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Erdmannsdorff, Friedrich Wilhelm (von)
(b Dresden, 18 May 1736; d Dessau, 9 March 1800). German architect, designer and writer. He studied ancient and modern languages at Dresden and Leipzig and, from 1754 to 1757, mathematics, physics, chemistry, history and philology at Wittenberg. In 1757 he met the young Prince Francis of Anhalt-Dessau and, after journeys on his own to Italy, he travelled with the Prince to England and Scotland (1763) and to Italy and France (1765–6). In Rome he explored the ancient buildings, made contact with Johann Joachim Winckelmann and studied the fundamentals of architecture with Charles-Louis Clérisseau. After returning via Antibes, Paris, London and Edinburgh, the Prince decided to have a palace and garden built at WÖRLITZ in the style of an English Palladian mansion. Schloss Wörlitz (1769–73) was Erdmannsdorff’s first important work and probably his masterpiece. His models were Duddingston House (1763–8), Edinburgh, by William Chambers, and Lancelot (‘Capability’) Brown’s preliminary studies for Claremont House (1772–4) in Surrey. The decoration over the windows and doors was derived from archaeological publications on the ruins at Baalbek and Palmyra. While construction was under way, he made further foreign journeys with the Prince and then carried out several works in Dessau, including Schloss Luisium and its gardens (from 1774) and a small theatre (1777) installed in the palace at Dessau. Schloss Georgium, Dessau, was built in 1780, while from that year he was entrusted with the decoration of seven rooms in the Berlin Schloss, Berlin, and two at Schloss Sanssouci, Potsdam. On 1 December 1786 the Berlin Academy admitted him as an honorary member. On a further journey to Italy, accompanying Frederick William, Prince of Brandenburg (later Frederick William III), he bought a number of ancient objects for Frederick William II, King of Prussia. In Italy he met, among others, Angelica Kauffman, Antonio Canova and Philipp Hackert. After his return he built a new theatre at Magdeburg (since rebuilt) and, in addition to an orangerie (1793–4), another theatre (1795; destr. 1855) at Dessau, the completion of which, like that of his town hall (begun 1795) at Wörlitz, he did not live to see. Erdmannsdorff’s house in Dessau frequently served as a sort of academy, one of his pupils being Friedrich Gilly, and on his advice the Chalkographische Gesellschaft was founded in 1795; it was widely held in high esteem. Erdmannsdorff’s buildings are now regarded as among the most important works of early German Neo-classicism.
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