Ludwig Richter

Sächsischer Kunstverein, Dresden (acquired from the artist in 1830)
Landbaukondukteur Kegel, Bautzen
Geheimrat Dr. Müller, Dresden, by 1876
Pauline Brandes, Apolda
R. von Zahn, Dresden, by 1922
Private collection, Germany

Dresden, Gedächtnisausstellung, 1903

The artist's paintings ledger, no 19 (as Fischer am Kastell von Bajä)
Viktor Paul Mohn, Ludwig Richter, 1803-1884, 6th ed., Leipzig, 1921, p. 38
Karl Josef Friedrich, 'Die Gemälde Ludwig Richters', Forschungen zur deutschen Kunstgeschichte, vol. 24, Berlin, 1937, p. 44 f, no. 33
Ludwig Richter, Der Maler, exh. cat., Dresden, Munich & Berlin, 2003, p. 182 ff.

The canvas has not been lined. There is a pattern of fine craquelure throughout; however, this is not visually distracting. Ultra-violet light reveals some intermittent strokes of retouching along the extreme framing edges. This work is otherwise in good original condition and ready to hang. Presented in a decorative gilt frame. Colours are overall less red than in the catalogue illustration.
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Following in the footsteps of, and taking inspiration from, Domenico Quaglio, Ernst Ferdinand Oehme and Franz Ludwig Catel, Ludwig Richter travelled to Italy in 1823, returning to Dresden in 1826 with countless impressions and sketches. He worked these up into highly finished oils celebrating the Neapolitan light and peasant life, among them paintings commissioned by the art collector and patron Johann Gottlob Quandt. Italian subjects are rare in Richter's oeuvre, but works including Thunderstorm in the Sabine Mountains (Frankfurt, Städel Museum) also helped make him famous.

Like his predecessors, Richter perceived reality filtered through the lens of the art of the Renaissance, down to the picturesque construction of the composition, the fisherman's family classically framed by the Castello Aragonese di Baia on the right and the drying nets on the left. The publication of Johann Wolfgang Goethe's Italienische Reise (Italian Journey) in 1816 lent a new dimension to German attitudes towards Italy. In this work, Goethe provided an example of an individual reaching maturity through contact with a country that possessed a classical past, establishing a standard by which later travellers - artists and Grand Tourists alike - measured their own Italian experience.