178. Red Scarf

Along with Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller (1793 - 1865), Friedrich von Amerling (1803 - 1887) was one of the most prominent Austrian painters of the 19th century and a leading figure of the Viennese Biedermeier. He began his artistic education in his native Vienna, and then continued his studies in Prague, London, and Paris, where the paintings of Thomas Lawrence (1769 - 1830) and Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres (1780 - 1867) left a strong impression on him. Von Amerling's painting style was characterized by exceptional refinement, soft facial modeling, and excellent psychological characterization of the portrayed persons. Thanks to his skill, he quickly established himself as a portrait artist of the aristocracy and intellectual elite, and as a court painter of Emperor Franz Joseph. His work was crowned with a noble title, numerous honors, and in 1879 he was also awarded the Order of the Iron Crown. Von Amerling's impressive oeuvre includes more than 1,000 works, primarily portraits, and his works are kept in numerous world museums, such as the Museum of Art History and the Belvedere Gallery in Vienna and the Liechtenstein Museum. The period between 1830 and 1850 represented the most fruitful period in von Amerling's creative career. The portrait of the girl with the red bow probably comes from the end of this creative period, and based on similarities in the painterly handwriting, we can compare it to von Amerling's "Portrait of Mrs. Plach", dated 1850. In both works we recognize somewhat freer painting expression of von Amerling, in which he deviates from the often dry modeling of Biedermeier and approaches his youthful influence, Thomas Lawrence. Rich and soft brush strokes model the face of this young girl, and light accents – carefully placed in the corners of the eyes and lips of the portrayed – add a note of sensuality and voluptuousness to her figure. If she weren't dressed in a coat with a fur collar, but in a white empire dress with a high waist, we would easily mistake this girl for one of the beauties in Lawrence's portraits from the early 19th century.

Dimensions

width 49.5 cm, height 63 cm

Description

oil on canvas

PROVENANCE

until the late 1940s: historical collection of Ervin Weiss (1884-1966) and Branka Weiss (1902-1975); 1947: The Ministry of Culture of the People's Republic of Croatia declares the Weiss collection a private collection of public importance; after 1949: the collection is inventoried by the communist regime, followed by confiscation; 1955: it becomes the responsibility of the Modern Gallery, where it is kept for the next 70 years; after 2021: the collection becomes the property of the Weiss family heirs, after nearly 30 years of legal proceedings for restitution.

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