Adam Elsheimer | |
|---|---|
 Self-portrait at theUffizi Gallery, Florence | |
| Born | 18 March 1578 |
| Died | 11 December 1610(1610-12-11) (aged 32) |
| Resting place | San Lorenzo in Lucina, Rome |
| Education | Friedrich Brentel Johann Rottenhammer |
| Notable work | The Flight into Egypt |
| Spouse | Carla Antonia Stuart (1606–1610) |
| Elected | Accademia di San Luca, Rome (1606) |
| Patron | Francesco Maria del Monte[1] |
Adam Elsheimer (18 March 1578 – 11 December 1610)[2] was a GermanBaroque painter who worked inRome. Though his career was short, his relatively few paintings were very influential in the early 17th century. His works were nearly all small oils on copper plates, of the type often known ascabinet paintings. They include a variety of light effects, and an innovative treatment of landscape. He was an influence on many other artists, includingRembrandt andPeter Paul Rubens.
Elsheimer was born inFrankfurt am Main, one of ten children and the son of a master tailor.[3] His father's house (which survived until destroyed byAllied bombs in 1944) was a few metres from the church whereAlbrecht Dürer'sHeller Altarpiece was then displayed. He was apprenticed to the artistPhilipp Uffenbach.[4] He probably visitedStrasbourg in 1596. At the age of twenty, he travelled toItaly viaMunich, where he was documented in 1598.[5]
His stay inVenice is undocumented, but the influence on his style is clear. He probably worked as an assistant toJohann Rottenhammer, some of whose drawings he owned.[6] Rottenhammer was a German who had been living in Italy for some years, and was the first German painter to specialize incabinet paintings. Uffenbach had specialized in large altarpieces, and although Elsheimer's earliest small paintings on copper seem to date from before he arrived in Italy, Rottenhammer's influence is clear in his mature work.[5]
Elsheimer is believed to have produced some significant works in Venice, such asThe Baptism of Christ(National Gallery, London) andThe Holy Family (Gemäldegalerie, Berlin) which show the influence of the Venetian paintersTintoretto andPaolo Veronese, as well as Rottenhammer.
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In early 1600, Elsheimer arrived inRome and quickly made friends with contacts of Rottenhammer, notablyGiovanni Faber, a Papal doctor, botanist and collector originally fromBamberg. He was Curator of theVatican Botanical Garden, and a member of theAccademia dei Lincei, a small intellectual coterie founded in 1603, and mainly concerned with the natural sciences.
Another friend of Rottenhammer was the Flemish landscape painterPaul Bril, already established in Rome, who was (with Faber) a witness at Elsheimer's marriage, painted a picture together with him (nowChatsworth House), and was owed money by him at his death. Like Faber, Bril was a long-term resident in Rome who had converted fromLutheranism toCatholicism, as Elsheimer did later.
Both Faber and Bril knewRubens, who was inRome in 1601, and who became another friend, later reproaching Elsheimer for not producing more work. He knewDavid Teniers the Elder, recently Rubens' pupil, and there is evidence that they lodged together. In 1604Karel van Mander, a Dutchman recently returned from Rome, published hisSchilder-Boeck which praised Elsheimer's work, and described him as slow-working and making few drawings. He also spent much time in churches, studying the works of the masters. Other writers mention his exceptional visual memory, his melancholy and his kind-heartedness. In a letter after his death,Rubens wrote: "he had no equal in small figures, landscapes, and in many other subjects. ...one could have expected things from him that one has never seen before and never will see."
In 1606, Elsheimer married Carola Antonia Stuarda da Francoforte (i.e. Stuart of Frankfurt – she was of Scottish ancestry and a fellow Frankfurter), and in 1609 they had a son. The son was not mentioned in a census a year later, possibly (Klessman says optimistically) because he had been put out to awet-nurse. She was the recent widow of the artist Nicolas de Breul (born inVerdun) and after Elsheimer's death remarried an Italian artist, Ascanio Quercia, within a year of his death. Elsheimer converted to Catholicism by 1608 (possibly 1606). He was admitted to theAccademia di San Luca, the Roman painters'Guild, in 1606, giving them a self-portrait (his only portrait, and only painting on canvas) now in theUffizi. In spite of his fame and talents, he appears to have both lived and died in difficult financial circumstances.
