Lot Essay
This painting is an important rediscovered late work by the artist. It is the larger version of a painting probably commissioned directly from the artist by Bertel Thorvaldsen in 1823 (now in the Thorvaldsens Museum, Copenhagen, inv. no. B147).
In 1820 the artist left Vienna with Johann Christoph Erhard to the Via Quattro Fontane in Rome to join the main exponents of the Nazarene movement. He spent the summers of 1821, 1822 and 1824 in the Casa Baldi in Olevano with Karl Wilhelm Götzloff, Ludwig Richter and Franz Theobald Horny.
While in Italy, Reinhold's output of finished works in oil was limited, his concentration directed towards oil and pen sketches of the Serpentara while in Olevano. Three of his finished works in oil were directly commissioned by Thorvaldsen (now in the Thorvaldsens Museum, Copenhagen). On 24 November 1824 Reinhold wrote to his brothers "... denn eigentlich sind es meine Studien, die mich etwas bekannt gemacht haben, nebst den Bildern bei Thorvaldsen ..." (... actually it is my sketches which made me better known, aside from Thorvaldsen's paintings ...) (Catalogue of the Exhibition, Bertel Thorvaldsen, Cologne, 1977, p. 314).
Karl Friedrich Schinkel, who met Reinhold on his travels through Italy in 1824, purchased twelve such oil studies and four pen drawings in October of that year. He wrote to his wife on 28 October 1824 'Für mich und für Dich habe ich denn im eigentlichsten Sinne etwas wirkliches von Kunst mitgebracht ... Es sind die Studien, welche der jetzt in Rom anwesende talentvollste junge Landschaftler Reinhold an Ort und Stelle von mehreren Punkten von Neapel und Rom in Ölfarben auf Papier und in sauberen Zeichnungen gemacht hat, zwölf Farbskizzen, von denen die mehrsten (sic.) aber wirklich kleine Bildchen machen, und vier Bleistiftzeichnungen'. (For myself and for you, I'm bringing something that can truly be considered Art ... they are the studies, which the young landscape painter Reinhold, who has the most talent of the artists at present in Rome, painted in situ from several points around Naples and Rome in oils on paper and as clear drawings. Twelve coloured sketches, of which the majority are rather nearly completed paintings, and four pencil drawings).
Our painting is one of the last complete oils which Reinhold made before his early death on 15 January 1825. Although similar to Thorvaldsen's version (the two figures are reversed and the foliage differs), our picture was probably the work exhibited in the Kunstakademie, Berlin, in 1824.
In 1820 the artist left Vienna with Johann Christoph Erhard to the Via Quattro Fontane in Rome to join the main exponents of the Nazarene movement. He spent the summers of 1821, 1822 and 1824 in the Casa Baldi in Olevano with Karl Wilhelm Götzloff, Ludwig Richter and Franz Theobald Horny.
While in Italy, Reinhold's output of finished works in oil was limited, his concentration directed towards oil and pen sketches of the Serpentara while in Olevano. Three of his finished works in oil were directly commissioned by Thorvaldsen (now in the Thorvaldsens Museum, Copenhagen). On 24 November 1824 Reinhold wrote to his brothers "... denn eigentlich sind es meine Studien, die mich etwas bekannt gemacht haben, nebst den Bildern bei Thorvaldsen ..." (... actually it is my sketches which made me better known, aside from Thorvaldsen's paintings ...) (Catalogue of the Exhibition, Bertel Thorvaldsen, Cologne, 1977, p. 314).
Karl Friedrich Schinkel, who met Reinhold on his travels through Italy in 1824, purchased twelve such oil studies and four pen drawings in October of that year. He wrote to his wife on 28 October 1824 'Für mich und für Dich habe ich denn im eigentlichsten Sinne etwas wirkliches von Kunst mitgebracht ... Es sind die Studien, welche der jetzt in Rom anwesende talentvollste junge Landschaftler Reinhold an Ort und Stelle von mehreren Punkten von Neapel und Rom in Ölfarben auf Papier und in sauberen Zeichnungen gemacht hat, zwölf Farbskizzen, von denen die mehrsten (sic.) aber wirklich kleine Bildchen machen, und vier Bleistiftzeichnungen'. (For myself and for you, I'm bringing something that can truly be considered Art ... they are the studies, which the young landscape painter Reinhold, who has the most talent of the artists at present in Rome, painted in situ from several points around Naples and Rome in oils on paper and as clear drawings. Twelve coloured sketches, of which the majority are rather nearly completed paintings, and four pencil drawings).
Our painting is one of the last complete oils which Reinhold made before his early death on 15 January 1825. Although similar to Thorvaldsen's version (the two figures are reversed and the foliage differs), our picture was probably the work exhibited in the Kunstakademie, Berlin, in 1824.