The chocolate girl
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The Viennese Chocolate Girl ( La Belle Chocolatière de Vienne ), a pastel painting on parchment (82.5 × 52.5 cm) by Jean-Étienne Liotard , was created between 1743 and 1745, perhaps December 1744. The artist stayed during this time on request the Empress Maria Theresa in Vienna. Here he painted his most famous pastel picture, the portrait of a housemaid.
Dresden
On February 3, 1745, Count Francesco von Algarotti bought the picture in Venice when he was commissioned by King August III. , Elector of Saxony, was in Italy for the Dresden collection. It is unclear whether Liotard was already in Venice to set up a lottery. After all, he portrayed Algarotti that year.
In September 1746 Algarotti was back from his (third) trip to Italy. That year he wrote to Prime Minister Heinrich von Brühl , a collector and close confidante of the king:
" All Venetian painters, including Rosalba Carriera herself, considered the" Chocolate Girl "to be the most beautiful pastel that one has ever seen ."
In a letter to his friend Pierre-Jean Mariette in 1751, Algarotti wrote:
“ I bought a pastel painting about three feet high from the famous Liotard. It depicts a young German maid in profile, carrying a tray with a glass of water and a cup of chocolate on it. The painting is almost without shadows, against a light background, and it receives its light from two windows that are reflected in the glass. It is made in half tones, with imperceptible gradations of light, and of perfect relief ... and although it is painting from Europe, it might be to the taste of the Chinese , sworn enemies of shadow, as you know. As for the completion of the work, it is a Holbein in pastel. "
Until then, the pictures by contemporary painters had been scattered in different places in living rooms and representative rooms and were not publicly accessible.
Since 1855 it has been exhibited in the Old Masters Picture Gallery in Dresden . During the Second World War , the picture was moved to the casemates of the Königstein Fortress to protect it from bomb damage. After the invasion of the Red Army , the painting was tracked down and taken with the other stored art treasures to the Soviet Union , from where it returned in 1955. On the occasion of the return, the GDR issued a special postage stamp in December 1955.
Under the title “'The most beautiful pastel you've ever seen.' The Chocolate Girl by Jean-Étienne Liotard ”took place from September 28, 2018 to January 6, 2019, a special exhibition in the Dresden State Art Collections. A catalog was also published for the occasion.
The chocolate girl as a trademark
When Henry L. Pierce , then president of the American Walter Baker & Company , Dorchester , saw the chocolate girl (1881?) On his business trip in the picture gallery in Dresden, he decided to make this image the trademark for Baker's cocoa and on his cocoa cans to print. The trademark was registered in 1883. The success of this trademark was so great that other companies such as Droste, H. de Jong Wormerveer, Van Houten, all from the Netherlands, and Rowntree’s from Great Britain also used the image in a modified and adapted form as their own trademark.
Myth: Nandl, Anna or Charlotte Baldauf
The portrait was nameless until 1837. Allgarotti's diary simply describes the sitter as “une Stoubenmensche” and the oldest catalogs (1765) as “Viennese parlor”, which is a girl waiting in a coffee house according to Viennese parlance. Even so, some names are associated with this painting:
- 'Nandl Baldauf' or Nannerl seems to have been the daughter of a Viennese coachman who was in court service.
- It cannot have been Anna Baldauf (1757–1815). In the guide in the Royal Painting Gallery in Dresden (from 1864) “The famous Viennese chocolate girl” is described as follows:
“ She was born in Vienna around 1730, was called Anna Baldauf and was famous as the“ beautiful Nannerl ”. But she should not be confused with Anna Baldauf, a Viennese woman, who was married to Prince Johann Baptista Karl Walther von Dietrichstein on July 23, 1802 and, since May 25, 1808, a widow, died on February 25, 1815. "
(In 1802 Anna married Count Karl Johann von Dietrichstein-Proskau-Leslie (* 1728, † 1808) ).
- Charlotte Baldauf is said to have been the daughter of a Viennese banker with whom Liotard was staying.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b www.cicero.de: Portrait of a nameless person
- ↑ a b c Walter Koschatzky (Ed.): Maria Theresia and their time, p. 313. On the 200th anniversary of death. Exhibition May 13 to October 26, 1980, Vienna, Schönbrunn Palace. Organized by the Federal Ministry of Science and Research, Gistel, Vienna 1980 on behalf of the Austrian Federal Government.
- ↑ Meyers Konversations-Lexikon pdf 4 KB
- ↑ Marcel Roethlisberger & Renée Loche Liotard: catalog, sources et correspondance , Volume 1. p. 336. [1]
- ^ Hans Posse , Count Francesco Algarotti's letters to the Sächsischer Hof and his picture purchases for the Dresden Picture Gallery 1743–1747. In: Yearbook of the Prussian Art Collections, pp. 29, 33. Vol. 52: Beih. Berlin: Grote 1931
- ^ François Fosca La Vie, les Voyages et les Oeuvres de Jean-Étienne Liotard. Citoyen de Genève, dit Le Peintre turc , p. 30. La Bibliothèque des Arts. Lausanne - Paris.
- ↑ The original Italian text
- ↑ From the history of the fine arts in Saxony
- ↑ Various sources also mention a different date
- ^ Walter Baker & Company
- ↑ History as a trademark
- ^ Friedrich Matthäi : Directory of the Royal Saxon Painting Gallery in Dresden , Dresden 1837 [2]
- ↑ The Dresden maker
- ^ Catalog Dresden Collection 1864 by Wilhelm Schäfer [3]
- ↑ Jean-Etienne Liotard ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
literature
- Harald Marx: A tour of the Dresden Old Masters painting gallery . State Art Collections Dresden. PSF 450 - BN 93677903 - JG 71/15/81 (20/80)
- Stephan Koja, Roland Enke (ed.): “The most beautiful pastel you've ever seen.” The chocolate girl by Jean-Étienne Liotard. Hirmer Verlag , Munich 2018, ISBN 978-3-7774-3134-5 .
