HUMMEL, MARIA INNOCENTIA

Franciscan; b. Massing, Bavaria, 1909; d. Siessen, 1946. Berta Humel was the third of six children. She began her education in a local Catholic elementary school. At the age of 12, she enrolled in the Institute of English Sisters, a boarding school in Marienhoehe. There, she demonstrated an early artistic talent, especially in watercolor and pastels. From 1927, she attended the Academy of Applied Arts in Munich from which she graduated in 1931. The predominant theme in her art was children in a Bavarian rural and folk setting. After graduation, she entered the Convent of the Franciscan Sisters of Siessen, a community of 250 sisters with an apostolate of teaching. She took the name in religion of Sr. Maria Innocentia. During her novitiate, she designed vestments and altar clothes. Upon her profession she taught for a time at St. Anna, a school for girls in Saulgau. Her art was published in books and art cards where it caught the eye of Franz Goebel of Goebel Porzellenfabrik, the head of a porcelain company who was looking to establish a new line of porcelain figurines. Based on her watercolors of children in Bavarian folk settings, the line of "Hummel" figures was introduced in January 1935. They were immediately popular within Germany. During the occupation after May 1945, they were especially popular with GI 's who brought them back to the U.S. Sr. Mary Innocentia died from tuberculosis at the young age of 37 in 1946. New figures are still being produced in Sr. Mary Innocentia's style after review by the Artistic Board of the Siessen Convent. The M. I. Hummel figures have achieved world renown and are widely collected.

[d. p. sheridan]