{
"data": {
"id": 151298,
"accession_number": "1983.155",
"share_license_status": "CC0",
"tombstone": "Prater Landscape, c. 1831. Ferdinand Georg Waldm\u00fcller (Austrian, 1793\u20131865). Oil on wood panel; framed: 37.5 x 43.5 x 5.5 cm (14 3/4 x 17 1/8 x 2 3/16 in.); unframed: 25 x 31 cm (9 13/16 x 12 3/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund, 1983.155",
"current_location": null,
"title": "Prater Landscape",
"creation_date": "c. 1831",
"creation_date_earliest": 1826,
"creation_date_latest": 1836,
"artists_tags": [
"male"
],
"culture": [
"Austria"
],
"technique": "oil on wood panel",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "Modern European Painting and Sculpture",
"collection": "Mod Euro - Painting 1800-1960",
"type": "Painting",
"measurements": "Framed: 37.5 x 43.5 x 5.5 cm (14 3/4 x 17 1/8 x 2 3/16 in.); Unframed: 25 x 31 cm (9 13/16 x 12 3/16 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"framed": {
"height": 0.375,
"height_inch": 14,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.75,
"width": 0.435,
"width_inch": 17,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.125,
"depth": 0.055,
"depth_inch": 2,
"depth_inch_fraction": 0.1875
},
"unframed": {
"height": 0.25,
"height_inch": 9,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.8125,
"width": 0.31,
"width_inch": 12,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.1875
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": null,
"inscriptions": [],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"id": 309669,
"title": "The Year in Review for 1983",
"description": "The Year in Review for 1983. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 22-April 8, 1984).",
"opening_date": "1984-02-22T05:00:00"
},
{
"id": 383281,
"title": "Stories from Storage",
"description": "Stories from Storage. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 7-May 16, 2021).",
"opening_date": "2021-02-06T05:00:00"
}
],
"legacy": [
{
"description": "Vienna, Oesterreichischer Kunstverein. Katalog der Ausstellung von Kunstwerken des Malers und Professors der k. k. Akademie, Ferdinand G. Waldm\u00fcller. 169. Ausstellung (1865), no. 67.",
"opening_date": null
},
{
"description": "Vienna, Hagenbund. Ferdinand Georg Waldm\u00fcller (1930), no. 32, Praterb\u00e4ume, Privatbesitz Wien (repr.).",
"opening_date": "1930-01-01T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "Basel, Kunsthalle. Kunstwerke des 19. Jahrhunderts aus Basler Privatbesitz (1943), no. 66, Praterlandschaft.",
"opening_date": "1943-01-01T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "Salzburg, Residenz. Ferdinand Georg Waldm\u00fcller 1793-1865 (1953), no. 36, Praterb\u00e4ume (early 1830s), private collection, Switzerland.",
"opening_date": "1953-01-01T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "Winterthur, Kunstmuseum. Europ\u00e4ische Meister 1790-1910 (1955), no. 212, Praterb\u00e4ume, Schweizer Privatbesitz.",
"opening_date": "1955-01-01T00:00:00"
}
]
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "Herr von Beer",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [
"Rupert Feuchtm\u00fcller\u2019s Waldm\u00fcller catalogue raisonn\u00e9 is the only known source for the inclusion in the provenance of Herr von Beer, about whom further details are unknown. The source for his ownership of the Waldm\u00fcller in 1865 is also unknown. It is also possible that \u201cHerr von Beer\u201d should in fact be \u201cHerr von Behr,\u201d as there are very few references to anyone by the name of \u201cHerr von Beer.\u201d An obscure reference to one Herr von Beer during the years 1870-74 appears in the 1906 Memoirs of Prince Chlowig of Hohenlohe-Schillingsfuerst, vol. 2, p. 58: \u201cWhen the Bavarians marched past with the other picked troops, my neighbor, Herr von Beer, was so moved that he thanked me heartily for my share in the arrangement.\u201d A perhaps more relevant reference is in Francis Turner Palgrave\u2019s Official Catalogue of the Fine Art Department, which accompanied the International Exhibition in London of 1862, which lists among the architectural designs of \u201cE. Knoblauch,\u201d a Prussian architect (possibly Carl Heinrich Eduard Knoblauch), the \u201cResidence of Herr von Behr, Wilhelmsplatz, Berlin\u201d (p. 182).
