Hans von Marées

1837 – 1887

German painter, mainly of mythologies, who went to Italy in 1864. In 1869 he visited Spain, France, and the Netherlands with the writer on art, Konrad Fiedler, his future biographer. He served in the Francp-Prussian War of 1870-71, but was able to return to Italy in 1873 and began his most famous work, the frescoes in the Aquarium at Naples, on which he was assisted by Adolf von Hildebrand, the leading German sculptor. He spent the rest of his life in Italy, and, like Böcklin and Feuerbach, he was essentially a German Romantic who longed for Italy: unlike Leibl, he was untouched by the Realist movement and all that it implied. In spite of his interest in wall-painting and the success of his Naples frescoes he never succeeded in obtaining another monumental commission, The style of the frescoes is similar to that of his great French contemporary, Puvis de Chavannes. He died in Rome at the age of 49 and is buried in the Protestant Cemetery there.

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