His Early Life

August Wilhelm Leu (1818-1897) was a German landscape painter of the Romantic School. Leu was born in Munster, Germany, in 1818. He was a pupil of Johann Wilhelm Schirmer, a landscape painter of the Dusseldorf School. Leu presents an essentially romantic view of nature and landscape. He specialised in the depiction of nature, especially, majestic mountains, placid waters of lakes and rivers, stormy clouds hovering around the mountains and the green leafy forests. The diminutive figures of humans and animals painted in the foreground, dwarfed by the majestic, sublime landscape appear as though they are soon to seek shelter from an approaching storm. Most of Leu’s pictures are in large format and depict scenes in Norway and the Alps. His son, also named August Leu studied under him and became a landscape and animal painter.

Painter of Norwegian Landscape

August travelled in Norway in 1843 and 1847 and later in the Alps region. His paintings depicting rich Norwegian landscape introduced the scenic beauty of that country to the Germans and raised awareness among the countrymen about the country’s rich scenic beauty and bounty . August lived in Brussels for a while and then returned to Dusseldorf. He received an honourable mention at the Paris Exposition. In 1882, he moved to Berlin where he became a royal professor and a member of the Academy of Art. August was also a member of the Vienna, Amsterdam and Brussels Academies. He received several gold medals in Berlin and the Belgian Order of Leopold. He exhibited his works at the Exposition Universelle de Paris in 1855, 1863 and 1878. Leu died in Seelisberg ,Switzerland in1897.

Some of his famous paintings are ‘Landscape on a River’. ‘Marina Piccola Bay, Capri’, ‘Gebirgslands Chaft’,(1857) ‘Im Schatten Der Alpen’ (1860), ‘Hardanger Fjord’, Gebirgs See’, ‘Hardangerfjord im Sonnenlicht’, ‘Norwegian Landscape with Waterfall’, ‘Sognefjord’, ‘Oeachinen Lake’, ‘ Queen Joanne’s Palace at Naples’, ‘Pool at Blankenburg in the Harz Mountains’, ‘On the Engstlenalp’, ‘Norwegian High Plateau’, ‘Sunset on the Coast at Sorrento’, ‘Alpine Peak’, ‘Matterhorn’, ‘Norwegian Fjord Landscape’, ‘Fjord Landscape with Glacier and Reindeer’, etc.