"
],
"date": "1865?",
"sortorder": 1
},
{
"description": "(Kunsthandlung Arnot, Vienna)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [],
"date": "?",
"sortorder": 2
},
{
"description": "Private collection, Vienna",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [
"Ku\u0308nstlerbund Hagen. Ferdinand Georg Waldmu\u0308ller: Ja\u0308nner-Ma\u0308rz 1930, in den Ra\u0308umen des Hagenbundes. [Wien]: [Kunstlerbund Hagen], 1930.
"
],
"date": "By 1930",
"sortorder": 3
},
{
"description": "Fritz Nathan, sold to Dr. Tobler",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [
"According to Johannes Nathan, Fritz Nathan was frequently in Vienna in the 1930s and may very well have purchased the painting there prior to 1937.
"
],
"date": "Until 1937",
"sortorder": 4
},
{
"description": "Dr. Tobler",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [
"The archives of Galerie Nathan show that they sold the painting to one Dr. Tobler in 1937. Johannes Nathan suggested that Fritz Nathan may have sold the painting to Robert von Hirsch on behalf of Dr. Tobler, although their records, which are incomplete, do not provide confirmation one way or the other. \"Dr. Tobler\" is handwritten on the \"Sammlung Robert von Hirsch, Basel\" label on the back of the painting.
"
],
"date": "1937-",
"sortorder": 5
},
{
"description": "Baron Robert von Hirsch [1883-1977], Basel, sold to Dr. Fritz Nathan",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [
"German industrialist von Hirsch lent the Waldm\u00fcller to an exhibition of nineteenth-century artworks at the Basel Kunsthalle in 1943.
"
],
"date": "By 1943 - by 1945",
"sortorder": 6
},
{
"description": "Dr. Fritz Nathan, St. Gallen, sold to a Swiss private collector",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [
"Peter Nathan recalled that his father, dealer Fritz Nathan, had purchased the painting from von Hirsch during the war.
"
],
"date": "By 1945",
"sortorder": 7
},
{
"description": "Private collection, Zurich",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [
"A 1953 Waldm\u00fcller exhibition at the Salzburg Residenz and Bruno Grimschitz\u2019s 1957 Waldm\u00fcller monograph both give the painting's current owner as a Zurich private collector, likely the Swiss collector to whom Fritz Nathan had sold it previously.
"
],
"date": "By 1957",
"sortorder": 8
},
{
"description": "(Galerie Nathan, Z\u00fcrich, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [],
"date": "Until 1983",
"sortorder": 9
},
{
"description": "The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [],
"date": "1983-",
"sortorder": 10
}
],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [],
"former_accession_numbers": [],
"did_you_know": "Waldm\u00fcller, best remembered as one of the most important Austrian landscape painters, financed his early training by painting candy pictures and portrait miniatures, teaching children, and designing theater sets.",
"early_education_description": null,
"artlens_description": null,
"description": "In this depiction of the Prater, a large public garden in Vienna, Austria, a man sits beside a tree in the left foreground. Brilliant sunlight floods into the park illuminating a multitude of trees, their leaves rendered with fine detail. Although celebrated for his portraits, Waldm\u00fcller also produced closely observed landscapes and often visited the Prater to paint the majestic oak trees. He was forced to retire from his position as a professor at the Vienna Academy for rejecting doctrines of idealized, moralizing art in favor of truth to nature based on direct observation.",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q60475169"
],
"internet_archive": [
"https://archive.org/details/clevelandart-1983.155-prater-landscape"
]
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "Feuchtmu\u0308ller, Rupert. Ferdinand Georg Waldmu\u0308ller 1793-1865: Leben, Schriften, Werke. Wien: C. Brandsta\u0308tter, 1996.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Feuchtmu\u0308ller, Rupert. Ferdinand Georg Waldmu\u0308ller 1793-1865: Leben, Schriften, Werke. Wien: C. Brandsta\u0308tter, 1996.
