August Wolf is known primarily for his work as a copyist. He trained in Nuremberg and Carlsruhe before moving to Munich in 1869 where he became acquainted with Count Adolf Friedrich von Schack. Besides his collection of paintings by contemporary German artists, Schack also formed a collection of 85 copies after famous Italian and Flemish masters. The artist Franz von Lenbach was the driving force behind this enterprise. In his memoires published in 1881, Schack records his first impression of Wolf's skills as a copyist: "Im Frühjahr 1870 kam mir eine vortreffliche Kopie zu Gesichte, die ein junger Maler aus Baden, August Wolf, in Dresden gefertigt hatte. [...] Die Nachbildung von Wolf liess nichts zu wünschen übrig; sie besass in hohem Grade jenes undefinierbare Etwas, was erst die Seele eines Kunstwerkes ausmacht." (see E. Ruhmer et.al., Schack-Galerie Gemälde Katalogue, II, 1969, p. 11). In 1871 Wolf was commissioned by Schack to paint copies after masterpieces in Venice; he spent the next 11 years there painting around 48 copies (40 of which are now housed in the Schack-Galerie, Munich). Wolf was later regulary commissioned for copies by among others, the Archduke of Oldenburg

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