A carved softwood Berlin frame after a design by Karl Friedrich Schinkel
Retouches to the polychromy. H frame 80, W 157.5, inner dimensions H 64, W 140 cm.
Ca. 1820 - 30.
The "Museumsrahmen der Profilnummer 1" was designed in connection with the planning of the Neues Museum, which was highly praised at the time of its construction. The art historian Gustav Friedrich Waagen was called to Berlin in 1823 to furnish the museum and catalogue its paintings. He travelled to Italy with Karl Friedrich Schinkel in 1824, and it was there that the two were inspired to create the cohesive framing scheme for the building. The present work is the largest of the frame types which Schinkel designed. His penchant for panoramic works meant that he frequently required extremely wide frames. These could be mounted either horizontally or vertically, as he used no ornaments in their designs which would have confined them to either one direction.
The original painting in this frame was an Adoration of the Magi by an Italian Master of the 17th C., Inv.Nr. I.200.
Literature
A similar frame for a wall mirror in cat.: Karl Friedrich Schinkel. Möbel und Interieur, Munich-Berlin 2002, no. 37.
Cf. also: Spindler, Bilderrahmen des Klassizismus und der Romantik, Munich 2007, p. 145, illus. 14.
Cf. v. Roenne, Ein Architekt rahmt Bilder. Karl Friedrich Schinkel und die Berliner Gemäldegalerie, Munich-Berlin 2007, illus. 18.