Maurycy Gottlieb
Maurycy Gottlieb (sometimes Maurycego Gottlieba) (1856–1879)
was a Polish-Jewish painter. He was born in Drohobycz, Galicia.
At fifteen, he was enrolled at the Vienna Art Academy. Later, he
would study under Jan Matejko in Krakow. However, he experienced
anti-semitism from his fellow students, and left Matejko's studio
after less than a year, returning to Vienna to pursue his Jewish
roots, having been raised secular.
Shylock and JessicaAt twenty, he won a gold medal from a Munich
art competition for Shylock and Jessica (at left), showing a scene
from Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. He painted the face for
Jessica based on a woman, Laura Rosenfeld, who he had proposed marriage
to.
However, Rosenfeld rejected his proposal, and wed a Berlin banker.
It is believed that he then committed suicide by exposure to the
elements, dying of complications from a cold.
Despite the early age of his death, more than three hundred of
his works survive, though not all are finished. After the fall of
the Iron Curtain, many Polish collections unknown in the West were
discovered, and his reputation grew greatly.
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