In Ida Hoff’s interpretation, Ferdinand Hodler’s painting “The Day” depicts “the varying attitudes of women to the issue of women’s rights”. Ferdinand Hodler, “The Day”, 1899-1900 (detail).
In Ida Hoff’s interpretation, Ferdinand Hodler’s painting “The Day” depicts “the varying attitudes of women to the issue of women’s rights”. Ferdinand Hodler, “The Day”, 1899-1900 (detail). Kunstmuseum Bern / Wikimedia

Physician Ida Hoff’s feminist interpretation of Hodler

Born in Russia, Ida Hoff became one of the first women to attend university in Switzerland around 1900. In addition to pursuing a career in medicine, she was a staunch advocate of women’s rights, guided by her feminist conscience and a penchant for irreverence. She found an outlet for the latter at the second Swiss Congress for Women's Interests in 1921, where she wittily subjected Ferdinand Hodler’s painting “The Day” to a fresh new feminist interpretation.

Franziska Rogger

Franziska Rogger

Franziska Rogger is a freelance historian.

Website: franziskarogger.com
Ida Hoff (1880-1952) and her mother came to Switzerland circa 1900 from Russia, where women were banned from higher education under the czarist regime. Like many other Eastern European and Russian women at the time, mother and daughter wished to attend university and achieve greater freedom in life. The highly talented Ida obtained a medical degree in Bern and opened her own practice as a “specialist in internal medicine” in 1911, while also working as a school doctor. Around 1900, Hoff became an active member of the Bern Female Students' Association, which campaigned vigorously for equal rights. She was also involved in other women’s groups with political and trade union leanings that were pushing for a better, fairer future for women. She sat on the board of the Women’s Suffrage Association and of the Federation of Women Graduates, and, in 1928, worked on the Schweizerische Ausstellung für Frauenarbeit (SAFFA, the Swiss Exhibition for Women’s Work).
The confident, feminist Female Students' Association in Bern 1903 at the opening of the new university building. Ida Hoff is standing at the very left of the back row.
The confident, feminist Female Students' Association in Bern 1903 at the opening of the new university building. Ida Hoff is standing at the very left of the back row. Bern University Archives
Ida Hoff never married but shared a home with philosopher Anna Tumarkin (1875-1951), the first woman in Europe to become a professor. The two women were described by their contemporaries as serious and devoted to academic pursuits. But they also loved art and drove around the country in Hoff’s car, accompanied by local artist Ruedi Münger and his wife Marie. They also liked to visit Cuno Amiet in Oschwand and they bought a painting from him for 1,000 francs showing a “naked, bashful young girl”.
Ida Hoff at the age of 25, 1905.
Ida Hoff at the age of 25, 1905. Private archive of Li Carstens, Uppsala
Anna Tumarkin
Anna Tumarkin Hermann Völlger
But for all her seriousness, Ida Hoff also had a mischievous side and a wry sense of humour. During an evening’s entertainment at the second Swiss Congress for Women's Interests in 1921, she regaled those present with her unconventional take on Ferdinand Hodler’s (1853-1918) painting “The Day”. The members of the women’s movement in Switzerland at the time – minus the Catholics and Social Democrats – had gathered in Bern to demand the right to work, equal pay and improved access to vocational education. Coincidentally, a major exhibition commemorating Hodler was being held at the Museum of Fine Arts in Bern. The grand opening had been attended by two Federal Councillors and three members of the Cantonal Government, inspiring Hoff to make fun of the whole thing. Hodler was the cause of much disagreement among art lovers of the period: the avant-garde nature of his art led to passionate feuding in which some condemned him while others admired him.
Ferdinand Hodler, “The Day”, 1899-1900
Ferdinand Hodler, “The Day”, 1899-1900 Kunstmuseum Bern / Wikimedia
Ida Hoff took a fresh look at Hodler’s painting “The Day” from a feminist angle: “The Day” – Ida Hoff cheekily maintained – had originally been called “The Women’s Congress”. In her reading, the artwork depicted the “varying attitudes of women to the issue of women’s rights”: in the middle sits “the progressive woman, resolutely asserting her stance on the issue, determined to employ radical means, not shying away from any of the consequences, completely casting off the veil of convention, she announces the coming day to the world.” On either side of her, Hoff saw “women embroiled in a fierce mental battle between the old and the new. One blinded by the bright aura of the new age, the other unable to find the strength to break with old traditions.” The two figures at the edge of the group were “swathed in their feminine beauty, still bound by old ties, stuck in the lethargy of the old ways, one raising her hands like blinkers to shade her eyes from all that is new, the other ‒ not used to acting in her own right ‒ begging for a strong guiding hand.” Meanwhile, the journalists of the period were focusing on Hodler’s global importance. They were particularly keen to explore the way in which the artist created a spiritual connection between the French- and German-speaking aspects of Swiss culture. A native of Bern but educated as a Genevan, Ferdinand Hodler was seen as “a Swiss artist in the most profound sense”. Two years after the end of the First World War, the journalists’ favourite topic was that of Swiss unity, echoing on from Carl Spitteler’s unforgettable, statesmanlike speech “Unser Schweizer Standpunkt [Our Swiss Standpoint]”, given in December 1914, in which he had made an impassioned plea for a neutral Switzerland to display its unity. The issue of women’s rights was slow to gain traction. It reached a first highpoint circa 1928 with the SAFFA, then went through many ups and downs before women finally gained the right to vote in 1971.

Published on: 23.04.2024

URL: https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/en/2024/04/physician-ida-hoffs-feminist-interpretation-of-hodler/

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