RAUCH, rouK. CHRISTIAN DANIEL (1777 1857). The most celebrated German sculptor of the nineteenth century. He was born January 2, 1777, at Arolsen. in the Principality of Waldeck. His father was employed at the Court of Prince Frederick 11. of Hesse, and iu 1790 the lad was apprenticed to the Court sculptor Valentin at Arolsen; in 1795 he became assistant to Buhl, Court sculptor at Cassel. Gn the death of his father in 1797. Rauch abandoned sculpture tem porarily, and entered the personal service of King Frederick William II]. of Prussia. Study ing at odd moments. he came under the in fluence of Johann Gottfried Sehadow: in 1802 he exhibited his first statue, a "Sleep ing Endymion and Artemis." and in 1S03 his bust of Queen Louise. In 1804 he went to Rome, provided with a small stipend. During his six years' stay at Rome his art was chiefly influenced by Thorwaldsen and by the antique. Among these early work, were reliefs of "Hip polytus and Phedra." "Mars and Venus Wounded by Diomedes," and busts of the King of Prussia and Queen Louise. besides others executed by order of the King of Bavaria for the Walhalla.
In 1818 he was summoned to Berlin by the King and given the commission for a monument to Queen Louise in the royal mausolemn at Charlottenburg. The marble statue of the Queen, dressed in a light garment which charmingly re veals the figure, reclines on a simple sar cophagus. This work, one of the most interest ing in modern German sculpture, gave Rauch a European reputation. A similar statue of the Queen. even inure successful, was placed in the park of Sans Souci at Potsdam. While engaged upon his works he found time to model numerous excellent portrait busts, among the best of which are those of Dilrer (1837. Walhalla). of Thorwaldsen for the King of Denmark. and a colossal bust of Goethe (18201. In 1819 he es tablished a royal atelier of sculpture in Berlin, and assisted in his scheme for the museum. which was finished in 1830.
A projected statue of Goethe for Frankfort was modeled, but not executed, though a charm ing statuette of the poet in his study gown is well known. Rauch made an interesting series of bronze statues of German heroes of the Napo leonic wars, the best of which are at Berlin and at Breslau. Other important works are: the monument of the two Polish princes Mieczislaw and Boleslaw, in the Cathedral of Posen (1840) ; the statue of Albrecht Diirer in Nuremberg (1840) ; the Max Joseph monument in Munich (1833) ; the gable group and six smaller Vic tories for the Walhalla near Regensburg. His greatest work is the immense bronze monument of Frederick the Great in Berlin (1839-51). A colossal equestrian statue of the King sur mount, a pedestal. about the base of which are groups of generals and soldiers, and bas-reliefs representing scenes in the life of Frederick. Rauch's works combined, to a remarkable ex tent, absolute natural truth with ideality of character, and he succeeded in the difficult task of adapting modern costume to the ideal portrait representation. He was the founder of the Berlin school of sculpture. the most important in Germany, and in which his spirit yet prevails. Consult: Abbildungen der rorzuglichsten Werke Rauchs unit ertiiuteradent Text ran Waage,' (Berlin, 1327-29) ; Eggers, Christian Daniel Ranch (5 vols., ib., 1873-901, the leading biography, upon which Cheney's Life of christian Daniel Rauch ( Bostou, 1893) is based; Dobbert, Bauch (Berlin. 1877) ; Eggers, Rauch und Goethe, arkundliche Mittheilungen ; also Slerckle, Des Denkmal Konig Friedrich des Grossen (Berlin. 1894).