Station: [20] Science and Art

Soldiers with sabres drawn, people who have been decapitated, burning funeral pyres and dead bodies hanging naked from the gallows...
When Daniel Chodowiecki addresses the life and suffering of the Huguenots during the Wars of Religion in France, the events in his etchings are marked by horrific violence.
Chodowiecki's extensive oeuvre, comprising hundreds of prints, made him world famous in the 18th century. He provided the illustrations for major books of German poetry and philosophy, and repeatedly grappled with the history of the Huguenots. 
Daniel Chodowiecki himself was from a family with Huguenot roots. He was born in 1726 in Gdansk, formerly Danzig, and went to Berlin in his twenties to train as an artist. He went on to run a large printmaking studio with considerable success. An influential artist of his day, he was a member of the Royal Prussian Academy of Arts and even served as its director for several years. 
Many Huguenots and their descendants strongly influenced intellectual life in their new home country. The religious refugees included many scholars and scientists, who were welcomed with open arms in Germany. In the 18th century, French language and culture were highly valued at German courts and among the intellectual elite. They were seen as expressions of a superior culture and intellectual stature. 
The portrait gallery we have here reads like a Who's Who of Huguenot greats. Among them is the physicist Denis Papin, who carried out important pioneering work on the development of the steam engine and the submarine. The German writer Theodor Fontane was also of Huguenot descent, as was the architect Paul Wallot, who designed the Reichstag building in Berlin.

Foto: © DHG