",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Ku\u0308nstlerbund Hagen. Ferdinand Georg Waldmu\u0308ller: Ja\u0308nner-Ma\u0308rz 1930, in den Ra\u0308umen des Hagenbundes. [Wien]: [Kunstlerbund Hagen], 1930.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Johannes Nathan, email to Victoria Sears Goldman, Feb. 24, 2015, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Johannes Nathan, email to Victoria Sears Goldman, Feb. 26, 2015, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Johannes Nathan, email to Victoria Sears Goldman, Feb. 24, 2015, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Tania Lehmann, email to Victoria Sears Goldman, Feb. 18, 2015, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Feuchtmu\u0308ller, Rupert. Ferdinand Georg Waldmu\u0308ller 1793-1865: Leben, Schriften, Werke. Wien: C. Brandsta\u0308tter, 1996.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Galerie Nathan, invoice, Nov. 30, 1983, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "S\u00f6ren Schmeling, email to Victoria Sears Goldman, March 29, 2016, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Feuchtmu\u0308ller, Rupert. Ferdinand Georg Waldmu\u0308ller 1793-1865: Leben, Schriften, Werke. Wien: C. Brandsta\u0308tter, 1996.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Peter Nathan, letter to Sherman Lee, May 27, 1983, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Galerie Nathan, invoice, Nov. 30, 1983, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Feuchtmu\u0308ller, Rupert. Ferdinand Georg Waldmu\u0308ller 1793-1865: Leben, Schriften, Werke. Wien: C. Brandsta\u0308tter, 1996.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Grimschitz, Bruno. Ferdinand Georg Waldmu\u0308ller. Salzburg: Galerie Welz, 1957.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Peter Nathan, letter to Sherman Lee, May 27, 1983, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Galerie Nathan, invoice, Nov. 30, 1983, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Ferdinand Georg Waldmu\u0308ller, 1793-1865. [Katalog zur Geda\u0308chtnis-Ausstellung Ferdinand Georg Waldmu\u0308ller, Salzburg, Residenz, 15. Juni bis 15. September 1953. Salzburg: Galerie Welz, 1953.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Galerie Nathan, invoice, Nov. 30, 1983, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Grimschitz, Bruno. Ferdinand Georg Waldmu\u0308ller. Salzburg, Austria: Galerie Welz, 1957.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: pl. 5",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Turner, Evan H. \u201cYear in Review for 1983.\u201d The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 71, no. 2 (February 1984): 38\u201379.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: p. 52-53; Mentioned: p. 69, no. 26",
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/25159848"
},
{
"citation": "Lurie, Ann Tzeutschler. \u201cFerdinand Georg Waldm\u00fcller in the Cleveland Museum of Art: Portrait of Crescentia, Countess Zichy (later Countess Sz\u00e9chenyi) with a Parrot and a Camellia in a Mountainous Landscape.\u201d The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 81, no. 1 (1994): 3-17.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 3, 15",
"url": "https://www.jstor.org/stable/25161437"
},
{
"citation": "Lurie, Ann Tzeutschler. \u201cFerdinand Georg Waldm\u00fcller in the Cleveland Museum of Art: Prater Landscape.\u201d The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 81, no. 1 (1994): 18-23.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 18, 21; Mentioned: p. 18-23",
"url": "https://www.jstor.org/stable/25161438"
},
{
"citation": "Argencourt, Louise d', and Roger Diederen. Catalogue of Paintings. Pt. 4. European Paintings of the 19th Century. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1974.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: P. 639-640, Vol. II, no. 224",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Robinson, William. \u201cNature Transformed.\u201d Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 61, no. 1 (Winter 2021): 27.",
"page_number": "Reproduced and Mentioned: P. 27.",
"url": ""
}
],
"url": "https://clevelandart.org/art/1983.155",
