Lot 37 Dα

A look at the Morgenstern family tree reveals the history of a German family of artists in which artistic talent was passed down through the generations. At the beginning of the 18th century, we find the court painter Johann Christoph Morgenstern in Rudolstadt, but soon the branches of the family separate. One part of the family settled in Frankfurt, another in Hamburg, and both sides produced artists. At the turn of the 20th century, Christian Morgenstern became famous as a poet in Munich. His grandfather was Christian Ernst Bernhard Morgenstern, who was born in Hamburg in 1805 but later moved to Munich.

Hamburg in the north and Munich in the south were the two opposing geographical poles that shaped Christian Morgenstern's landscape painting. His early Scandinavian landscapes reveal the influence of Johann Christian Clausen Dahl. Like many other north German artists of his generation, Morgenstern was acquainted with Carl Friedrich von Rumohr, an artist and critic whose influence on the contemporary artistic scene can hardly be overestimated. It was on his advice that Morgenstern moved to Munich, where he met and became friends with Carl Rottmann.

In 1835, Morgenstern began to spend the summer months in the Alsace region, where a Bavarian patron (whose daughter received drawing lessons from Morgenstern) owned a farm in Riebeauvillé. This view of the vineyards of Riebeauvillé in late summer, which is characteristic of the artist's realistic landscape style, was painted during his stay there in 1836.