Heroic period and maturity

A thousand faces and one eternal mask

“Take a good look at the mask of deaf Beethoven. It teaches you courage and solitude, patience and silent struggle. The more constrained life is, the higher it is: the higher it rises, the harder it becomes [...] It teaches me about fury and maelstrom [...] With that rugged forehead, those jaws capable of crushing a stone, that mouth that appears to be sealed against the bursting forth of flames, that nose as short and wide as a lion’s snout! Yet, whoever saw him smile once, saw nothing as sweet in the entire world [...]”

(Gabriele D'Annunzio, Più che l'amore, Milan, 1907)

Start

1802 was a crucial year for Beethoven. In the summer, Dr Schmidt sent him to the spa in Heiligenstadt (Vienna) to alleviate abdominal complaints, to slow the progress of his deafness and to ease his stress after an intense period of creativity. Towards the end of his stay in the house at Probusgasse 6, Beethoven suffered a physical decline. His state of mind in those days comes alive in the touching pages of the Heiligenstadt Testament.

EMMA BORMANN, Austrian painter and printmaker, *Döbling, 29 July 1887 – †Riverside, California, 28 December 1974. She studied under Ludwig Michalek and Alfred Cossmann, gained fame throughout Europe, travelled the world and settled in California. Her works are on display in Europe’s pre-eminent museums.
Exterior view of the House of the Heiligenstadt Testament, expressionist woodcut, 1927.

In the moving passages of the Heiligenstadt Testament, Beethoven justifies his misanthropy caused by the looming spectre of deafness. It was not apathetic resignation, but rather a courageous struggle against fate. Discovered after his death in the summer of 1827 and published by the Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung, the Testament is today found at the Stadtbibliothek in Hamburg. Heiligenstadt marks the beginning of Beethoven’s heroic period (1802–1815).

Facsimiles of the first and last pages of the Heiligenstadt Testament.
Italian translation by Luigi Della Croce, Turin.

The work of a talented artist, a skilled printmaker, a sensitive and gifted painter of landscapes and vedute, considered the last expert in the topography of Vienna.

HERTA CZOERNIG-GOBANZ, Austrian painter and printmaker, *Klagenfurt, 13 March 1886 – †Vienna, 14 October 1970.
She studied at the Art School for Women and Girls in Vienna and Weimar, and then engraving under Ludwig Michalek in Vienna.
Many of her works are now in the Vienna Museum. Heiligenstadt (Vienna) Probusgasse 6, inner courtyard, colour etching, Vienna c. 1920.

This clay brick handmade in 1700 was gifted by the “Friends of the Vienna Museum” association on 29 September 2016, to mark the symbolic link between the Beethoven Library of Muggia and the House of the Testament.

Original brick from the house of the Testament, Probusgasse 6, Heiligenstadt (Vienna).

The drama of deafness
This powerful image depicts the moment when Beethoven no longer hears the music of the violins and realises that he is going deaf, the greatest tragedy for a composer. On the left, his noble protectors and the musicians themselves look on in concern at his distress. Beethoven’s part was played by the famous romantic actor and theatre manager Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree (1853–1917).

STEVEN SPURRIER, 1878–1961.
Cover of The Graphic magazine, Saturday 27 November 1909, based on the 1909 play Beethoven by René Fauchois (1882–1962), adapted by Louis Napoleon Parker and performed on 25 November 1909 at His Majesty’s Theatre, London.

Beethoven’s eyes convey pain and sadness, but he also expresses determination: he is clasping thorns that are boring into his ears. Above him, the Muse of Music is playing the kithara. Her hair spreads out gracefully, like Beethoven’s magnificent music. This book is the first important publication (not only in Italy) on Beethoven’s deafness and, thanks to its cover, it is the most striking Italian book on Beethoven ever published.

GIÒ PONTI, one of Italy’s most important post-war architects and designers, *Milan, 18 November 1891 – †Milan, 16 September 1979.
Woodcut, art cover for the book La sordità di Beethoven, Formiggini, Rome, 1921.
GUGLIELMO BILANCIONI, otorhinolaryngologist, author of more than three hundred scientific publications, *Rimini, 2 July 1881 – †Rome, 6 January 1935.

A rare and extremely interesting piece of print-work, a personal and engaging vision of the author in the German expressionist style of the time. Beethoven composing at the piano, his face stricken with inspiration and discomfort. Fantastic figures and disquieting presences, expressions of the composer’s divine music, swirl up from the keyboard.

BURGER FERDINAND ALBERT, German painter and caricaturist, *Hildburghausen, 1879 – †Berlin, 1953 or 1959.
Die Tote Ohren Beethoven's (Beethoven's Dead Ears), original aquatint etching signed and numbered in pencil below the figure, Berlin, 1922.

A striking device is used to convey the tragedy of his deafness: two skulls in place of his ears represent the tragedy of the disease that afflicted Beethoven for much of his life. They also emphasise his extraordinary spiritual energy in defiance of his adverse fate, which made him immortal.

The life mask
In 1812 Beethoven was 42 years old and at the height of his heroic period. The world wanted his image. Franz Klein made a plaster cast of his face. The task was made difficult by Beethoven’s impatience caused by his fear of suffocating. The cast was made in small sections at the second attempt. The distress and discomfort he experienced during the process were partly the cause of the surly expression that would later influence much of the iconography of the composer.

