Bach in Arts - Bach Portraits

B-02

Type:

Bach Painting

Title:

E.G. Haussmann, Replica 1748 (?)

Description:

It is in good condition, has obviously been spared any far-reaching overpainting, the face is more expressive the notes on the manuscript of the canon clearer than in the Haussmann painting of 1746 in its present condition (B-01), with some differences in costume detail (viz. the waistcoat). It clearly served as model for several later portraits of Bach (cf. B-12 and B-13).

Measures:

Oil on canvas
76.3 x 62.8 cm
On the back a more recent label on a piece of canvas of latcr date: “Hl. Johann Sebastian Bach C. M./ Dir. mus. Lips./ Hausmann pinx : Lips : 1748”, which deviates from Haussmann’s usual type of signature.

Creator:

Painter: E.G. Haussmann
Year: Replica 1748 (?)

History:

It was first reproduced in 1950 with commentary by Hans Raupach and first exhibited at the Göttingen Bach Festival of 1950, at which time it was owned by Walter E.E. Jenke, formerly of Bad Warmbrunn in Silesia, who moved to Sutton Waldron, Blandford, Dorset, England in 1937. It was acquired by his family from a Berlin antique dealer some time after 1800, and since 1953 has been in private ownership in the USA. (William H. Scheide, Princeton, N. J., USA). A decision whether this second version of the Haussmann portrait, presumably executed at the family’s request, is a genuine replica, finally depends on the question of whether the signature visible today does in fact correspond to the original one covered by canvas (which has never yet been uncovered to date), or whether it is just evidence of the model from which the copy was made, with the date 1748 in error for 1746. Regarding its identification as C.P.E. Bach’s Haussmann portrait and J. Chr. Kittel’s Erfurt picture cf. p. 398.

The eminent British conductor, and one of the world’s foremost Bach experts and performers, John Eliot Gardiner, was responsible for persuading William H. Scheide, a US philanthropist and fellow Bach aficionado who bought the portrait in 1951, to bequeath it to the city of Leipzig in his will. “Scheide had the generosity to change his will and make the portrait an outright gift to the Bach archive, so that Bach has been able to return to his place of origin,” said John Eliot Gardiner. William H. Scheide passes away on November 14, 2014. After a short farewell ceremony following Scheide’s death at the age of 100, the painting was flown in April 2015 from his home in Princeton, New Jersey, to Leipzig, where J.S. Bach spent his most productive years as Thomaskantors, from 1723 until his death in 1750.

Current Location:

Previous: William H. Scheide, Princeton, N. J., USA (1953-2015)
Current: Bach Museum | Bach-Archiv Leipzig, Leipzig, Saxony, Germany (from 2015)

Photograph by:

01: William H. Scheide, Princeton, N. J., USA
02: AP

Comments:

Buy item at:

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Source/Links:
Bach-Dokumente IV (1979)
The Face of Bach
Painting of Johann Sebastian Bach returns home to Leipzig (The Guardian) [June 12, 2015]; Photo 02: AP
Bach is coming home! (Bach Musum Leipzig) [April 29, 2015]
Contributor: Thomas Braatz (December 2007); Jose Solis (June 2015)