Elsheimer's painting ofTobias and the Angel (1602–1603; the "small" Tobias, now at Frankfurt) was especially well received because of its new conception of landscape. This picture was engraved by CountHendrick Goudt and as a result, was published across Europe. However, his association with Goudt, who lodged and trained with him for several years, was difficult. Elsheimer seems to have borrowed money from Goudt, which according to one account resulted in his brief incarceration inDebtor's prison. After Elsheimer's early death in 1610 in Rome, Goudt owned several of his pictures. Goudt made sevenengravings of Elsheimer's paintings, which were crucial in spreading his influence, as very few of his paintings were viewable even by artists; ascabinet paintings they were mostly kept in small and very private rooms.
Elsheimer had a definite preference for choosing rare or original subjects, both for his mythological and religious paintings.Jupiter andMercury in the house ofPhilemon and Baucis, (c. 1608, nowDresden) is based on an episode inOvid, and had never been painted before.The Mocking ofCeres(Kingston, Ontario, a copy exists in thePrado),Apollo andCoronis (Liverpool), andIl Contento (Edinburgh) were equally new. Some of his religious scenes were more conventional, but his selection of the moment to depict, as inSt Lawrence prepared for Martyrdom (London), is often unusual.
His perfectionism, and an apparent tendency to depression, resulted in a small total output, despite the small size of all his pictures. In all about forty paintings are now generally agreed to be by him (see Kressmann below). He made a few etchings, but not very successfully. However, his work was highly regarded by other artists and a few important collectors for its quality. He had a clear and direct influence on other Northern artists who were in Rome such asPaul Bril,Jan Pynas,Leonaert Bramer andPieter Lastman, laterRembrandt's master, who was probably in Rome by 1605. Rembrandt's first dated work is aStoning of St Stephen which appears to be a response to Elsheimer's painting of the subject, now in Edinburgh. Some works by Italian artists, such as the six pictures fromOvid byCarlo Saraceni now in theMuseo di Capodimonte,Naples, also show Elsheimer's clear influence.Rubens, who owned at least four of his works, knew Elsheimer in Rome, and praised him highly in a letter after his death.
In a wider sense, he was influential in three respects. Firstly his night scenes were highly original. His lighting effects in general were very subtle, and very different from those ofCaravaggio. He often uses as many as five different sources of light. He graduates the light relatively gently, with the less well-lit parts of the composition often containing important parts of it.
Secondly, his combination of poetic landscape with large foreground figures gives the landscape a prominence that had rarely been seen since the Early Renaissance. His landscapes do not always feature an extensive view; often the lushness of the vegetation closes it off. They are more realistic, but no less poetic, than those of Bril orJan Brueghel, and play a part in the formation of those ofPoussin andClaude. His treatment of large figures with a landscape backdrop looks forward, throughRubens andvan Dyck, to the English portrait in the eighteenth century. Soon after his death, he became very popular with English collectors, notablyKing Charles I of England, theEarl of Arundel, andGeorge Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham, and over half his paintings have been in English collections at some time (nearly one third are still in the UK).
Thirdly, his integration of Italian styles with the German tradition he was trained in is perhaps more effective than that of any Northern painter sinceDürer (with the exception of his friendRubens). His compositions tend to underplay the drama of the events they depict (in noticeable contrast to those of Rubens), but often show the start of moments of transformation. His figures are relatively short and stocky, and reflect little of classical ideals. Their poses and gestures are unflamboyant, and their facial expressions resemble those in Early Netherlandish painting rather than thebella figura of most Italian Renaissance work.
The largest collection of his work is inFrankfurt. TheAlte Pinakothek, Munich has two of his finest night-scene paintings, and Berlin, Bonn, Dresden and Hamburg[clarification needed] have paintings. TheNational Gallery, London has three paintings with others in theNational Gallery of Scotland,Edinburgh,Apsley House,Windsor Castle,Petworth House, theWellcome Library andLiverpool. In 2006 an exhibition at theStädel,Frankfurt, then Edinburgh, andDulwich Picture Gallery in London reunited almost all of his oeuvre.[7]
There are drawings in Paris (Musée duLouvre) and Edinburgh among other locations.
Only two works are on public display outside Europe. One is in theKimbell Art Museum,Fort Worth (The Flight into Egypt),[8] and the other is theMocking of Ceres, now in theAgnes Etherington Art Centre in Kingston, Ontario,[9] badly damaged by fire at some point in its history; it had been part of theDutch Gift toCharles II of England in 1660.[10]
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Source unless otherwise stated
Media related toAdam Elsheimer at Wikimedia Commons
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