Schadow, Johann Gottfried

SCULPTOR (PRUSSIA)
BORN 20 May 1764, Berlin: Lindenstrasse - DIED 27 Jan 1850, Berlin
GRAVE LOCATION Berlin: Dorotheenstädtischen Friedhof, Chausseestrasse (CAL-3-1/2 (Ehrengrab, 5. weg li., am Ende))

Son of the tailor Gottfried Schadow. He was educated at the Gymnasium zum Grauen Kloster and Giovanni Battista Selvino gave him drawing lessons. In 1778 he became a pupil to the sculptor Jean Pierre Antoine Tassaert.

Tassaert considered him hi best pupil and liked him. He even suggested that Schadow might succeed him as court sculptor and he suggested that Schadow would marry his daughter. But Schadow had different ideas and left Berlin with his lover Marianne Devidels for Vienna, where her father, the jeweler Samuel Devidel, lived. He had probably met her at the salon of Henriette Herz.

They stayed in Dresden with the painter Anton Graff and then moved on to Italy. There his "Perseus fres Andromeda" won the Prize of the Roman Academy. In Rome he befriended the painters Füger and Zauner and the sculptor Canova. On 25 Aug 1785 he married Marianne Devidels in Prague. In 1786 they had a son, Karl.

Schadow had become a roman catholic, but back in Berlin 1787 he returned to the protestant belief. In 1788 Tassaert died and he succeeded him as court sculptor. In 1788 his son Friedrich was born. In 1795 he modelled the quadriga for the new Brandenburger Tor.

In 1801 he visited Goethe in Weimar to prepare a bust of him but the project didn't materialize. During the next years he taught at the Academy of Arts in Berlin and in 1805 he becamer its vice director. In 1816 he became the director of the Royal Prussan Academy of arts.

Marianne died in 1815 and in 1817 he married Caroline Henriette Rosenstiel with whom he had three further children. In 1827 he entered politics as a representative for Berlin and in 1830 he received a honouray doctorate at the University in Berlin. In 1836 he had an eye operation after which he was hardly able to sculpt and paint anymore and he restricted himself to drawing.

Family
• Son: Schadow-Godenhaus, Wilhelm Friedrich von
• Son: Schadow, Rudolf

Related persons
• visited Beer, Amalie
• designed grave monument of Fleck, Johann Friedrich Ferdinand
• made a sculpture of Friederike von Mecklenburg-Strelitz
• was teacher of Genelli, Bonaventura
• knew Herz, Henriette
• made a sculpture of Luise von Mecklenburg-Strelitz, königin von Preussen
• has a connection with Schleiermacher, Friedrich

Images

The princesses Louise and Friederike of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. The sculpture was made by Johann Gottfried Schadow.
(1797)
Picture by Androom (2 Aug 1998)

 

The grave of J.G. Schadow at the Dorotheenstädtischen Friedhof, Berlin.
Picture by Androom (16 Aug 2010)

 

Sources
Winkler Prins Encyclopedie (editie 1909), 1909
Johann Gottfried Schadow – Wikipedia


Schadow, Rudolf

Published: 29 May 2011
Last update: 11 Feb 2023