What did Mozart really look like?
The true appearance of Mozart is surprisingly contentious - He’s even been described as the most famous person whose true likeness is the least recognized. All of his portraits look a little different. His family members - as well as historians - have commented on this. His sister Nannerl said that she had “never seen so many portraits of my brother that are so different when seen side by side, but that nevertheless all look like him.”
Portrait of the Mozart family by Johann Nepomuk della Croce
Mozart scholar Arthur Schurig said, “Mozart has been the subject of more portraits that have no connection with his actual appearance than any other famous man.” Alfred Einstein, a Mozart specialist said: “We have nothing to give us an idea of Mozart's physical appearance, except for a few mediocre canvases that don’t even resemble each other.”
So what then, is his true appearance?
Let’s start with some portraits that were created from life, during his lifetime.
This Della Croce portrait of the Mozart family was made from life around 1780, and gives us a good look at the young Wolfgang.
He’s also seen in the Bologna portrait. He’s shockingly only 14 in this image. His father said his son was ill the day this portrait was painting, and that it wasn’t even a good work of art - but also added that it looks “very much like him”.
Portrait of Mozart at just 14(!!) by an unknown painter (this is a 1777 copy of a lost 1770 original).
Another is an unfinished image, made by his brother-in-law, which Mozart’s wife said was the most accurate image, but somehow looks the most different from the others.
We know some details from the people he lived and worked with. A colleague Michael Kelly said that Mozart was very thin and pale (he was only about 5’ tall), with abundant dark blond hair. He was very fond of billiards (and always won). Drank punch (with little moderation), and was a kind-hearted man with a good sense of humor.
We also know he had large blue eyes, a strong nose, and a head considered too big for his body.
He was considered a sickly child, he’d had smallpox in his youth which marked his face, and suffered from poor dental health and toothaches. His poor health, I suspect, is a reason he always looks much older than his years in some of these portraits.
His friends agreed that Mozart knew he wasn’t a man who was exceptionally attractive, so he made up for it by wearing luxurious clothing, and always caring meticulously about his appearance.
One small indicator of possible self-consciousness is that we don’t see his left ear in any paintings. He had a defect of the left ear (we now refer to this as “Mozart’s ear”) that changed the shape quite drastically.
A watercolor image of Mozart’s ear deformity, painted by himself. The ear on the left is his ear, compared with a normal ear on the right.
I’m going to use the best quality image we have of Mozart to bring him to life - this 1819 version by Barbara Krafft. While it was not made from life, Krafft actually worked closely with Mozart’s sister on this version to create a kind of “definitive likeness”. Kind of like what I try to do these days. She used 3 faithful works as models for this image. Krafft and Nannerl agreed that Mozart hadn’t been painted by the most talented artists of his time, and they wanted to have a good portrait of him.
Credit to Vincent P. De Luise for this wonderfully comprehensive overview of Mozart’s portraiture.
