DOI issue:
Nr. 170 (May 1907)
DOI article:Stoessl, Otto: An Austrian sculptor: Franz Metzner
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.20774#0314
Franz Metzner, Sculptor
service and had a potent influence on his artistic
development. Working on buildings made him
familiar with the materials of which they were
constructed, with their possibilities, purposes and
peculiarities—he grew up with them, so to
speak. It was, indeed, this strenuous manual
labour that laid the foundation in Metzner for that
broad perception and sense of proportion which
constitute the very essence of monumental sculp-
ture, which reaches its highest expression as the
artistic consummation of architecture, the vitalising
principle of which it really is. Confronted by the
need for a harmonious disposition of plastic forms
in any large architectural scheme and in the laying
out of given spaces, the creative artist with his
feeling for monumentality and the assurance which
his mastery of large sculptural problems affords
him, runs no risk of flailing into a narrow concep-
tion of his art. If in the course of his experience
he applies himself to those minor objects which
exercise the sculptor’s art, the sure mastery he has
acquired over the means to be employed enables him
to achieve his task successfully, while his breadth of
perception invests it with deeper significance.
It so happened that Franz Metzner first attracted
attention as a Kleinplastiker—a modeller of small
figures. This was when he did a number of objects
in porcelain for the Royal Prussian Porcelain
Factory. These were exhibited at the Paris Exhi-
bition, and made a great impression by the bold
originality, depth of feeling, and refinement of form
which characterised them. Soon, however, he
began to take part in competitions—he was now
living in Berlin, which had been his abode since
1890—and his fate in these was the same as that
which befalls most men of original and transcending
talent. His work was far ahead of the average
work sent in ; he succeeded in earning the recogni-
tion of the judges, but failed to secure a commission
for the carrying out of his prize designs, this- dis-
tinction being usually accorded to works of a more
conventional type than those of Metzner. Two
designs which he made for a monument to Richard
Wagner at Berlin are sufficient to demonstrate to
the intelligent observer how effectively such pro-
blems as were here presented have been solved by
a modern master. In both of these designs the
energetic figure of the great composer, represented
292
service and had a potent influence on his artistic
development. Working on buildings made him
familiar with the materials of which they were
constructed, with their possibilities, purposes and
peculiarities—he grew up with them, so to
speak. It was, indeed, this strenuous manual
labour that laid the foundation in Metzner for that
broad perception and sense of proportion which
constitute the very essence of monumental sculp-
ture, which reaches its highest expression as the
artistic consummation of architecture, the vitalising
principle of which it really is. Confronted by the
need for a harmonious disposition of plastic forms
in any large architectural scheme and in the laying
out of given spaces, the creative artist with his
feeling for monumentality and the assurance which
his mastery of large sculptural problems affords
him, runs no risk of flailing into a narrow concep-
tion of his art. If in the course of his experience
he applies himself to those minor objects which
exercise the sculptor’s art, the sure mastery he has
acquired over the means to be employed enables him
to achieve his task successfully, while his breadth of
perception invests it with deeper significance.
It so happened that Franz Metzner first attracted
attention as a Kleinplastiker—a modeller of small
figures. This was when he did a number of objects
in porcelain for the Royal Prussian Porcelain
Factory. These were exhibited at the Paris Exhi-
bition, and made a great impression by the bold
originality, depth of feeling, and refinement of form
which characterised them. Soon, however, he
began to take part in competitions—he was now
living in Berlin, which had been his abode since
1890—and his fate in these was the same as that
which befalls most men of original and transcending
talent. His work was far ahead of the average
work sent in ; he succeeded in earning the recogni-
tion of the judges, but failed to secure a commission
for the carrying out of his prize designs, this- dis-
tinction being usually accorded to works of a more
conventional type than those of Metzner. Two
designs which he made for a monument to Richard
Wagner at Berlin are sufficient to demonstrate to
the intelligent observer how effectively such pro-
blems as were here presented have been solved by
a modern master. In both of these designs the
energetic figure of the great composer, represented
292