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Lotte Frank - Witt

Lotte Witt was a sister-in-law of Otto Frank.

Person

  • Anna Charlotte Frank - Witt
  • Maagdenburg, Duitsland Aug. 26, 1900
  • Londen, Groot-Brittannië Aug. 6, 1974

Anna Charlotte (Lotte/Lottie/Lotti) Witt was married to Robert Hermann Frank, the eldest brother of Otto Frank. She was a daughter of Gustav Heinrich Witt and Elise Witt — Wesarg, and had two sisters: Paula (1907) Anneliese Olga (1916).[1] Her father was a policeman and Lotte herself worked at the Ricard art gallery as Robert's secretary. She was a Gentile and apparently, her future mother-in-law Alice Frank was initially opposed to the marriage.[2]

Her marriage to Robert Hermann Frank took place on 1 July 1922.[3] In 1933, she and her husband went to London. There they lived in Westminster and Kensington and lived through the Blitz and the further bombing during the Second World War.

After the death of her husband in 1953, her brother-in-law Otto supported her with small amounts of money. Between the summer of 1954 and the autumn of 1956 this amounted to three gifts of 50 pounds each.[4] She had a keen eye for art.  In 1964, she bought Welsh Landscape with Two Women Knitting (1860) by William Dyce’s at Christie’s, London, and sold it to career diplomat Sir David Montagu Douglas Scott a year later for £ 950. When it was auctioned at Sotheby’s in 2008, Dyce’s celebrated picture sold for $ 816,800/£ 541,250 (including buyer’s premium) to a foreign buyer.  An export ban was put on it by the U.K. government, and in 2010, National Museum Wales secured it for £ 557,218 with a mix of grants, donations and gifts.[5]

On 28 March 1972, she drew up her will.[6] On her death in 1974, Lotti left two paintings "in memory of her husband Robert Frank" to the Tate Gallery in London.[7] These were two parts of The Last Judgement triptych by John Martin: The Last Judgement and The Plains of Heaven.[8] The Tate Gallery had already owned acquired the third part, The Great Day of his Wrath, from Robert in 1945, so the triptych was now complete again. In 2011-2012 the triptych was part of an exhibition about Martin.[9] The revival of interest in the work of John Martin, a British painter of the Romantic school, owes much to Robert Frank and his wife Charlotte. Until her death in 1974, she continued to promote John Martin's work.[10]

Lotti Frank's estate included another several dozen paintings, some by Martin and some by painters from his 'school'.[11]

Source personal data.[3][12] Addresses: Ffm; 1B King Street, St. James Square, London SW1 (Westminster).

Footnotes

  1. ^ Ancestry: Elise Wesarg.
  2. ^ Carol Ann Lee, The hidden life of Otto Frank, Londen: Penguin Books, 2003, p. 21.
  3. a, b Marriage Index Hessen, 1849 – 1931 on MyHeritage.
  4. ^ Anne Frank Stichting (AFS), Anne Frank Collectie (AFC), reg. code OFA_071: Otto Frank aan Lotte Frank - Witt, 6 juli 1961.
  5. ^ Lucy Paquette, "James Tissot and the Revival of Victorian Art in the 1960s." The Hammock.
  6. ^ Jersey Archive, St. Helier (UK), Principal Registry of the Family Division, D/Y/B1/216/34: testament A.C. Witt, weduwe van R. Frank (kopie).
  7. ^ Wikipedia: The Last Judgement (Martin paintings).
  8. ^ Tate Britain: The Last Judgment, John Martin, 1853 and The Plains of Heaven, John Martin, 1851-3.
  9. ^ Tate Britain: John Martin: Apocalypse.
  10. ^ Laia Anguix-Vilches, Rediscovering John Martin: Collecting the apocalypse in post-war Britain, in: Journal of the History of Collections, 36 (2024) 1 (March), p. 179–192. For John Martin, zie Wikipedia: John Martin (painter).
  11. ^ Anne Frank Fonds (AFF), Bazel, Familienarchiv, reg. code FEFA_StE_bdoc_007: Lijst ‘24/2380 Mrs. A.C. Frank deceased’.
  12. ^ AFS, AFC Otto Frank Archief (OFA), reg. code OFA_031: agenda 1974, 6 augustus.

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