Collection: Art prints by Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller

Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller was an Austrian painter and is considered one of the most important and idiosyncratic representatives of the Austrian Biedermeier style in the 19th century. He was born in Vienna in 1793 and received his artistic training at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts, against whose academic conventions he turned with growing vehemence from an early age. This tension between institutional integration and artistic conviction was to accompany him throughout his life and lead him into open conflict with the Academy, which tarnished his reputation during his lifetime, but ensured his work an independence and consistency that still characterizes it today.

In his early works, Waldmüller devoted himself primarily to portraiture, which provided him with a livelihood and in which he quickly became one of the most sought-after Viennese portraitists of his time. He soon transferred the precision of observation and the ability to condense a person's personality and social position into a single image, which characterized his portraits, to other pictorial genres. As he matured, he turned increasingly to landscape painting and rural genre painting, in which he developed the direct, light-flooded view of nature that made him a forerunner of Realism and even Impressionism.

A central feature of Waldmüller's mature work was the combination of meticulous observation of nature and a radiant, sun-drenched colorfulness that was unparalleled in Austrian painting of his time. His depictions of the Viennese surroundings, in particular the landscapes of the Vienna Woods and the Salzkammergut, are famous, as are his rural genre scenes with farmers, children and village communities, which he portrayed with a directness and lighting effect that appeared raw and unconventional to his academic contemporaries. These works reveal his masterful ability to capture the light of the great outdoors - the harsh midday light of summer as well as the soft light of early morning - with a persuasive power that still makes his paintings seem fresh and immediate today. His spring and summer landscapes in particular, with their exuberant abundance of flowers and almost painful luminosity, are among the most impressive achievements of 19th century Austrian painting.

In addition to his work as a painter, Waldmüller was a controversial and uncomfortable personality in Viennese artistic life. He wrote writings on the reform of art teaching, in which he defended the direct observation of nature against the academic practice of copying, and became embroiled in years of bitter conflict with the Vienna Academy, which ultimately led to his suspension. These institutional battles cost him energy and reputation, but at the same time testify to the seriousness and uncompromisingness with which he defended his artistic convictions.

Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller died in Hinterbrühl near Vienna in 1865, leaving behind an oeuvre of great thematic breadth and exceptional painterly quality. During his lifetime, he enjoyed great success despite all the conflicts, and his works found their way into important collections early on. Today, Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller is regarded as the central figure of Austrian Biedermeier painting, whose works in the major Austrian museums, above all the Belvedere, are among the most highly regarded holdings and are extremely valued on the international art market, while his sun-drenched landscapes and genre scenes are regarded as the most luminous and lively testimonies to an Austrian pictorial tradition that focused on the concrete, the light-filled and the human.