This website uses cookies

We use cookies and similar technologies on this website to analyze visits and to show you relevant messages on social media. By clicking 'Accept all' you give permission for their placement and for the processing of personal data obtained in this way, as stated in our privacy & cookie statement.

Our privacy & cookie statement:

Order tickets
Birthday in diary 1925
Escher Today
17 June 2017

Birthday in diary 1925

Today is Eschers Birthday! On 17 June 1898 at 7.15 Maurits Cornelis Escher was born in the substantial parental house in Leeuwarden, in what is now The Princessehof National Museum of Ceramics. Not that he was fond of birthdays himself. He used to say life was too short to create everything he wanted. His birthday only reminded him of the passage of time. But when he was younger, he did write his birthday in his diary.

Like in this one, from 1925 (in graceful handwriting). Later in life, he stopped this habit too. It is nice to read how he reminds himself of his church marriage to Jetta, a year and a day earlier:

"Matrimonio Chiesa Jetta"

Erik Kersten

Erik Kersten

Editor

Share:

More Escher today

Wedding photo with mothers, 1924

Wedding photo with mothers, 1924

On 16 June 1924 Maurits marries Jetta Umiker in the Italian coastal town Viareggio. The eldest daughter of the Swiss businessman Arturo Umiker and the Italian Enrichetta Cataneo, she was a silent girl whom he had met in Ravello 15 months earlier. Maurits was fascinated by this melancholic, sickly girl. He believed she was unhappy and the infatuated young man hoped to make her happy. Though not necessarily through marriage, as he was afraid of losing his artistic freedom and wanted more time to get to know Jetta.
Read more
Death of George Arnold Escher

Death of George Arnold Escher

George Arnold Escher was 96 years old when he passed away on 14 June 1939. It was therefore no surprise to his son Maurits that his death was near. Yet it felt like a shock. Maurits was the last of father Escher’s five sons (two of whom were from his first marriage).
Read more
Nonza and The Art Institute of Chicago

Nonza and The Art Institute of Chicago

In May 1933, Escher made a trip across Corsica with his friends Giuseppe Haas-Triverio and Roberto Schiess. Corsica was quite rugged and desolate in those days, inhabited by just 150,000 people. Within five weeks, they crossed the island on foot, by carriage, and by bus. The medieval town of Nonza was the subject of a lithograph Escher made the following winter.
Read more