Landscape (Franconian Landscape)

Details

Roennefahrt 263; Wichmann 1414.

Literatur:
Alois Elsen, Carl Spitzweg, Wien 1948, S. 127f. Text, Farbtaf. 63;
Günther Roennefahrt, Carl Spitzweg. Beschreibendes Verzeichnis seiner Gemälde, Ölstudien und Aquarelle, München 1960, S. 162, Kat.-Nr. 263, mit Abb.;
Siegfried Wichmann, Carl Spitzweg. Die kleine Landschaft der Spätzeit, Dokumentation, Starnberg-München, R.f.v.u.a.K. 1988, Bayer. Staatsbibl. München, Inv.-Nr. Ana 656 SW 7;
Siegfried Wichmann, Carl Spitzweg, München 1990, S. 162, S. 214, Kat.-Nr. 109;
Siegfried Wichmann, Carl Spitzweg. Verzeichnis der Werke, Stuttgart 2002, S. 515, Kat.-Nr. 1414, mit farb. Abb.

Ausstellung:
Ausstellung Carl Spitzweg. Zur 150. Wiederkehr seines Geburtstages am 5. Febr. 1958, Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, München 1958, S. 37, Kat.-Nr. 81 (betitelt als “Landschaft mit Frau und Kind”).

Provenienz:
Sammlung der Fürsten zu Liechtenstein (Inv.-Nr. 2152);
Sammlung Georg Schäfer, Schweinfurt (Inv.-Nr. 2329), auf der Rahmenrückseite mit dem Etikett;
Privatsammlung, Süddeutschland.

Description

The view sweeps across a wide valley cut through by a river, with a small village within walking distance on the right. In the far distance lies the Franconian Jura with its typical layered structure, behind which the silhouette of a mountain ridge is recognisable in strong blue. In the afternoon sun, which lends the Bavarian landscape a southern flavour, a woman – her child on her skirt – is out and about. They have passed a dried-up riverbed and are now walking downhill towards the housing estate on a slightly sloping heath path lined with dense bushes. It is the timeless idyll of a summer’s day, with a few white clouds drifting leisurely across the blue sky.
In this landscape study, Spitzweg skilfully switches between perspectives – the foreground is given from an elevated viewpoint, creating the impression of a top view, while the background behind the bushes widens out like a panorama from a horizontal perspective. In 1851, he had visited the artists’ colony in Barbizon together with Eduard Schleich the Elder, where the foundations for Impressionism, which would spread only a little later, were laid. Spitzweg’s small painting illustrates the great influence that the painting of the Barbizon school had on his late work.