Bronze life mask of Beethoven, first half of the 19th century, from a plaster cast by Franz Klein (1812).

The bronze mask in the Carrino Collection is an extremely rare specimen, probably taken from Klein’s original plaster cast. It is still possible to see traces of the marks left by the joints between the pieces of plaster that formed the original mask (now lost) and even the pores in the composer’s skin and the scars left by the smallpox that afflicted him in his youth. Details of Beethoven’s true face!

Bronze life mask of Beethoven, first half of the 19th century, from a plaster cast by Franz Klein (1812).

According to his contemporaries, this portrait was a very good likeness and was also admired by Beethoven himself. In 1816, the composer gave it as a gift to his great friend Franz Gerhard Wegeler and his “affectionate friend” Antonie Brentano, née Birkenstock.

BLASIUS HÖFEL, Austrian engraver and lithographer, *1792 – †1863.  Ludwig van Beethoven, copper engraving, published by Artaria in Vienna in 1814.

From Thayer's Life of Ludwig van Beethoven, (Krehbiel) vol. II, The Beethoven Association, New York 1921, p. 287.

"(...) At the time set, the engraver appeared with his plate. Beethoven seated himself in position and for perhaps five minutes remained reasonably quiet; then suddenly springing up went to the pianoforte and began to extemporize, to Höfel’s great annoyance. The servant relieved his embarrassment by assuring him that he could now seat himself near the instrument and work at his leisure, for his master had quite forgotten him and no longer knew anyone was in the room. This Höfel did [...] The result was so satisfactory [...] It is well known that Höfel’s is the best of all engravings made of Beethoven!”

BLASIUS HÖFEL, Austrian engraver and lithographer, *1792 – †1863.  Ludwig van Beethoven, copper engraving, published by Artaria in Vienna in 1814.

H. E. V. WINTTER
Ludwig von (sic) Beethoven, original lithograph, 49.5 x 41.3 cm (framed), 1817.

MARTIN TEJČEK, engraver and painter, a contemporary of Beethoven’s, *Prague, 1780 – †Prague, 1847. Ludwig van Beethoven out walking, lithograph from a drawing by Johann Peter Lyser, 65 x 55 cm.

RUDOLF HOFFMANN, portrait artist, lithographer, miniature painter, active in Vienna from 1840 to 1861. Ludwig van Beethoven composing, lithograph inspired by Beethoven’s portrait by painter and singer Ferdinand Schimon (1818–1819). Printed by F. Paterno, Vienna, undated.

Beethoven loved this lithograph and sent a copy with a handwritten dedication to his friend Franz Wegeler in Koblenz. He engaged Stephan von Breuning on 28 August 1826 to deliver it, as his son Gerhard writes in his Memories of Beethoven, Vienna, 1874.

FRIEDRICH DÜRCK, Stieler’s nephew and pupil, *1809 – †1884.
Original lithograph based on Stieler’s painting, 1826. Printed by Joseph Anton Selb in Munich and sold by Artaria in Vienna.

Koebler recounts: “When Beethoven saw my portrait of him, he remarked that the treatment of his hair pleased him very much: other painters (he said) had always made him look so well groomed as if he were about to go into service at court, which was not the case at all”. Perhaps the finest life portrait of Beethoven, it was admired by critics and musicians including Liszt, who kept it on display in his house in Weimar.

AUGUST (KARL FRIEDRICH) VON KLOEBER, German painter and portrait artist, *Breslau (Wroclaw), 21 August 1793 – †Berlin, 31 December 1864.
Original lithograph by THEODOR NEU, Berlin, 1841, produced under Kloeber’s supervision, from one of the latter’s live drawings of Beethoven created in Mödling in 1818.

After the premiere of the Ninth Symphony at the K. K. Hoftheater in Vienna on 8 May 1824, Decker was commissioned by the Vienna Lithographic Institute to produce a portrait of Beethoven. Thayer, Beethoven’s biographer, believed this was the portrait. The composer had just come out of a challenging period of illness and the enormous effort it took to organise his Academy. His face shows clear signs of suffering and his eyes have a veil of melancholy.

DECKER JOHANN STEPHAN, French Alsatian portrait artist and engraver, *1783 – †1844.

NAVIGATION GUIDE

This section is a legacy of the online exhibition “The Man. The Genius. The Myth” presented in 2021, preserved here in its essential content. The narrative unfolds in three main themes:

THE MAN dedicated to the most important events and themes in the composer’s life;
THE GENIUS dedicated to his works and how they are interpreted in the figurative arts;
THE MYTH dedicated to the worldwide spread of the Beethoven Myth, the exploitation of the composer’s image for commercial and political purposes, his veneration and desecration.

Several sub-itineraries are proposed within each of the three.

For example:
when the “GENIUS” itinerary is selected, the “SIXTH SYMPHONY” sub-itinerary becomes available.
Each sub-itinerary consists of a Gallery of works and/or documents on the theme with a short introduction.
Each image is accompanied by a description and can be enlarged and viewed in a different resolution.
The “INTRO” feature is a short audiovisual introduction to the specific section.

CREDITS: all works and documents are from the Carrino Collection
© Collezione Carrino – Casa Museo Biblioteca Beethoveniana
Any use of these images is prohibited without the express permission of Casa Museo Biblioteca Beethoveniana.

Visit the Exhibition

NAVIGATION GUIDE