Painter Václav Mánes. Twice director of the Academy, all his life in the shadow of others
Václav Mánes is once again a somewhat backward member of the entire artistic family. “We don’t even know the exact date of his birth,” states Naděžda Blažíčková-Horová in the book Malířská rodina Mánesů. Perhaps it was meant to be sometime around 1793 in Praguewhere the Mánes family lived.
A talent assigned by chance?
Much like his older brother Antonin (†58), whose the son was the famous Josef Mánes (†51), Václav also started to deal in childhood by painting. “After studying at the Piarist grammar school he followed his older brother Antonín to the Prague Academy,” he states, profiling himself as diligent and capable studentwho “regularly participated in all school competitions and in 1816 won the competition on the given topic with his drawing of Gedeon with an angel.”
However, it was during his studies that it was known that it was his brother Antonín, who was 10 years older, to whom the judges awarded more talents. He himself should have expressed to Václav that “he got into art by pure chanceIn the 20s of the 18th century, Václav Mánes painted two paintings for the cycle History of the Czech Republic in pictures – Bivoje and Volení Libuše za knežna, which aroused general praise.
For example, Václav Mánes painted the picture Bivoj for the Czech History in Pictures cycle.
Author: Reprophoto from the book Mánes Painting Family
Inspiration from the masters
While Antonín Mánes profiled himself as a landscape painter, Václava was enchanted figure painting. His great inspiration was the Renaissance painters, especially the Italian ones. “From his student years, Mánes did not stop traveling around Italy, and the trip to Rome became the main goal of his thoughts and efforts,” says Blažíčková-Horová. “After all, supporters from the ranks of the nobility finally gave it to him, and in 1829 Mánes was able to go to Rome as a scholarship holder, where he lived until 1832 and where he was only able to correct his previous idea of Italian art.”
“Manes was very reluctant to leave Rome and after arriving in Prague, he did not stop using the possibility of returningLittle-known painter Jan Pechtl (†96), who was in contact with Mánes, about whom he wrote in a letter that “he only paints portraits in Prague and wants to save enough to go to Rome.” However, as Naděžda Blažíčková-Horová points out, “He never left Prague until the end of his life.”
Fickle fortune
It was generally difficult for painters to profit by selling their own paintings. That’s why Mánes “made a living above all else.” by teaching drawing in noble and bourgeois families,” and “was interested in orders for altarpieces,” the author states, adding that he painted a number of them mainly for rural churches – for example in Nové Bor, Všeradice u Beroun or Kostelec nad Vltavou.
While Antonín Mánes was a well-known landscape painter, his younger brother Václav devoted himself mainly to figure painting and portraits. In 1839 he painted the Portrait of Mr. Dustman.
Author: Reprophoto from the book Mánes Painting Family
The year 1835, when Mánes was “about” roughly 42 years old, represented the possible peak of his painting career for the painter. As a former successful graduate, he was in a hurry appointment as director of the Academy of Fine Arts. The pretext for the appointment was the premature death of the current director. Manes “he was secretly hoping for confirmation of the directorship,” however, it soon became clear that he was only appointed not for now. The same thing happened again in 1840, when the immense talent of Josef Mánes began to assert itself at the Academy.
Honesty against one’s own blood
Václav is said to have followed his nephew’s promisingly developing work with interest. “He believed in Josef’s success,” says the author. the circumstances that occurred precisely in 1840, when Václav Mánes was temporarily next to the Academy, may not be too indicative of this. When annual prizes were to be awarded among students, precisely because of the decision of Václav Mánes, his nephew was not awarded.
“Václav Mánes as director insisted on his decision not to award the first prize to his nephew Josef, who was proposed, for in his strict honesty he feared accusations of patronage,” says Blažíčková-Horová. “Josef Mánes for work of far higher quality he only got recognition.”
Disappointed and discredited
Václav Mánes took it hard that the position of director was not confirmed for the second time, but only temporarily. “Eyewitnesses noted that he was closed and taciturn and that the Manesian proverbial sensibility turned into shyness and timidity in him. He was often sullen and disaffected and he begged for a fate that did not unfold according to his imagination. I locked myself in the privacy of my studio and worked.’
As early as 1857, he sent one of his paintings to the annual exhibition. He died a year later. And as obscure as the reports of his birth date are, so is his death. It is mentioned somewhere 31 January 1858art historian Naděžda Blažíčková-Horová gives the date March 27 of the same year. “He died in Prague, in Ve Smečkách Street No. 596where he moved after the death of his brother Antonín,” he states.
In 1832, Václav Mánes painted the painting Christ Heals the Blind.
Author: Reprophoto from the book Mánes Painting Family