Ernst Benedikt Kietz
German, 1815-1890
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Ernst Benedikt Kietz was a German painter and lithographer.
Ernst Benedikt Kietz was the son of a senior postal secretary and a former actress. His two younger brothers, Gustav Adolph Kietz (1824-1908) and Theodor Kietz (1829-1898), both became sculptors. From 1831 to 1838, Ernst Benedikt Kietz studied at the Academy of Arts in Dresden under Johann Friedrich Matthäi, Johann Carl Rößler and Ernst Rietschel. In 1832, 1834 and 1838, he took part in the Dresden Academy exhibitions with portraits of Dresden society. From 1838 he was a student in the studio of Paul Delaroche in Paris. He became friends with Richard Wagner, who dedicated a piano piece in E major (WWV 64, so-called Albumblatt für Ernst Benedikt Kietz, “Lied ohne Worte”) to him in 1840.
He participated in the Paris Salon several times between 1841 and 1857. In 1853, he traveled to Constantinople via Malta; on his way back, he resided in Athens and Rome, and from around 1858 in Épernay. In 1870, he returned to Germany. At the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War, he was teaching drawing at the castle of Primkenau (Silesia) to the daughters of Frederick VIII, Grand Duke of Schleswig-Holstein (including the future Empress Augusta Victoria). He then settled in Dresden, where he taught drawing to Princess Mathilde of Saxony.