Garten am Haus Illies

Flourishing fruit trees are on a slope. A wooden fence runs across the picture. A red house roof can be seen in the background. As the title of the painting reveals, it is the Illies family’s home garden in Wernigerode. The picture is signed at the bottom right. Otto Illies was born in Japan in 1881. He spent school in Hamburg. He had painting lessons with Georg Burmeister and the painter Ernst Eitner. From 1901 to 1902 he was a hospital officer at the University of Munich. From 1904 to 1908 he was a master student of Ludwig von Hofmann at the Weimar School of Art. He married Hildegard Golich in 1917. In 1924 he moved to Wernigerode. A friendship developed with Ludwig von Hofmann. They painted together by the sea, for example. He had exhibitions in Weimar, Hamburg, Braunschweig, Magdeburg, Dessau, Jena, Halle and Wernigerode. He died in 1959 in Wernigerode. (Wernigerode Harz Museum)