Otto Fischer (22 Mai 1886 — 9 April 1948) Veröffentlichungen zur asiatischen Kunst

Otto Fischer was born into a merchant family in Reutlingen on May 22, 1886. From 1904 he studied law, then art history in Tübingen, Munich, Vienna and Berlin and received his doctorate in 1907 with the dissertation Altdeutsche Malerei in Salzburg under Heinrich Wölfflin in Berlin. After study trips to Italy and France, he lived in Munich from 1909 to 1913 as a private scholar and was in close contact with the young artists of the Neue Künstler-Vereinigung München, which developed into the Blaue Reiter. In 1913, he habilitated in Göttingen with the thesis Die chinesische Malerei, which was published in a revised form as Die Chinesische Landschaftsmalerei. After serving in the war as a volunteer in 1915–1918, he was Director of the Museum of Fine Arts in Stuttgart (now the Staatsgalerie) in 1921–1927, where he distinguished himself with exhibitions such as Neue Deutsche Kunst (1924) and Schwäbische Malerei des neunzehnten Jahrhunderts (1925). In 1925–1926, he undertook a research trip to China, Japan, Java and Bali, which he described in two books. In 1927–1938, he was Director of the Kunstmuseum Basel and taught as a Professor Extraordinary at the university. In 1938, he retired to Ascona as a private scholar. He died in Basel on 4 April 1948. Fischer’s main areas of work and research were Old German painting and East Asian art—the fields to which, as can be seen already from his two dissertations, he applied himself in equal measure. His publications on German art are easily accessible, whereas his publications on the art of China, Japan and Southeast Asia reached only a comparatively small circle. In addition to his books on Chinese painting and sculpture, his work on Chinese art theory and Chinese stone rubbings as well as Chinese graphic art (color prints) deserve special mention. Fischer’s many-sided, sometimes controversial activities have been acknowledged several times in recent years (cf. literature on Fischer); the aim of this small contribution is to make Fischer’s publications on East Asian art known in their entirety. The material has been recorded after the scholar’s autopsy and is partly annotated. Perhaps the compilation will stimulate an art historian to appreciate Fischer’s contributions to East Asian art history in terms of content.