Moritz von Schwind Austrian, 1804-1871

Ludwig van Beethoven (until his death on 26 March, 1827)
Moritz von Schwind
Marie Baurnfeind (the artist's daughter)
Joseph and Hermine Hupka, Vienna (acquired from the above; until 1939)
Städtische Sammlungen, Vienna (1939)
Restituted to the heirs of Hermine and Joseph Hupka in 2004

Depicting the double wedding of Figaro and Susanna, and Bartolo and Marcellina, Schwind's seminal early work is based on Act III of Mozart's famous opera, first performed in Vienna on 1 May 1786. 

On 22 December 1823 Schwind wrote in an unpublished letter to his friend Franz von Schober that he had been to the theatre to hear The Marriage of Figaro. 'The inventiveness and the music, though I already knew them a little, astonished me. How compelling and true both are!' On 2 April 1825 he wrote, again to Schober, 'I have just completed a long wedding procession, depicting over thirty pages much that is both serious and fun. The wedding couples are Figaro and Susanna and Bartolo and Marcellina, and the Count and Countess [Almaviva] are also present.  Ahead go musicians, dancers, soldiers, servants, country folk, pages, and so on. Drawing up the rear are guests and masked figures: allegories from [Friedrich Schlegel's] Lucinda, Papageno in love, the Four Seasons, then a page with various figures, who form the rearguard, and finally Cherubin and the sweet Barbarina together in a bower. There are over one hundred figures in all, between three and four per page. The paper is very fine, the plumes have often caused me grief. I am very curious to know what you think. I think that there are some good parts and the whole something very new.'

Not only did Schwind himself regard the finished album as a great success and important work, it was also admired by friends and contemporaries. In a letter to Franz Schubert of 25 July 1823 Schwind wrote: 'I don't know if I told you, I have been to see [Franz] Grillparzer [the Austrian playwright]. He very much liked my 'Marriage' and assured me that he would still remember every figure after ten years...That he regarded 'The Marriage of Figaro' as I do was for me a small triumph.' And, as Schwind's inscription on the frontispiece attests, it was in the possession of Ludwig van Beethoven until the latter's death in 1827, before reverting to Schwind.

Schwind's imaginary interpretation of the wedding procession is based only loosely on Lorenzo Da Ponte's libretto. It transcends the time in which the story is set, introducing a host of individuals ranging from allegorical figures, dancers, and musicians to diverse opera characters and fantastical masked faces. Among those recognisable in the procession are Don Giovanni, Papageno and Papagena from The Magic Flute, and the Graf von Gleichen from Schubert's unfinished opera, not to mention Schwind's own self-portrait on the nineteenth sheet. The costumes too have been historicised, the whole procession having a strong element of Renaissance pageantry about it. Schwind greatly admired Albrecht Dürer, in particular his Triumphal Procession commissioned by Emperor Maximilian I, a likely inspiration for the present work.

Following Schwind's death, the album remained in the artist's family who, to commemorate the centenary of  Schwind's birth in 1904, gave permission for all thirty sheets to be published as a limited edition commemorative album. A few years later, the original was acquired by Joseph Hupka, Professor of business law at the University of Vienna and an avid collector and patron. Hupka and his wife Hermine were at the heart of literary and artistic circles in Vienna, counting among their close acquaintances the composers Iganz Brüll and Johannes Brahms, the writers Felix Salten and Hugo von Hofmannsthal, and the painter Ferdinand Schmutzer. Following the Austrian Anschluss in 1938, the Hupkas' extensive art collection was confiscated and broken up, the album appropriated by Vienna's museums authority. Hupka and his wife lost their lives in the Theresienstadt concentration camp.

Through the efforts of Vienna-based lawyers Dr Hans Spohn and Dr Andreas Nödl the album was finally restituted to Joseph and Hermine Hupka's heirs in 2004. It is fitting that the album should reach the market in the 250th year of Mozart's death.