powerful work. … One can see that the horse is already lost, but the person is triumphing. The beautiful amazon radiating with spiritual superiority will survive, and will at least take revenge for the horse.” This concern for a secondary figure is unusual from a critic, but we know that Varnhagen fought the Napoleonic wars under Austrian, Prussian and Russian flags, and was able to exactly gauge what it means to lose a horse in an emergency. However, no one is yet concerned for the tiger at this time.

The Fairmount Park Art Association (now the Association for Public Art) acquired the plaster casts for both works in 1889, but the Amazon cast was in such poor condition that it could not be shipped to the United States.

With the assistance of the German government, a new plaster cast was made from the original bronze and exhibited in Memorial Hall until 1909. The decision to commission only American art prompted the Association to present the Amazon as a gift to Harvard’s Germanic Museum. However, once construction began on the new building for the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Association arranged to cast another copy so that it could sit across from The Lion Fighter."

-taken from associationforpublicart and riowang's blogspot

Amazon attacked by Panther by August Kiss 1841. Altes Museum.

1st May 1936: Rally in Berlin.

Detail of horse strap with year made and swastika decoration.

Horse strap with swastika design.

Illustrirte Zeitung, September 30, 1843.

John Absolon: The Eastern Wing of the Crystal Palace, 1851.

In this 1854 photograph, the Amazon is still alone along the steps of the museum. But her mate, the lion killer, “der Löwenkämpfer” is already on the way. It was created between 1847 and 1856 by Albert Wolff, who was a student of the same Christian Daniel Rauch, founder of the Berlin School of Sculpture and leading sculptor of 19th-century Germany, as Kiss.

Photo by Adolphe Braun & Compagnie, ca. 1860-66.

6 June 1939. Adolf Hitler speaks in front of Berlin's Altes Museum on the occasion of the return of the Legion Condor.

State ceremony for the Condor Legion in Berlin, 1939. Color unit of the Condor Legion (with the colors, the Spanish bandera) in front of the lectern in the Lustgarten, Berlin during Adolf Hitler's speech. In the background, soldiers of a guard regiment, members of the Hitler Youth holding nameplates of the fallen, and the facade of the Altes Museum.