(Soldin 1791–1868 Prague)
Walkers in an Open Landscape, signed, dated A. Piepenhagen 1820, oil on canvas, 32 x 45 cm, framed, Additional information: View of the Watzmann (Rei)

Counterpart to lot 114.

Compare:
Blaží?ková – Horová N, Leubnerová Š, August Bed?ich, Charlotta and Louisa Piepenhagen, Prague 2009, p. 222 – 223

We are grateful to Dr. Michal Simek for his assistance in cataloguing this work.

Both lots, dating around 1820, are a rare example of August Piepenhagen’s earlier works. Born in Soldin, in Prussia, the artist came to Prague by 1811 at the latest and, although self-taught, his painting served as the cornerstone for 19th century Bohemian landscape painting. His short period of teaching with J.H. Wuest taught the talented painter about contemporary landscape painting. His marriage in 1815 in Prague brought with it ownership of a button-making workshop, requiring that he combine his business activities with his painting. Several similar paintings were executed in the years 1820–1825 (Mountain Landscape with Stream, National Gallery in Prague, O 5313), a few of which remain in pairs (Waterfall and Cave with Mountain Stream, national monument institute at Schloss Litomyšl, R633 and R 638). This newly discovered representative work of the painter can also be regarded as belonging to this series, and the artist, together with Josef Navrátil and Antonín Mánes, is counted amongst the most important proponents of Bohemian landscape painting of the first half of the 19th century.