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"date_created": "2008-10-27T19:35:42",
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],
"creditline": "Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund",
"image_credit": null,
"sketchfab_id": null,
"sketchfab_url": null,
"gallery_donor_text": null,
"athena_id": 151298,
"creators": [
{
"id": 2810,
"description": "Ferdinand Georg Waldm\u00fcller (Austrian, 1793\u20131865)",
"extent": null,
"qualifier": null,
"role": "artist",
"biography": "Ferdinand Georg Waldm\u00fcller was the leading innovator for Austrian portrait, landscape, and genre painting of the romantic period, substantially contributing to a style that came to be known as Biedermeier.1 His earliest art lessons were in flower painting with porcelain painter Josef Zintler (d. 1826). From 1808 until 1813 Waldm\u00fcller attended the Vienna Academy at intervals, studying with Hubert Maurer (1738-1818) and Johann Baptist Lampi (1775-1837). The next two years Waldm\u00fcller engaged in painting portrait miniatures. He undoubtedly perfected his painting technique significantly by studying and copying the great masters in the major Viennese galleries well into the 1820s. Between 1825 and 1856 he traveled to Italy, as well as to France and England, in Paris being presented to Emperor Napoleon III and in London to Queen Victoria.\r\nIn 1827, the year before he painted Cleveland's Countess Zichy, Waldm\u00fcller had been introduced to the imperial court of Emperor Franz I and received the great honor of painting his portrait. In 1829 Prince Metternich appointed Waldm\u00fcller curator of the Lamberg Painting Gallery and professor of the Vienna Academy. However, his radical proposals to change academic teaching methods, by insisting that observation of and truth to nature were the only sources of art, would have ended his academic career in 1846 had Prince Metternich not intervened. Nevertheless, in 1855 his continued open criticism of academic procedures cost him his retirement, which, thanks to Emperor Franz I of Austria, was reinstated in 1863. Waldm\u00fcller's convincing honesty in portraying his sitters exactly as they were reflected the growing confidence of the bourgeoisie after the French revolutionary wars and Napoleon's final defeat in 1815. The artist's faithfulness to nature on the one hand, and his talent in portraying the elegance and luxury of his sitters' attire on the other, appealed to both the bourgeoisie and aristocracy.\r\n1. The name Biedermeier was derived from a fictitious poet named Gottlieb Biedermaier (or Biedermeier) who was featured in the mid-nineteenth-century magazine Fliegende Bl\u00e4tter. \"Bieder\" describes a simple but honest and upstanding person, while \"Meier\" is a common German surname. The style pervaded all of Europe, but particularly Austria, Germany, Switzerland, and Scandinavia, centering mainly in cities with active academies. See also Amerling, The Young Eastern Woman, no. 4.",
"name_in_original_language": null,
"birth_year": "1793",
"death_year": "1865",
"use_in_caption": true,
"include_extent": false,
"weight": 1
}
],
"legal_status": "accessioned",
"accession_date": "1983-10-12T00:00:00",
"sortable_date": 1826,
"date_added_to_oa": null,
"date_text": "c. 1831",
"collapse_artists": false,
"on_loan": false,
"recently_acquired": false,
"record_type": "object",
"conservation_statement": "A solitary seated figure in the foreground draws the viewer into the composition, providing a sense of scale for the towering trees. To the right of the seated figure, another figure appears, previously painted in and later altered by the artist. This figure now appears as pentimenti, visible through paint layers that have become more transparent over time. Infrared imaging helped to better visualize this standing figure. Even though the artist has removed this figure from the composition, their shadow remains, as a thin opaque paint layer extending in front of the seated figure.",
"has_conservation_images": true,
"cover_accession_number": null,
"is_nazi_era_provenance": true,
"impression": null,
"alternate_titles": [
"Prater Landscape"
],
"is_highlight": false,
"updated_at": "2026-06-20 11:04:22.986000"
}
}