August Natterer

August Natterer, given the pseudonym Neter by his psychiatrist to protect him and his family from the intense social stigma associated with mental illness at the time, was born on 3 August 1868 in Schornreute, a quarter of Ravensburg, Germany, the son of a clerk and the youngest of nine children.

Natterer studied engineering, got married, travelled widely and had a successful career as an electrician, but was suddenly stricken with delusions and anxiety attacks.

They were at least twenty meters big, clear to observe, almost without color like photographs… The images were epiphanies of the Last Judgment.

[3]This ordeal led to a suicide attempt and committal to the first of what would be several mental asylums occupied during the remaining twenty-six years of his life.

[6] Max Ernst's Oedipus Rex was influenced by Natterer's piece Miraculous Shepherd.