Evening Mood at Schlachtensee

A romantic glow illuminates the pastoral lake in Walter Leistikow's (1865-1908) Evening Mood at Schlachtensee (cover). The aquatic smooth surface reflects light and the surrounding tall trees, belying the turmoil of the German art world at the time of Leistikow's painting. Only mild ripples mar the luminous water at the edge of Grunewald forest: no such placidity could be conferred upon the era of the Berlin Secession and its companion movements, the Munich and Vienna Secessions. The Arts and Crafts school, Art Nouveau, the German Jugendstil, and Impressionism were all factors in the gestation of the first Secession, which took place in Munich in 1892 (JAMA cover, April 1, 2009). Berlin, considered a second city—art-wise—when compared with its Bavarian sister Munich, followed with its own Secession, which exhibited for the first time in May 1899. Leistikow served as one of its main instigators, along with fellow painter Max Liebermann (JAMA covers, April 28, 2004, and August 8, 2007).

The forerunner of the Berlin Secession had arisen in 1892 with formation of Die Gruppe der Elf (The Eleven, or The XI). Leistikow, Liebermann, and 9 of their colleagues broke away at that time from the established art association, the Verein Berliner Künstler. The Verein had full support of Emperor Wilhelm II: his conservative and pro-Imperial Germanic policies influenced the production and display of the works from accepted Verein artists. Coinciding with this rupture was a one-man show by Edvard Munch (JAMA cover, March 7, 2001); his works, once hung in the gallery, were considered too shocking and inappropriate for the Verein, and his exhibit was terminated. Leistikow came to Munch's defense, writing a facetious article—under the alias Walter Selber (“Walter Himself”)—in the Freie Bühne. The painters had become friends, and in 1902, Munch executed a lithographic portrait of Leistikow and his wife, Danish poet Anna Mohr Leistikow. The Secession commenced in earnest when the Verein jury, in 1898, rejected Leistikow's landscape painting Grunewaldsee. The Berlin Secession exhibited until 1913, although Lovis Corinth (Leistikow's friend and biographer) wrote that when Leistikow died in 1908, the Secession “fell apart.” Leistikow, as the secretary for the Secession, worked closely in the beginning with business managers Paul and Bruno Cassirer to establish permanent gallery space for the Secession's exhibits.

Leistikow, also known as a decorative artist and wallpaper designer, painted many landscapes. Evening Mood at Schlachtensee is representative of the fine detail and evocative atmosphere of Leistikow's work during the Berlin Secession era. The provocative vertical lines of trees in the foreground contrast with shorter, more rounded trees depicted in the distance; Leistikow's use of perspective deepens the scene and its emotional impact. The smooth lake surface beckons visitors to the Schlachtensee's shores. The painting possesses fullness of spirit and is not diminished in any way by the lack of human presence. Leistikow's celestial sphere, just arisen above the far reaches of the water's edge, emits pale light: its reflection on the Schlachtensee burns brighter than the light's actual source. Construed by some as the setting sun, the orb could equally represent the moon and the lunar goddess Selene; daylight lasts well into the nighttime during a northern German summer. Viewing other Leistikow landscapes, such as Grunewaldsee and Waldinneres, one senses the peace that must have inspired the painter to settle in Berlin, and there create such beautiful pieces. His friend Munch painted, also in 1895, a similar scene of a lake in Norway, titled Moonlight. Munch's depiction of riparian serenity, which includes an oddly phallic reflection of the moon's shadow, appears more symbolic and stylized than Leistikow's German lakescape. Unlike many fin de siècle artists breaking away from the molds of tradition, Leistikow achieved commercial success and boasted that he “waded in money.”

The torment of tertiary syphilis drove Leistikow to his suicide at a Berlin sanatorium in 1908. What demons he wrestled are not overtly revealed in the calm beauty of his interpretation of the Schlachtensee. The lake, still a sanctuary from Berlin's summer heat, possesses a mirrorlike quality, not only in its pure, untainted reflection, but in its meaning to individual observers. Looking into the Schlachtensee's depths, here courtesy of Leistikow's brush, either one absorbs the peace and simplicity of nature's radiated beauty—or one peers into the depths of misery and a seemingly endless pool of despair.