Studio: international art (34.1905)

Otto Fischer

"in the silesian riesexgebirge"

(By permission of Mr. E',

(Vol. XIII.), and readers of refined judgment are
in a position to see for themselves with what ex-
cellent taste Fischer accommodated his nude
figures to the decorative landscape. He carefully
refrained from pushing the modelling of the flesh
to such a stage of finish that a resultant realism
would put them out of sympathy with their setting.
This is good style ; yet some of his friends and
colleagues at the time took exception thereto, and
considered it a superficial treatment of the nude.
They were painters filled with a sculptor's sense
for far-going, delicate modelling.

Fischer, influenced by them, directed his atten-
tion to studies of this nature, and for a while he
drew and painted most conscientiously after the
living model. But he could do nothing with it
in the end, his inclinations drifting altogether
another way, and so he gave it up in disgust,
abandoning at the same time the practice of
oil painting.

For several years he gave himself up to
" Kunstgewerbe " (applied art), and invented de-
signs for the cabinet-makers, which were executed
by the Dresdener Werkstatten, and jewellery, which
was executed by E. Berger of Dresden, for dresses,
etc. After having crossed over from realistic art to
the other extreme as it were, he felt scarcely less

from the pastel drawing by otto fischer
•list Arnold, Dresden)

uncomfortable than when he was painfully copying
nature. Many of his designs were excellent, but
hardly one of them satisfied the artist himself.
The best creation among his works for applied art
is a stained-glass window, Vineta, which illustrates
an old northern legend.

In 1897 Otto Fischer turned his attention to
etching. This, with lithography and crayon
drawing, came to be the media which he found
most suited to his talents. The source of his
knowledge as to the technical manipulations of the
art was a friend, a pupil of the late Buerkner.
Buerkner, a reproductive etcher of some repute at
Dresden, could, however, offer little more than the
tricks of the trade. In consequence of his con-
tinually reproducing pictures he had drifted into a
degenerate, impersonal style which leaned towards
questionable half-tone effects, and which could serve
only as a warning for the pupil. At an early date
Fischer by chance, became acquainted with the
manly work of Strang and Legros, and that opened
his eyes to the possibilities of etching. The import-
ance of directing his attention to line dawned upon
him, and he soon became keenly appreciative ot
the fact that black-and-white work must be based
on principles of its own, entirely different from
those that should guide the painter or sculptor.

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