Lucy Mensing: Reflections on expressionism
Much has been made of the parallels between modern physics and modern art, especially between Einstein and Picasso. There is little evidence, however, that the pioneers of modern physics had any appreciation for the pioneers of modern art. Lucy Mensing, however, took an early interest in German expressionist painting. Writing about a visit to the Ludwig Museum in Cologne in a letter of August 1982 to Ernst Ising, a friend from her student days in Hamburg, and his wife Hanna, she recalls seeing one of Franz Marc’s paintings in the Hamburger Kunsthalle as a student:
The painting Wild Boars of Marc reminded me of the Hamburg Mandrill. It used to be taunted and mocked in my youth. Then the professor for literature, in a class we, i.e., Ernst and I, attended once a week, discussed The Mandrill—the colorful animal in the lush jungle—and we saw it with different eyes. I assume that one was also by Franz Marc. The painting is said to have disappeared during the war. Whether the Nazis had already taken it earlier and sold it to US?”
The original German:
Bei einem Bild Wildschweine von Marc fiel mir der Hamburger Mandrill ein. Der wurde in meiner Jugend beschimpft und lächerlich gemacht. Dann hat der Lit.-Professor bei dem wir, d.h. Ernst und ich, einmal in der Woche ein Kolleg hörten, Den Mandrill besprochen – das farbenprächtige Tier in dem üppigen Urwald – da sah man es mit anderen Augen an. Ich nehme jetzt an, daß der auch von Franz Marc war. Das Bild soll im Krieg verschwunden sein. Ob die Nazis es schon früher beseitigt und nach Amerika verkauft hatten?”
As Mensing surmised, The Mandrill was indeed among dozens of paintings the Nazis confiscated from the Hamburger Kunsthalle in 1937. Earlier in 1982, Lucy Schütz and the Isings had admired paintings by Emil Nolde and others in the Kunsthalle in Kiel (where Lucy’s sister Hildegard lived).
Cite this resource
Michel Janssen, “Lucy Mensing,” American Institute of Physics, 2025. http://www.aip.org/history/lucy-mensing