Johann Heinrich Löffler (copperplate engraver)

Title page of the work Virgo Lauretana Commentarij's Illustrata per Reverendissimum Patrem Laurentius a Dript. After a drawing by Johann Georg Rudolphi, engraved in copper by Johann Heinrich Löffler.

Johann Heinrich Löffler (* around 1615 in Treysa , Hessen-Nassau , † after 1683 probably in Cologne ) was a German engraver .

Origin and family

Johann Heinrich Löffler was born around 1615 in Treysa in Hesse. On January 23, 1644 he married Anna Maria Badenhewers in the parish of St. Paul, Cologne. There is evidence that the marriage resulted in 10 children.

Artistic work

Like his older brother Johann Eckhard Löffler, he learned the craft of copperplate engraving . Johann Heinrich therefore signed his works with "Löffler junior". In the quality of his work, however, he surpassed his brother. A numerically extensive oeuvre can be documented from the period from 1640 to 1683. These include the following works:

• Allegory of the government of the Cologne mayor Johann Andreas von Mülheim. 1653. After Johann Toussyn.
• Homage to the city of Cologne when Emperor Leopold I took office in 1660. After the same.
• Allegory of the government of the two mayors Franz von Brassart and Johann Wilhelm von Siegen. 1663. After the same.
• Five sheets of allegorical representations. After Johann Georg Rudolphi .
• Portrait of Princess Anna Katharina Konstantia, Countess Palatinate near Rhine, born Princess of Poland. The portrait is one of Löffler's best works.

literature

• Freundeskreis Oelinghausen eV in collaboration with the Archbishop's Academic Library Paderborn (ed.): Two masters of their subject, the copper engraver Johann Eckhard Löffler the Elder. Ä. and Johann Heinrich Löffler the Elder J. (= Oelinghauser Contributions. Heft 5), booklet accompanying the exhibition from September 26, 2010 to October 31, 2010 in the monastery garden museum in Oelinghausen, Arnsberg 2010.
• Johann Jakob Merlo : Cologne artists in old and new times. Publication of the Society for Rhenish History. Volume 9, 1845, columns 540-555.
• Löffler, Johann Heinrich . In: Hans Vollmer (Hrsg.): General lexicon of fine artists from antiquity to the present . Founded by Ulrich Thieme and Felix Becker . tape 23 : Leitenstorfer – Mander . EA Seemann, Leipzig 1929, p. 318 .
• Dirk Strohmann: Johann Georg Rudolphi 1633–1693. The graphic work.
• Painting catalog supplement. Paderborn, Munich, Vienna, Zurich, undated (1981) ISBN 3-506-76176-5 . It contains Löffler's engravings on drawings by Johann Georg Rudolphi.