Carl Spitzweg

Visit to the monk’s hermitage (The hermit in love)

Details

Wichmann 1533.
Literature:
Cf. Günther Roennefahrt, Carl Spitzweg, Munich 1960, p. 276, no. 1261 (variant of the same motif);
Siegfried Wichmann, Carl Spitzweg. Die Nachhilfestunde. Dokumentation, Starnberg-München, Reihe für vergleichende und angewandte Kunstgeschichte 1988, pp. 5-42 text and colour illus. Staatsbibl. Munich, inv. no. Ana 656 SW 62;
Siegfried Wichmann, Carl Spitzweg. The private lesson. Dokumentation, Starnberg-München, R.f.v.u.a.K. 1994, pp. 30-35 text and colour illus., Bayer. State Bibl. Munich, inv. no. Ana 656 SW 101; Siegfried Wichmann, Carl Spitzweg. Visit to the Hermit. Documentation, Starnberg-Munich, R.f.v.u.a.K. 2000, Bayer. Staatsbibl. Munich, inv. no. Ana 656 SW 73.
Siegfried Wichmann, Carl Spitzweg. The surprised hermit. Dokumentation, Starnberg-München, R.f.v.u.a.K. 2001, pp. 3-45 text and colour illus., Bayer. Staatsbibl. Munich, inv. no. Ana 656 SW 171; Siegfried Wichmann, Carl Spitzweg. Verzeichnis der Werke, Stuttgart 2002, p. 551, cat. no. 1533, with col. Illus.
Provenance:
Documented in 1908 in the possession of Otto Spitzweg;
from 1916 owned by Richard Spitzweg, who passed the painting on to Wilhelm Spitzweg, Gräfelfing;
1936 sale by Galerie Hugo Helbing to the Peek & Cloppenburg Collection;
Neumeister, Munich, auction, 27 June 2001, lot 866;
Private property, Southern Germany;
Karl & Faber, Munich, auction 252, 8 November 2013, lot 171 (result: € 150,000);
since then in private ownership, Southern Germany.

Descrizione

In 1802/03, secularisation changed the political and religious balance of power in Bavaria forever. As a result, hundreds of monasteries were dissolved and expropriated. Cultural and intellectual life reacted to the upheavals and increasingly began to retreat into Biedermeier worlds and small-town idylls. At the same time, countless monks who had become homeless retreated into the solitude of the European forests, and art and literature also discovered the theme for themselves: while artists such as Moritz von Schwind and Ludwig Richter usually approached the motif in late Romantic transfiguration, Carl Spitzweg had already developed his very own interpretations of this theme early on. In countless variations, he staged hermits, hermits and monks, whose simple, nature-loving seclusion was always intended to reflect the little bit of joie de vivre that was worth preserving in the face of otherwise difficult times. Threats to his “private happiness” always came from outside, often with the ironic wink typical of Spitzweg. In the full maturity of his late work, Spitzweg once again devotes himself to this popular theme, depicting a cheerful monk having a little fling with a young maid, with the approaching guardian of morals in the form of a Jesuit priest in the background: “… a very late depiction by the painter, who puts all his skill into this little episode. He depicts a frequently observed situation with early Impressionist precision and technique, not without drama, (…), a small painting that would grace any state gallery” (S. Wichmann, Dokumentation, Starnberg, 16 April 2001, p. 46).

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