Equestrian statue of Wilhelm ll in Cologne Germany

CountryGermany
Town:Cologne
Year of creation:1910
Rider(s):Wilhelm ll

Wilhelm II (1859-1941), the 29-year old son of Friedrich III succeeds him. Not a liberal like his father, but a thoroughly Prussianised emperor, who began a campaign of militarization and adventurism that eventually led Germany into isolation and ultimately to the disastrous World War I.
Sculptor(s):Tuaillon, Louis

Louis Tuaillon (1862 —1919) was a German sculptor most famous for his equestrian sculpture Mounted AmazonFrom 1879 to 1881, he attended the Hochschule für Bildende Künste in Berlin, then worked in the studio of Reinhold Begas. In Vienna, he spent two years in the studio of Rudolf Weyr, then spent the years 1885 to 1903 in Rome. From 1906, Tuaillon was once again in Berlin, as Professor in the Academy.

Description:

The only equestrian statue of this emperor stands on a corner of the Hohenzollern-bridge in Cologne. Of the so-called ‘Kaiserärmchen’ (the left arm of Wilhelm II was as from his birth to short) is naturally nothing to see. A few days after the installation of the statue somebody unknown hanged a travel bag on this arm. This could not only be interpreted, as a reference to the travel madness of the emperor but was also clearly an invitation to leave the country.

Worth noting is that on both sides of the bridge over the river Rhine in Cologne two equestrian statues are placed. On the cathedral side two statues by Louis Tuaillon of the successors of Wilhelm I: Wilhelm II (1910) and Friedrich III (1911), and on the other side the statues of Friedrich Wilhelm IV and Wilhelm I, both from 1864 by respectively Bläser and Drake. The condition of these statues is very poor. Starlings have their nest in the statue as the pictures show.