Heinrich Bürkel - Barge Haulers Pulling a Ship Upstream - image-1

Lot 2520 Dα

Heinrich Bürkel - Barge Haulers Pulling a Ship Upstream

Auction 1153 - overview Cologne
30.05.2020, 14:00 - Art of the 19th Century
Estimate: 14.000 € - 16.000 €
Result: 21.250 € (incl. premium)

Heinrich Bürkel

Barge Haulers Pulling a Ship Upstream

Oil on canvas (relined). 32 x 46 cm.
Signed and dated lower left: HBürkel 1830.

Heinrich Bürkel painted this early work during a three-year stay in Rome, a fact that neither the style nor the motif of the work would lead one to assume. When in the city, he simply continued the artistic path he had begun previously, seemingly unimpressed by all that Italy had to offer. Bürkel painted two works with the motif of barge haulers when in Munich in 1828 and three others whilst in Rome in 1829 and 1830, of which the present work is the last.

Bürkel's works are considered the epitome of Biedermeier genre painting. In a time of stylistic plurality and specialisation, he decided early in his career that he would concentrate on rural genre scenes. Neither Josef Anton Koch and Christian Reinhart's search for the sublime nor the yearning of the German painters in Italy seem to have interested him. He was more concerned with the daily lives of his contemporaries, and focussed on mastering a painting technique that would help him to depict their personalities, light and weather phenomena, landscapes, buildings, and vegetation. Even those of his works in which Italian landscapes form a backdrop are more reminiscent of the Bamboccianti. In this sense, his artistic roots and intentions are to be found more among the Dutch painters of the 17th century than among his 19th century peers.

Provenance

Acquired in 1966 from Alexander Gebhardt art dealers, Munich. - Subsequently in family ownership.

Literature

L. von Buerkel: Heinrich Bürkel 1802 -1860. Ein Malerleben der Biedermeierzeit, Munich 1940, p. 103. - F. von Bötticher: Malerwerke des Neuenzehntes Jahrhunderts, Leipzig 1941, Heinrich Bürkel p. 146, no. 7. - H. P. Bühler / A. Krückl: Heinrich Bürkel mit Werkverzeichnis der Gemälde, Munich 1989, p. 266, no. 370.

Exhibitions

Spring exhibition on Capitol in Rome, 1931 (L. von Buerkel op. cit) (F. v. Bötticher, op. Cit.)