Javelin Thrower

Metadata

Monograph

Structure type:: Monograph

Title:: Anthologie des arts au Luxembourg

Author:: Reiles, Paul; Herr, Lambert

Publication year:: 1992

Publisher:: É. Borschette

Place of publication:: Luxembourg

Measurements:: 464 p.

Description:: Art luxembourgeois

Chapter

Title:: [Anthologie des artistes]

Figure

Title:: Haas Carlo, dessin, 1989, l.-p., 22.11.1989

Description:

Between 1912 and 1948, the Olympic Games included an artistic competition. Multiple Luxembourg artists, like Jean Jacoby (1891-1936) who won the gold medal in 1924 and 1928, participated in this competition. Here we present a work by another Luxembourg artist, the painter Corneille Lentz (1879-1937). The MNHA acquired this work in the context of a legacy by the daughter of the artist, Antoinette Schleich-Lentz, who passed away in 2016 and who lived in the family house on the Limpertsberg until her death. A few dozen works by her father were kept in the attic of this house, many of which joined the collections of the Villa Vauban and the MNHA. Due to the bad storage conditions in the attic, the works had suffered considerably in the decades they spend there.

The work on paper presented here has holes and one can see stains of brown liquid. Like many Luxembourg works of art that are kept in the museum collections, Lentz’s Javelin Thrower is conserved for historical reasons. Not intended to be exhibited in a near future, he has not yet been restored but he is kept in adapted storage conditions that prevent further deterioration.

Once his inclusion in an exhibition is planned, the work can be restored – the holes will be filled and the liquid stains faded. In the meantime, the Javelin Thrower remains an object that can teach us a number of things: The choice to draw on paper shows the need to select a light material making it easier to be send to the United States where the work, as a sticker on the back lets us know, was shown at the Los Angeles Olympiad. Lentz’s Javelin Thrower has therefore almost traveled once around the world before returning to its point of departure: Created in Lentz’s workshop on the Limpertsberg, he returned and stayed there before he was rediscovered by the MNHA in 2017.

In the meantime, the house of Corneille Lentz, avenue de la Faïencerie on the Limpertsberg, has been restored and transformed, according to the wishes of his daughter Antoinette Schleich-Lentz, into student lodgings. It is now managed by the Fondation Schleich-Lentz and also includes an artist workshop and a small art gallery.

Text | CC BY-NC | Régis Moes

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