Ski Art: Rudolf Reschreiter (1868-1938)

Rudolf Reschreiter combined his love of hiking and mountaineering with a talent for portraying his high-mountain country in summer and in winter. He studied at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste München, the Munich Academy of Fine Arts, under Gabriel von Hakl, specializing in watercolors. He became known for his ability to paint the mountain scenery with great naturalness.

His pictures from a trip to South America in 1903 showed Chimborazo, the highest mountain in Ecuador, in all its volcanic and glacial majesty. Prince Regent Luitpold of Bavaria acquired the Chimborazo painting directly from the artist in 1906.

Quite often, Reschreiter depicted mountain huts that he found congenial. The Rotwandhaus, near the Schliersee in Bavaria at 1,765 meters (5,790 ft), was built in 1890 and saw its first skiers in March 1894. Reschreiter painted this picture in 1907, perhaps by way of celebrating the lodge’s construction. The Rotwandhaus became a popular mountaineering goal for men and women adventurers; here Reschreiter depicts fashionable skiers using the single-pole style in vogue at the turn of the 20th century.

Reschreiter’s watercolor works can be visited in the Alpine Museum in Munich, his home base, and in Kempten, as well as in the Alpine Club in Innsbruck, Austria. There is a 100-Year Festschrift (commemorative book) of the Rotwandhaus by Bernd Rost, published in 2007.