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Description
‘Otto von Bismarck’, the greatest European statesman from the 19th century
Biography: Fritz Schaper
‘Not by speeches and votes of the majority, are the great questions of the time decided, but by iron and blood’
(‘Nicht durch Reden und Majoritätsbeschlüsse werden die großen Fragen der Zeit entschieden, sondern durch Eisen und Blut’).
Both the Deutsches Historisches Museum in Berlin and the Museum of the City of Cologne have a similar copy of this Bismarck sculpture by Fritz Schaper.
Bismarck is depicted in the uniform of a ‘Kürassier’, a member of ‘Heavy Cavalry Regiment’. The original statue of Otto van Bismarck by Fritz Schaper, erected in 1878 at Augustinerplatz in Köln, was 2.83 metres high. In 1875, when Bismarck was 60 years old he was granted the title Honourable Citizen of the City of Cologne and the decision was made to raise a statue for him. Creating the sculpture in Cologne took three years. It was the first public monument honouring Bismarck in Germany. More than 500 monuments of Bismarck, honouring the creator of the German Kaiserreich in 1871, would follow. In 1878 the sculpture was awarded a gold medal at the Academy Exhibition in Berlin. It is unclear if the statue was destroyed during bomb attacks in World War II, or if it was stolen in the first months after the end of the war.
| – condition | : II |
| – size | : height 54 cm |
| – signed | : at the foot: ‘F. Schaper fec.’ |
| – type | : bronze. created aprrox. 1880 |
| – misc. I | : signed at the foot: ‘Akt. Gesellsch. Gladenbeck Berlin’ |
| – misc. II | : also signed with the Imperial Eagle of the German Empire from 1889 – 1918 |
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