Details

Literatur:
Eduard A. Safarik, Johann Kupetzky (1666-1740): Gesamtwerk, Bd. I, Brünn 2014, S. 68, Kat.-Nr. 179, mit Abb. S. 198.

Provenienz:
Nachlass von Radulf Graf zu Castell-Rüdenhausen, Rödelsee, Schloss Schwanberg;
Privatbesitz, Süddeutschland.

Description

Kupetzky´’s portraits found great favour among the leading personalities of his era. A six-part collection of engravings based on Kupetzky’s paintings was published in 1745 under the title “Joannis Kupezki, Incomparabilis Artificis, Imagines et Picturae […]”. It brings together rulers, aristocrats, but also the aspiring middle class, mostly from his Nuremberg period. Thanks to the generally reliable register at the back of the work, it is possible to name the subjects. Here Johann Andreas Schmid, market manager, quartermaster and assessor by profession, is shown as a half-length figure facing left. Effectively illuminated against a dark background, he looks out of the picture with alert eyes. The red velvet cap trimmed with lace, which you often encounter in this form in Kupetzky’s oeuvre, especially catches the eye. Schmid wears an unbuttoned gold brocade vest embroidered with regalia under a blue-green coat. Clamped between his hand and his upper body, his shotgun is always within reach. Enclosed: “Yeah. Andr. Schmidius from Altenstadt. Norib.”, mezzotint by Berhard Vogel (1683-1737) after J. Kupetzky, (1735), 34.3 x 25.4 cm (sheet size 49.4 x 35 cm). Below the motto “Variam semper dant otia mentem. Lucan.” (Idleness always makes the mind fickle).