Scholarly catalogue “German Paintings in the Städel Museum 1550–1800, Part 2: 1725–1800”

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Jochen Sander
• Subject Area: Art History
• Term: since 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 498972318

Over the past nearly thirty years, the Städel Museum has been devoted to the in-depth analysis of its Old Master painting holdings. Since the first catalogue on Early Netherlandish painting submitted by the applicant in 1993, all scholarly catalogues have been distinguished by the systematic integration of technological investigation methods (microscopy, ultraviolet fluorescence, infrared reflectography, X-ray, dendrochronology). Following the study of the entire collection of pre-1550 Netherlandish, German, and Italian painting as well as the Dutch and Flemish Baroque paintings, part 1 of the scholarly catalogue project “German Paintings in the Städel Museum 1550–1800”, concentrating on German paintings from 1550 to 1725, has recently reached completion. Part 2, devoted to the examination of the German paintings from 1725 to 1800, is now to commence to close the last remaining gap in the study of the holdings.The aim is to carry out a thorough study of 137 German paintings dating from 1725–1800 within a period of three years. The works include Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein’s Goethe in the Roman Campagna, a masterpiece of international prominence. The holdings to be examined are otherwise of a strongly regional nature and encompass a large group of small-scale cabinet paintings made by the so-called Frankfurt ‘Goethe Painters’ and ‘Hollandists’, including works by Christian Georg Schütz the Elder, Justus Juncker, Johann Georg Trautmann, and Johann Georg Pforr. Apart from portraits by Anton Graff, Friedrich Georg Weitsch, among others, twenty-two portraits of the von Holzhausens, a family of Frankfurt patricians, make up another major group. The holdings also comprise examples of Southern German Rococo painting and Neoclassicist works by Angelica Kauffmann and Jakob Philipp Hackert. Each object is to be technologically examined and comprehensively documented along with its history, and the current state of research is to be presented. The subsequent discussion will embed the works in the current research discourse revolving around monographic issues related to the significance of the painting in the oeuvre of the respective artist. The art historian will work closely with the museum’s painting conservator to clarify questions pertaining to the work’s genesis, attribution, and dating. A further step will be to interpret the subject matter, taking both the iconography and the work’s execution context into account. The last-named aspect bears a connection to the overall discussion of eighteenth-century German painting. For the holdings to be examined, issues related to the social history of artists, the reception of Dutch and Flemish art, art theory, and art and collectors’ markets are especially significant. The foremost aims of the project here being applied for are to participate in and contribute to these areas of research and to make the holdings accessible to the public and the scholarly community.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants