Adolf von Meckel

1856 – 1893

Adolf Meckel von Hemsbach, German landscape and genre painter. He was a descendant of Johann Friedrich Meckel the Elder (1724-1774), German anatomist and founder of the Meckel Collection. His father was Johann Heinrich Meckel von Hemsbach (1821-1856), professor of pathological anatomy. After the early death of his father, he spent his childhood with the maternal grandparents in Saint Petersburg. He attended high school in Stuttgart, where he had his first drawing lessons. He studied painting at the Karlsruhe Academy of Fine Arts under Hans Gude (1825-1903). In 1880-81 he visited countries in North Africa and the Middle east: Egypt, Palestine, the coast of the Dead Sea and Jordan. Among others, he visited the St. Catherine's Monastery at the foot of Mount Sinai. Besides the landscapes, he painted numerous oriental genre scenes. After his final return he was initially based in Karlsruhe, then in 1892 moved in 1892 back to Berlin. He regularly exhibited at the Royal Academy of Arts in Berlin, but also in Munich, Dresden, Stuttgart and Vienna. In 1893, he submitted five painting of which only four were accepted. Due to the refusal of the fifth, he committed suicide.

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