Tableau: Der Bürger und der Souverän / The Citizen and the Sovereign

Texts by dates (chronological order)

1806–1816
King Frederick I of Württemberg rules as an absolute monarch.
Portrait by Johann Baptist Seele, 1806

1816–1864
With King William I of Württemberg, the kingdom receives a constitution that grants the Estates co-determination.
Portrait by Joseph Karl Stieler, 1827

1827 Founding Member and First Chairman of WKV (until 1832)
Gottlob Heinrich Rapp,
from 1821 Gottlob Heinrich von Rapp
(* 1761 in Stuttgart; † 1832 ibid.)
Portrait by Philipp Friedrich Hetsch, ca. 1815
Gottlob Heinrich Rapp is the prototype of the influential educated and propertied bourgeoisie that established itself in the nineteenth century. He worked as a merchant, bank director, artist and patron of the arts, writer, civil servant, dilettante (self-proclaimed), theorist of lithography and horticulture, and much more. His and Friederike Rapp’s house at Stiftstraße 7 was a meeting place not only for the city’s artistic elite, including numerous professors and former students of the former Hohe Karlsschule, but also for Goethe and Schiller. Rapp took over his father’s textiles business at a young age, was appointed head of the ducal mirror factory and royal tobacco factory, supervised and later managed the royal court bank, and held numerous political offices. He was the brother-in-law of Johann Heinrich Dannecker, uncle of Gustav Schwab, and father-in-law of Sulpiz Boisserée. In 1807 he founded the newspaper Morgenblatt für gebildete Stände with Johann Friedrich Cotta and in 1827 the WKV with Cotta and numerous other members of the upper middle classes. As the court increasingly withdrew from supporting art, organs such as the Morgenblatt and the WKV provided important platforms for introducing art to new audiences and groups of buyers. With the independence of the court and the church, art’s new freedom coincided as well with its precariousness and dependence on new markets.

1827
Founding Member of WKV
Johann Friedrich Cotta
from 1822 Freiherr Cotta von Cottendorf
(* 1764 in Stuttgart; † 1832 ibid.)
In 1787, Johann Friedrich Cotta took over the family business founded in Tübingen in 1659, the Cotta’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, which he moved to Stuttgart in 1810. He developed the company into the most important publishing house of the German classical period and was sometimes referred to as the “Bonaparte of booksellers” (Carl August Böttiger, 1807). He had great political influence through various offices and especially as a representative of his Estate. Together with other figures in Stuttgart society, he shaped cultural life. In addition to books, Cotta published various newspapers and magazines, including the political Allgemeine Zeitung and the Morgenblatt für gebildete Stände (including the supplement “Kunst-Blatt”). Due to the strong censorship in the Kingdom of Württemberg, he eventually had to move the editorial office of the Allgemeine Zeitung to Ulm and later Augsburg. Cotta fought tirelessly for freedom of the press and authors’ rights. At the same time, he supported King William I of Württemberg politically and received numerous privileges in return. “It is precisely in Cotta, in whom one would like to see the prototype of the dynamic citizen due to his countless entrepreneurial activities and his commitment against censorship ..., that we can see the fascinating power still emanating from the aristocratic courtly world in the early nineteenth century. The ‘independent’ Cotta allowed himself to be integrated into it in order to find social recognition there.” (From Baden und Württemberg im Zeitalter Napoleons, exhib. cat. 1987, vol. 1.1, p. 338 f.)

1827
Founding Member of WKV
Gustav Schwab
(* 1792 in Stuttgart; † 1850 ibid.)
Portrait by Carl Jakob Theodor Leybold, 1825
The pastor, grammar school professor, and writer Gustav Schwab is considered a member of the Swabian school of poetry. His Sagen des klassischen Altertums (Legends of Classical Antiquity, 1838–1840), became a classic of German-language children’s and youth literature. He compiled the great epics of antiquity from original texts, translated them into German, and abridged them, toning down or removing violent and erotic passages. He and other writers of the Swabian school of poetry came into conflict with Heinrich Heine, who had sharply criticized the school. Their verbal attacks against Heine reveal strongly anti-Semitic and racist features.

1827
Founding Member of WKV
Heinrich Wagner
Ministerial clerk, secretary to Johann Heinrich Dannecker
Wagner pushes through the idea of founding an art association that buys works and distributes them to members by lottery.
Portrait c. 1840

1864–1891
When King Karl I of Württemberg reigns, the kingdom becomes a member state of the German Empire.
Portrait by Richard Lauchert, 1867

1891–1918
During the reign of King William II of Württemberg, the monarchy in Germany comes to an end.
Portrait by Rudolph Huthsteiner, 1896

Captions

1778–1779
Daniel Nikolaus Chodowiecki, Natürliche und affektierte Handlungen des Lebens

Philipp Friedrich Hetsch, Friederike Philippine Rapp, born Walz, with her child, around 1790

1794
Luise Duttenhofer, Goethe in Stuttgart (with Gottlob Heinrich Rapp)

1800
Gottlob Heinrich Rapp, Ruhendes Kind

Christian Gottlieb Schick, Heinrike Dannecker, born Rapp, 1802

1810
Gottlob Heinrich Rapp, Das Geheimnis des Steindrucks

Karl Jakob Theodor Leybold, Johann Friedrich von Cotta, 1824

Queen Pauline of Württemberg, portrait by Joseph Karl Stieler, 1825

King Karl of Württemberg, his wife Olga Nikolaevna Romanova and Duchess Vera Konstantinovna Romanova
Photo portrait by German von Bohn, 1852

1975
Poster for the exhibition Honoré Daumier und die ungelösten Probleme der bürgerlichen Gesellschaft at the WKV