Carl Schuch
and France

Carl Schuch is perhaps the best-known “unknown” protagonist of late 19th-century painting and has long been an insider tip. His art is a discovery. As a restless cosmopolitan, he broke away from national attributions early on and devoted himself uncompromisingly to painting. During his lifetime, he was hardly known to the public, but after his death, the art world quickly recognized the quality of his work, before it later fell into oblivion again.

The Städel Museum brought together around seventy of Schuch’s paintings in a stimulating dialogue with some fifty important works by French artists, including Paul Cézanne, Camille Corot, Gustave Courbet, Édouard Manet and Claude Monet. The exhibition focused on Schuch’s years in Paris, where he experienced his most artistically formative period from 1882 to 1894.

Schuch’s paintings exude a quiet yet impressive power. His work is characterized by subtle colour nuances, an extraordinary sensitivity to light and atmosphere, and an intense search for artistic truthfulness. Refusing to be pigeonholed into any particular style, he developed an unmistakable visual language.

This exhibition was more than a tribute. It presented Carl Schuch as an artist who, with his European perspective and unwavering attitude, wrote an independent chapter in art history. Art technology research deepened our understanding of his working methods and opened up new perspectives on his work. The findings were presented in a clear and comprehensible way in the exhibition. With “Carl Schuch and France”, the Städel Museum invited visitors to embark on a journey of discovery that put the artistic cosmopolitan and his impressive visual world in the spotlight they deserve.

Curators
Alexander Eiling (Head of Modern Art, Städel Museum)
Juliane Betz (Deputy Head of Modern Art, Städel Museum)
Neela Struck (Associate Curator, Modern Art, Städel Museum)
In collaboration with Dr Roland Dorn (author of the Carl Schuch catalogue raisonné)

Sponsored by
Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe with Deutsche Leasing AG, Frankfurter Sparkasse & Sparkassen-Kulturfonds of the German Savings Banks and Giro Association, Fontana Foundation, Kulturfonds Frankfurt RheinMain gGmbH, Städelscher Museums-Verein e.V. with the Städelfreunde 1815

With the support of
Aventis Foundation, Rudolf-August Oetker Foundation

Media Partners
Süddeutsche Zeitung, ARTE, Verkehrsgesellschaft Frankfurt am Main