The Rape of the Sabine Women; and The Intervention of the Sabine Women

Born into a family of painters in the southern Tyrol, Platzer became the chief exponent of the Austrian Rococo style. Predominantly a painter of history, allegories and conversation pieces, it was the brilliant colours and meticulous finish of his small-scale cabinet paintings, such as the present pictures, that established Platzer's reputation as the unrivalled exponent of his field. His only serious rival in this genre was his friend, Franz Christoph Janneck, whom he met upon his arrival at the Akademie der Bildenden Kunst in Vienna in 1726, and who painted a number of works in a very similar, if somewhat less detailed, manner. Platzer's miniaturist technique and predilection for the use of copper as a support reveal his debt to the Leiden fijnnschilders of the 17th and 18th centuries. Lavish in conception, lively in colour and meticulous in their attention to innumerable details, the present pictures form part of a series of which two are in the Ponce Museum, Puerto Rico and three in a private collection.