Wilhelm von Gloeden

Wilhelm von Gloeden was self-invented. He claimed to be the son of an officer and baron from Mecklenburg and gave "Schloss Volkshagen near Wismar" as his place of birth. However, there was no such castle. He was indeed born into a Mecklenburg branch of the German noble family von Glöden, but his title was false: the line of Freiherren von Glöden is well-documented, and he was not a member of the baronial line. His father was Carl Hermann von Gloeden (1820–1862), who in 1851 was a forest ranger in Volkshagen (today Völkshagen, near Marlow, east of Rostock), and in 1856 became a forest inspector in Dargun. His mother, Charlotte, née Maassen, had previously been married to Johann Magnus Wilhelm Raabe. Gloeden was given a Protestant upbringing. Hermann von Gloeden was an administrator of the hunting estates of the Grand Duke of Mecklenburg, whose superintendent was an illegitimate son of Frederick Louis, Hereditary Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, and his mistress, Luise Charlotte Ahrens, who had legitimized him by giving him the surname taken from an estate given to his son, the castle (actually a mansion) of Plüschow. His son married Charlotte Wilhemine Crull (1831–1891), the daughter of Hermann von Gloeden's half-sister, and one of their children was the male photographer Wilhelm von Plüschow. After the death of his father, his mother married for a third time, to Wilhelm Joachim von Hammerstein in 1864. Hammerstein (1838–1904) had been mentored by Carl Hermann von Gloeden, and his forestry career led to him becoming a politician of the German Conservative Party and editor-in-chief of the Kreuzzeitung. Von Gloeden described the relationship with his stepfather as not good. The most important family connection for Wilhelm was his half-sister Sophie Raabe from his mother's first marriage, who lived with him in Sicily for years. After studying art history in Rostock (1876), Gloeden studied painting under at the Weimar Saxon-Grand Ducal Art School (1876–77) until he was forced by lung disease (apparently tuberculosis) to interrupt his studies for a year, convalescing at a sanatorium in the mountain resort of Görbersdorf, now known as Sokołowsko in Poland. Gloeden wrote: "I studied painting at the Academy of fine arts in Weimar under the master Karl Gehrts, but then I fell ill with tuberculosis and had to leave the studio to move to Görbersdorf, where I spent a year." ==Taormina==

In a search for health, Gloeden travelled to Italy (1877–78), first staying in Naples and visiting Capri before moving on to Taormina in Sicily. During his stay in Taormina, Gloeden had a Bohemian lifestyle and exploited the impoverished locals with his wealth and resources. He frequently held midnight orgies with the youths who worked for him, some of whom were still adolescents. The extent of these revelries remains unknown. ==Works==

in Gloeden's garden in Taormina. The reverse bears the stamp of Gloeden's heir, Pancrazio Buciunì, and the date: May 16, 1914 While today Gloeden is mainly known for his nudes and is considered "one of the founders of modern homosexual iconography", in his lifetime he was also famous for his landscape photography that helped popularize tourism to Italy. In addition, he documented damage from the 1908 Messina earthquake, which may explain why the locals mostly approved of his work. The majority of Gloeden's pictures were made before the First World War, in the years from 1890 to 1910. During the war, he had to leave Italy. After returning in 1918, he photographed very little but continued to make new prints from his voluminous archives. In total, he took over 3000 images (and possibly up to 7000), which after his death were left to one of his models, Pancrazio Buciunì (also spelled Bucini; his dates are sometimes given as – but probably should be 1879–1963), known as ' (or ') for his North African looks. '''' had been Gloeden's lover since the age of 14, when he had first joined his household. In 1933, some 1,000 glass negatives from Gloeden's collection (inherited by Buciuni) and 2,000 prints were confiscated by Benito Mussolini's Fascist police under the allegation that they constituted pornography and were destroyed; another 1,000 negatives were destroyed in 1936, but Buciuni was tried and cleared at a court in Messina (1939–1941) of disseminating pornographic images. Most of the surviving pictures (negatives and prints) are now in the Fratelli Alinari photographic archive in Florence (which in 1999 bought 878 glass negatives and 956 vintage prints formerly belonging to Buciuni to add to its existing collection of 106 prints) and further prints (which fetch hundreds of pounds at auction) are in private collections or held by public institutions such as the in Milan. Attitudes towards his work during his lifetime and later Gloeden generally made several different kinds of photographs. The ones that garnered the most widespread attention in Europe and overseas were usually relatively chaste studies of peasants, shepherds, fishermen, etc., featured in clothing like togas or Sicilian traditional costumes, and which generally downplayed their homoerotic implications. He also photographed landscapes, and some studies were of, or included, women. His models were usually posed either at his house, among the local ancient ruins, or on Monte Ziretto, located two kilometres to the north of Taormina and famous in antiquity for its quarries of red marble. He wrote in 1898: "The Greek forms appealed to me, as did the bronze-hued descendants of the ancient Hellenes, and I attempted to resurrect the old, classic life in pictures...The models usually remained merry and cheerful, lightly clad and at ease in the open air, striding forward to the accompaniment of flutes and animated chatter. More than a few greatly enjoyed the work and anxiously awaited the moment when I would show them the finished picture." More explicit photos in which boys aged between about 10 and 20, and occasionally older men, were nude (sometimes with prominent genitalia) and which, because of eye contact or physical contact were more sexually suggestive, were traded "under the counter" and among close friends of the photographer, but "as far as is known, Gloeden's archive contained neither pornographic nor erotically lascivious motifs". ==Other similar photographers at the time==

