Overview
Arnold Böcklin was born to a silk tradesman on October 16, 1827, in Basel, Switzerland. At age 14, he studied drawing at Zeichenschule in Basel under the leadership of Ludwig Adam Kelterborn. Four years later in 1845, Böcklin enrolled at the Düsseldorf Academy, where he studied for two more years, this time under the German landscape painter Johann Wilhelm Schirmer. Böcklin showed early promise and was sent off on excursions to Antwerp and Brussels to copy the Dutch and Flemish masters such as Peter Paul Rubens, followed by a subsequent trip to Paris to copy the old masters housed at the Louvre.
After completing his military service, Böcklin married, but his happiness was short-lived; before their first wedding anniversary, his wife died. Broken-hearted, Böcklin set out for Rome in 1850. Here, he was influenced by the Classical and Renaissance art around him, as well as the natural landscape. Three years after arriving in Rome, Böcklin wed again, this time to a young Italian girl, with whom he bore 14 children, six of whom preceded him in death. In Italy he began transitioning from dramatic realistic landscape paintings showcasing the immenseness of nature to a more romantic landscape imbued with the mythological and allegorical.
In 1857 he returned to Basel, accepting a commission to paint the dining hall of the Royal Hanoverian Consul Karl Wedekind. After suffering from financial hardship and frail health, he moved his family to Munich where his fortune began to change. He exhibited and sold 14 paintings to the famous Munich art collector Friedrich Graf von Schack, who also offered him a position as Professor of Landscape Painting at the newly founded Kuntschule in Weimer. To add to his success, his Pan in the Reeds painting was bought by the ruler of Bavaria, King Maximillian II.
In 1862, he returned to Italy. His health continued to decline, and he lost full use of his painting arm, causing him significant pain and corresponding bouts of depression. He became preoccupied with death, and his work began taking a solemn and symbolic direction.
In 1880, a widow of a German diplomat Marie Berna requested a commission of an unfinished work she saw in Böcklin’s studio in Florence. The first two versions of Island of the Dead became so successful, that the artist made three more, which inspired numerous artists including the composer Rachmaninoff and the Surrealist painter Salvador Dalí.
By the time of his death on January 16, 1901, Arnold Böcklin was one of the best-known artists in Germany. He died in San Domenico, near Fiesole, Italy, leaving behind a lasting impact on the art world through an extensive body of work. Celebrated as a key figure of the Symbolist movement, Arnold Böcklin’s name is forever etched in the pantheon of 19th-century artists.