Emanuel Hahn
Emanuel Otto Hahn | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | 30 May 1881 |
| Died | February 14, 1957 (aged 75) |
| Nationality | German-Canadian |
| Known for | Sculptor and coin designer |
Emanuel Otto Hahn (30 May 1881 – 14 February 1957) was a German-born Canadian sculptor and coin designer. He taught and later married Elizabeth Wyn Wood. He co-founded and was the first president of the Sculptors' Society of Canada.
Biography
Education and training
Hahn was born in Reutlingen, Baden-Württemberg, Germany and moved to Toronto in 1888 with his family. He studied modelling and commercial design at the Toronto Technical School and Ontario College of Art as well as Industrial Design from 1899-1903. In 1901, he was hired by the McIntosh Marble and Granite Company where he created the bronze reliefs on various monuments. Hahn then went on to study in Stuttgart, Germany in 1903, he pursued art and design at the local school of art and design and the Polytechnical School, and briefly apprenticed in the studio of a sculptor teaching at the academy.
From 1908 to 1912 Hahn was a studio assistant to sculptor Walter Seymour Allward, helping in the construction of Allward's South African War Memorial the Alexander Graham Bell Telephone Memorial of Brantford and the Baldwin-Lafontaine Monument on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario. In 1912 he was hired as a modeling instructor at the Ontario College of Art, ultimately heading the sculpture department until his retirement in 1951.
Personal life
Hahn married Elizabeth Wyn Wood in 1926, a former student of his. The couple had one daughter.[1] They resided at 159 Glen Road, Toronto, Ontario.[2]
Career and official commissions
-
Emanuel Hahn's Sir Adam Beck Memorial (1934) on a traffic island, University Avenue and Queen Street West in Toronto -
Emanuel Hahn's monument to Ned Hanlan on the Toronto Islands -
Emanuel Hahn's official Canadian portrait Elizabeth II -
-
-
Bell Telephone Memorial, a large monument Hahn worken on with W.S. Allward -
Emanuel Hahn's Indians in a canoe on Canadian silver dollar
-
Emanuel Hahn's "Mackenzie Panels" (1938) in the garden of Mackenzie House, Toronto, Ontario.
- War Memorial, Westville, Nova Scotia
After World War I Hahn gained notability for his war memorial designs as communities sought to honour their veterans with cenotaphs and sculptures.[3] He designed a monument on the theme of a realistic soldier figure "going over the top" in Saint-Lambert, Québec and a meditating figure of Tommy in his Greatcoat in Lindsay, Ontario.[4] Emmanual Hahn sculpted the figure of a young Canadian soldier that surmounts the Gaspé War Memorial (1921) in Gaspé, Quebec.[5] Hahn's winning proposal for the city of Winnipeg's war memorial caused a national controversy when the sculptor's German ancestry was discovered in 1925. Hahn was forced to rescind the commission, although he was able to keep the prize money. Controversy erupted again when the competition was reopened and his wife Elizabeth Wyn Wood won the contact for the memorial. Critics condemned Wood for using her maiden name and accused her of copying her husbands design. She was also forced to cancel the contract and the memorial was awarded to the third-place competition winner.
However this did not hurt Hahn’s career as he received wide press coverage, some of which condemned the city of Winnipeg as Hahn was a naturalized Canadian citizen. The following year he was awarded the contract for the Edward Hanlan monument, erected on the Canadian National Exhibition grounds and later moved to the Toronto Islands.[6] In 1929 he won the competition for a memorial to Sir Adam Beck, his most important and largest monumental project, unveiled in 1934 on University Avenue, Toronto.
Hahn was a member of The Arts and Letters Club of Toronto and served as the first President of the Sculptors' Society of Canada, which he established with Frances Loring, Florence Wyle and Elizabeth Wyn Wood in 1928. The sculptor's society allowed Hahn to exhibit smaller sculptures independently of museums and galleries.
The Ontario Heritage Foundation plaque for the South African War Memorial erroneously states that Walter Seymour Allward studied under Emanuel Hahn, when in fact it was the other way around.
James Saull, who constructed the Oak Bay, British Columbia Cenotaph in 1948, studied under Emanuel Hahn.[7]
Coin design
Among the coins of Canada, Hahn designed the famous Voyageur Dollar design, which depicts a fur-trapper (coureur des bois) from the Hudson's Bay Company and an Inuit in a canoe with the Northern Lights (aurora (astronomy)), the famous Nova Scotian racing schooner Bluenose on the 10c. coin, the caribou's head on the 25c. coin, and the Canadian Parliament Buildings reverse of the 1939 Royal Visit silver $1 coin.
Portraits by other artists
Hahn was the subject of a larger than life-size bust authorized and sculpted by his former student Elizabeth Bradford Holbrook titled "Head of Emanuel Hahn" and measured 22" height. The sculpture was purchased by the National Gallery of Canada in 1962 and placed into their Permanent Collection. Note: only one bronze bust was ever created and one plaster the latter which is in a private collection.[8]
See also
References
- Citations
- ^
Hahn and Wife, Sculptors, Maclean's Magazine, November 1, 1945
{{citation}}:|access-date=requires|url=(help) - ^ Emanuel Hahn (March 1943), Artists Information Form, The National Gallery of Canada
{{citation}}:|access-date=requires|url=(help) - ^ Baker, Victoria. "The Canadian Encyclopedia". Retrieved 2009-04-06.
- ^ http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/index.cfm?PgNm=TCE&Params=A1ARTA0009128 Canadian Encyclopedia Monuments, World Wars I and II
- ^ Gaspé War Memorial (1921)
- ^ Safieddine, Hicham. "The Toronto Star: Facts and Figures". Retrieved 2009-04-06.
- ^ http://www.cmp-cpm.forces.gc.ca/dhh-dhp/nic-inm/sm-rm/mdsr-rdr-eng.asp?PID=145
- ^ The National Gallery of Canada 1961-1962 Annual Report, Queen's Printer and Controller of Stationary, Ottawa 1962
{{citation}}:|access-date=requires|url=(help)
- Bibliography
- Baker, Victoria. Emmanuel Hahn and Elizabeth Wyn Wood: Tradition and Innovation in Canadian Sculpture. Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 1997. ISBN 0-88884-670-3
External links