Gloeden's cousin Guglielmo Plüschow also photographed male nudes, working in Rome. Plüschow was already a firmly established photographer when Gloeden started doing photographs of his own in the early 1890s. It is even speculated that Gloeden was taught the (then difficult) art of photography by Plüschow. However, Gloeden soon eclipsed Plüschow, and later works by Plüschow often were erroneously attributed to Gloeden. From an artistic standpoint, Plüschow's work is somewhat inferior to Gloeden's, as his lighting is often too harsh and the poses of his models look quite stilted. Up until 1907, Plüschow's assistant Vincenzo Galdi secretly made work which he tried to pass off as Plüschow's own. However, Galdi's pictures lack elegance, often feature females, and generally tend to border on the pornographic. ==Gallery==

File:Reclining Male Nude Beside Vase - Wilhelm von Gloeden.jpg|Reclining Male Nude Beside Vase at the Metropolitan Museum of Art File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. G 0263 - Caino, ca. 1902.jpg|Cain File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 1744 - Hypnos.jpg|Hypnos File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 2096 - Autoritratto come arabo.jpg|Self-portrait in Arab garb File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 1764.jpg|Boy with Flying Fish File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 0229A - Ragazzo con gioielli - Twelvetrees, p. 3.jpg|Neopolitan Boy Wearing Jewels and a Headband File:Plüschow, Wilhelm von (1852-1930) - n. 10706 - Un uomo anziano e un ragazzo in abiti greci.jpg|An old man and a boy wearing Ancient Greek-like clothes File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 0299 recto - Pietro (Posillipo) travestito da Bacco - Janssen, p. 21 - Cm 16,8x22,7.jpg|Boy posing as Bacchus File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 0247 - Costume siciliano.jpg|Boy dressed as Sicilian girl File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 1094 - Nudo maschile con cane.jpg|''Boy with Gloeden's dog Nedda'' File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 0196 - Auch ich in Arkadien p. 107.jpg|Two Youths Holding Greek Vases File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 0545 - 24c - Le tre grazie.jpg|The Three Graces File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. G 0045 - Terra del Fuoco.jpg|Land of Fire File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 1039 - da - Amore e arte, p. 92.jpg|A Naked Boy Wearing a Flower Crown and Carrying an Amphora File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 1241 - 1898 - Taschen p.71.jpg|Faun File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 0248 - Ragazzo nel cortile S. Domenico - Puig p. 37.jpg|Untitled File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 1286 recto - Nudo maschile con vasellame greco in mano - da - Amore e arte, p. 54.jpg|Male Nude File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 1971.jpg|Female Nude File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 1080 - Paradis sicilien, p. 51.jpg|Pasquale Casillo e Nunziato "Paglia Lunga", standing naked along a shore File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 2729 recto - Ragazzo con braccia alzate sotto tettoia - Later reprint - ebay.jpg|Lad with raised arms under the canopy of a rural house File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 0831 recto - Pietro con un ramoscello sulle spalle, davanti a Mazzarò - Bonham auctions.jpg|Pietro along the coastline File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 1935 - Twelvetrees p. 18.jpg|Giacomo and a dark-skinned boy, side by side, look at each other's eyes File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 1899 recto - Due ragazzi in una grotta.jpg|Two lads by a cave File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 102 - Dancing boys.png|Dancing boys File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 2068 recto - Giacomo accanto a riproduzione di bronzetto di Pompei - Twelwetrees p. 59 - Cm 18x24.jpg|Giacomo Lanfranchi near a replica of a bronze statue from Pompeii. File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 0474 - ebay.jpg|Pietro laying nude on the ground, by a basket. File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. G 0149 - da - Auction.fr.jpg|Two nude youths File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 0573 recto - Una donna e due bambini, sulla terrazza di Villa Barbaja - Cm 24x18 - Zannier p. 138.jpg|A nude woman and two nude boys on the terrace of Villa Barbaja, Naples. File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 0743.jpg|Interior in Naples with two nude males posing File:Gloeden, Wilhelm von (1856-1931) - n. 2083 - Sehnsucht p. 36.jpg|A boy in Gloeden's garden, next to calla flowers ==Major exhibitions==

• Royal Photographic Society, London: 1893 (21 pictures shown); 1895 (3); 1907 (10); 1908 (3) • British Journal of Photography Exhibition, London, January 1909 (60 Gloeden prints, half of them studies of youths & maidens) • Internationale Ausstellung zur Amateurphotographie, Berlin (1899) • Baron Wilhelm von Gloeden, Kunsthalle Basel (1979) • Wilhelm von Gloeden – Auch ich in Arkadien, MEWO Kunsthalle Memmingen (2008): 400 photos on exhibit, 800 in the catalog ==References==