Family: Eduard Bitterlich / Marie Singer (F454)

• Male Eduard Bitterlich

  
  

  Birth	17 Aug 1833	Ukraine
  Death	20 May 1872	Pressbaum AT
  Burial
  Marriage
  Father
  Mother

  
  

  Female Marie Singer

  
  

  Birth
  Death
  Burial
  Father	(Father) Singer | F453 Group Sheet
  Mother	(Mother) Singer | F453 Group Sheet

  
  

• Notes

  Brother-in-law to August Peter Eisenmenger Bitterlich was born in Galicia where his father had established himself. While he was still young his parents moved to Vienna, with the intention of educating him for the civil service, but against their will he entered Waldmüller's studio, and devoted himself to miniature painting. In 1855 he went to Venice in order to copy the works of the old masters. Upon his return to Vienna he married Marie Singer von Wyssogurski, and immediately afterwards put himself under the direction of Rahl, whom he never afterwards left until his death. For this master he designed many fresco paintings, and sketched an immense number of small compositions, amongst them the 20 sheets for the Wanderings of the Argonauts, and the coloured sketches for the Duke of Oldenburg. ---- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eduard_Bitterlich 14 Jun 2025 Eduard Bitterlich (1833-1872) was a renowned painter and graphic artist, and up until his premature death had been a member of the workshop of Karl Rahl (1812-1865). Jointly with Rahl and Christian Griepenkerl (1839-1916) he produced a series of paintings destined to decorate the newly-built palaces of the Vienna Ringstraße; particularly notable are parts of the curtain and the ceiling of the Vienna Opera. In the same sense as Theophil Hansen had shaped the architecture, Eduard Bitterlich and Rahl, jointly with Griepenkerl, Eisenmenger and Carl Kundmann (1838-1919), were responsible for the buildings interior design and for the numerous sculptures surrounding them. For example, Eisenmenger contributed picture friezes to some of Hansen's buildings and Kundmann?s most visible work was the monumental statue of Pallas Athene in front of the Parliament (1902). At the turn of the century their way of opulent, representative painting and sculpturing was superseded by the innovative products of a new generation of artists who left the conservative Künstlerhaus and gathered in the so-called Secession. Eduard Bitterlich married Maria, née Singer von Wyssogursky (1829-1904); Maria's sister Emma (1841-1907) was the wife of August Eisenmenger, making him and Eduard Bitterlich brothers-in-law. Eduard and Maria had four sons, Hans (1860-1949), Richard (1862-1940), Max (1864-1940), Lenerl's uncles, and her father Friedrich (1866-1938). The eldest son Hans Bitterlich followed in his father's footsteps and became a successful sculptor. Many of his creations are landmarks of Vienna's cityscape, e.g. the Gutenberg monument (1900) at the Lugeck and, probably the best known, the monument of the Empress Elisabeth (1907) in the Volksgarten (People's Garden). He also contributed busts and reliefs to the portrait gallery of famous scientists, exhibited at the Arcaded Courtyard of the University of Vienna, among them those of Adolf Exner und Richard Wettstein (see Maisel 2008). From 1901 to 1931 he taught at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts, where he was elected Rector for the study year 1930/31. Eduard Bitterlich's second son, Richard, earned his living as an artist, too. He specialized in portrait painting but could not quite match the rank of his father and elder brother. Some of his portraits of the Empress Elisabeth are still in moderate demand in the art world. Max Bitterlich turned towards a more civil profession, studying agriculture and working as a veterinarian. He took his doctorate in 1913 at the Vienna Hochschule für Bodenkultur, where he lectured from 1915 to 1934. Just before retirement he published a monograph tellingly titled Die Entartung des Menschen (The Degeneration of Man) (Bitterlich 1932). Friedrich Bitterlich, Lenerl?s father, had a career in the Austrian army that took him from a teaching post at a military academy (Kadettenschule) to the rank of commander of the 1st Infantry Regiment (Schützenregiment) in World War I. He fought on the eastern front, then at the multiple battles on the Isonzo River. After Austria's defeat and the demise of the monarchy, he retired in 1918 with the rank of major general. During retirement he apparently bolstered his pension by working as a broker for the Dorotheum, a public pawn office in Vienna, and dedicated his spare time to the veterans club of his former regiment. ---- F. A. Hayek's Genealogy Bruce Caldwell Hansjoerg Klausinger Caldwell, Bruce; Klausinger, Hansjörg (2021) : F. A. Hayek's genealogy, CHOPE Working Paper, No. 2021-06, Duke University, Center for the History of Political Economy (CHOPE), Durham, NC, https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3844091