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Richter, Louise Marie Schwaab

    Full Name: Richter, Louise Marie Schwaab

    Other Names:

    • Louise Marie Schwaab Richter

    Gender: female

    Date Born: 1852

    Date Died: 1938

    Place Born: Bursa, Turkey

    Place Died: Lugano, Ticino, Switzerland

    Home Country/ies: Germany


    Overview

    Art historian and translator; novelist; wife of art historian Jean Paul Richter and mother to art historian G. M. A. Richter. Born in Broussa, Turkey which is present-day Bursa, Turkey. Schwaab’s father was a silk manufacturer and American Consul, stationed principally in Broussa (modern Bursa, Turkey). She traveled extensively with her family as a child, much of it in Asia minor. She came to London with her sister where she met and married the art historian Jean Paul Richter in 1878. Her knowledge of languages and the art-historical environment in which she lived spurred her to translate the early works of German art history into English as well as write volumes of her own. She and her husband had two daughters, both of whom became art historians as well, Irma A. Richter, born in 1876, and Gisela M. A. Richter born in 1886. In 1883 she translated one of the most important works of art methodology, the connoissuership manual and manifesto of Giovanni Morelli, thereby bringing Morelli’s method to English readers. In 1901 she issued a small volume in the series on “art cities” of Siena. She issued another translation of Hermann Knackfuss’ Rubens in 1904. Her survey of the art of Chantilly appeared in 1913. In 1931 she moved to Lugano where she died shortly after her husband.


    Selected Bibliography

    Chantilly in History and Art. London: J. Murray, 1913; Siena. Berühmte Kunststätten 9. Leipzig: Berlin, E. A. Seemann, 1901; [Translations:] Knackfuss, Hermann. Rubens. Bielefeld, Leipzig: Velhagen & Klasing, 1904; Morelli, Giovanni. Italian Masters in German Galleries. A Critical Essay on the Italian Pictures in the Galleries of Munich, Dresden, Berlin. London: G. Bell and Sons, 1883.


    Sources

    Richter, Jean Paul. Diaries, 1873-1932. Duke University Special Collections Library; Who Was Who Among English and European Authors, 1931-1949. vol. 3. Detroit: Gale Research, 1978, p. 1195; [obituary:] “Mrs. Richter.” The Times (London) January 13, 1938, p. 14.




    Citation

    "Richter, Louise Marie Schwaab." Dictionary of Art Historians (website). https://arthistorians.info/richterl/.


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