Karl Hermann Pfeiffer

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Karl Hermann Pfeiffer (* 1751 in Frankfurt am Main ; † March 26, 1829 in Vienna ) was a German engraver .

life and work

Karl Hermann Pfeiffer, about whose life little is known, came to Vienna with his parents in his youth, where his father worked as a secretary in a noble house. In Vienna, Pfeiffer received his first lessons in drawing from 1770 at the Academy of Fine Arts . The landscape painter, etcher and copper engraver Johann Christian Brand then provided the young artist with further training and encouraged him to try his hand at etching . In 1784 Pfeiffer received the academic award for a work that was partly engraved and partly etched from an oil painting by his teacher.

As a result, Pfeiffer chose the subject of copperplate engraving and, after trying different manners, finally devoted himself to the dotted manner (also known as the English manner ). This genre of copperplate engraving spread as a kind of art fashion from England to Germany and became generally popular here too, as booksellers also allowed it to be used to decorate their literary works, especially since the completion of a dotted plate could be brought about more quickly and therefore generally a cheaper price was to be achieved. Although Pfeiffer had earlier - as mentioned - occupied himself with etching as well as with engraving work in line style, his larger and most of his work belonged to that subject, as he received extraordinary orders from booksellers and then his reputation spread more and more .

Pfeiffer also used this copper engraving technique for larger-scale sheets by reworking larger historical sheets next to some larger portraits, partly according to older classical, partly also according to newer masters, for which the rich galleries and cabinets in Vienna offered him many opportunities. Raffael , Correggio , Fra Bartolomeo , Sassoferrato , Nicolas Poussin , Anton Raphael Mengs and others were the masters he used as models for his larger copper sheets.

Pfeiffer also made numerous portraits of the imperial Austrian house, including princes and other famous men of all classes in the imperial state , based on the paintings of well-known artists. Among other things, he created portraits of:

The sheets created by Pfeiffer that deal with historical, religious or mythological topics include:

  • Maria with the child , after Heinrich Friedrich Füger
  • two Madonnas after Bartolomeo della Porta and Sassoferrato for the Haas gallery
  • Venus , coming out of the bath , to Giuliano da Parma
  • Jupiter on the Ida, conquered by sleep in the arms of Juno , according to A. Lens
  • Madonna, after Anton Raphael Mengs
  • The judgment of Solomon , according to Poussin
  • Ariadne on Naxos , after Heinrich Friedrich Füger

Pfeiffer also designed a drawing book for women, 30 sheets of ideal heads according to older masters such as Raffael, Domenichino , Anton Raphael Mengs and Heinrich Friedrich Füger.

literature

Remarks

  1. ↑ This year of birth is named by H. Schöny:  Pfeiffer, Karl Hermann. In: Austrian Biographical Lexicon 1815–1950 (ÖBL). Volume 8, Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Vienna 1983, ISBN 3-7001-0187-2 , p. 34 .; In older lexicons such as Constantin von Wurzbach's Biographical Lexicon of the Empire of Austria , on the other hand, it is claimed that Pfeiffer was born in 1769.
personal data
SURNAME Pfeiffer, Karl Hermann
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German engraver
DATE OF BIRTH 1751
PLACE OF BIRTH Frankfurt am Main
DATE OF DEATH March 26, 1829
Place of death Vienna