Johann Heiss Memmingen 1640 - 1704 Augsburg

Heiss completed his early training in Memmingen with the local painter Johann Friedrich Sichelbein (c.1625-90) before moving to Augsburg and working in the studio of one the great luminaries of the German Baroque, Johann Heinrich Schönfeld (1609-1682/3). Although he started life as a painter of religious scenes, the protestant Heiss’s most popular subject matter were learned allegories such as the present work.

Another signed version, with some differences, is listed by Königfeld as in a private collection in Wiesbaden, Germany (see P. Königfeld, Der Maler Johann Heiss Memmingen und Augsburg 1640-1704, Munich 2001, cat. no. B50, p. 303, reproduced fig. no. 74).