Josef Madlener

Who was Josef Madlener?

Josef Madlener was a German artist and illustrator. He was born near Memmingen, Swabia. His work was published in various newspapers, magazines, and a few children's Christmas books, e. g. Das Christkind Kommt and Das Buch vom Christkind. Madlener's Christmas art also appeared in several postcard series. The monograph by Eduard Raps published for the artist's centenary, shows a sampling of Madlener's art.

The most famous of Madlener's paintings is "Der Berggeist", from similarities in style dated to the period around 1925–30. The painting is reproduced on a postcard that was in the possession of J. R. R. Tolkien, marked "the origin of Gandalf". Zimmermann interviewed the Madlener's daughter Julie, who distinctly remembered her father painting Der Berggeist sometime after 1925/6. She also noted that the postcard version was "published in the late twenties by Ackermann Verlag München, in a folder with three or four similar pictures with motifs drawn from German mythology: a fairy lady of the woods, a deer carrying a shining cross between its antlers, 'Rübezahl', and possibly one more". The whereabouts of the original was unknown for some sixty years, until it was auctioned on Sotheby's in July, 2005, and sold for 84,000 GBP.