Eugen Spiro

EUGEN SPIRO

 German Artist 1874-1972

Eugen Spiro was a German artist born in Wroclaw, Breslau in Lower Silesia in 1874.  He studied in the Academy at Breslau from 1892-4 and became a pupil in a master class of Franz Von Stuck in Munich.  He lived and painted in Paris between 1906-14 and in Berlin from 1914-34.

As a Jewish artist whose portraits were classified as degenerate by the Nazis, he emigrated to France in 1935 and was later interned in the French camp Gurs.  His first marriage was to the renowned German actress Tilla Durieux.

He emigrated to New York City in 1941 where he became an independent teacher and artist.  He painted portraits of Thomas Mann, Albert Einstein and many other famous people both in Europe and the USA, having a renewed career as an artist till well over 70.

Between 1958 and 1961 he decided to paint 15 of the last prophets of the Old Testament (Tanakh).  The only prophet he left out was Daniel (perhaps the most painted of the prophets?)  He had to read the Bible passages to put the appropriate detail in the background of his paintings.  Possibly he painted the prophets was because he was brought up in a very religious home and his father was a cantor in the local synagogue in Wroclaw.

Eugen Spiro died in 1972 aged 98.