Franz Xaver Messerschmidt

Works by this Artist

Intentional Fool
Franz Xaver Messerschmidt, c. 1780

Background

family of sculptors and carpenters

Studies

Academy in Vienna (1755-c.1760)

Career

1769-74 - Academy member and professor

1775-77 – Munich (court)

1777-83 - Bratislava

Travels

Rome (1765)

Commissions from

Austrian court

Important Artworks

Maria Theresa, 1764-66 (Belvedere Museum, Vienna)

Character Heads (self-portraits), 1770-83 (The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles)

A Hypochondriac, after 1770 (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

Readings

Chan, V. “Natural Genius, Inspired Madness, and Romantic Protest – Franz Xaver Messerschmidt’s Many Grimacing Faces,“ Arts Magazine, vol. 61, no. 2 (October 1986): 84-93

Krapf, Michael ed. Franz Xaver Messerschmidt, 1736-1783. Exhibition catalogue. Vienna: Galerie Belvedere, 2002 (in German)

Yonan, Michael. “The Man Behind the Mask? Looking at Franz Xaver Messerschmidt,” Eighteenth-Century Studies, vol. 42, no. 3 (Spring 2009): 431-51