652 - C. STÖLZEL (*1792) after NAEKE (*1786), Saint Elizabeth, 1834, Copper engraving

C. STÖLZEL (*1792) after NAEKE (*1786), Saint Elizabeth, 1834, Copper engraving Christian Ernst Stölzel (1792 Dresden - 1837 ibid.) after Gustav Heinrich Naeke (1786 Frauenstein (Saxony) - 1835 Dresden): St Elisabeth gives alms at Wartburg Castle near Eisenach, 1834, Copper engraving Technique: Copper engraving on Paper Inscription: At the lower part signed in the printing plate: "H. Näke del. et pinx. / E. Stölzel sc.". At the lower part inscribed in the printing plate: "DIE HEILIGE ELISABETH. Genaue Nachbildung einer Zeichnung von H. Näke/welche sich nebst dem großen danach ausgeführten Oehlgemälde in der Sammlung des Herrn v. Quandt in Dresden befindet Angekauft vom Sächs. Kunstverein auf das Jahr 1835". At the lower part dated: "1834". Date: 1834 Description: Naeke's painting "Saint Elisabeth Giving Alms in the Court of Wartburg Castle" is one of the major works of German Nazarene art. The status of the painting, which was lost for a long time, is undisputed today. Naeke worked for seven years in Rome and Dresden on the large-format painting, which reflects the essence of German-Roman Romanticism in unusual purity. In the 1820s, the theme from the Christian and Old German legends was the exception rather than the rule among the Nazarenes, who almost exclusively favoured subjects from the New Testament in panel painting, with a few also from the Old Testament. The skilful composition of the figurative scene, in which two groups of people stand opposite each other in front of a medieval architectural backdrop, is admirable. That of the merciful Countess Palatine with her entourage, who receives the poor and sick in her castle courtyard, takes up almost exactly a third of the picture surface, the larger part of which is reserved for the "people", who are characterised as biting subjects. The idealisation of the miserable figures and their beautiful outlines - today perceived rather disconcertingly - were praised by contemporaries. While the noble ladies in the left third of the picture appear smooth and beautiful, like models in make-up, there are interesting character heads in careful detail among the throng. In 1834, the draughtsman and engraver Christian Ernst Stölzel was commissioned to produce an etching after Naeke's painting as an annual gift for the members of the Saxon Art Society. The sheet, issued in 1835, the year of Naeke's death, shows a number of remarkable deviations from the painted version. Stölzel used a drawing of the same size by the artist, which is in the Dresden Kupferstich-Kabinett, as a model for his etching. The comparison shows that the changes to the painting correspond to its intention. They relate in particular to the main figure, St Elisabeth herself. In the print version of 1834, her special position is reduced in two respects. In the painting, Naeke particularly emphasised her social status. Here it is the noble princess in splendid robes, adorned and honoured with the golden count's crown, who graciously condescends to the poor people. The late version, on the other hand, makes the saint appear almost like a commoner's wife, rather plain in appearance too, without crown or princely costume, and recedes into the group of her companions. This emphasises the Franciscan element of the Elizabeth legend. The change in the imaginative, Romanesque architecture should not be overlooked either. The octagonal bevelling of both the palace corner and the two-step staircase to the portal in the painting has been replaced by cubically simplified "straightening". The study of Albrecht Dürer, in which there are no broken forms as in the painting, seems to have had an effect here. In the graphic version, the two groups are visually separated much more decisively by the corner of the wall and the edge of the shadow. The figure of Elisabeth now stands more clearly against a dark background. The composition of 1834 thus appears more austere than that of the painting. The simplification of the architecture and the clear separation of the areas of light and shadow also benefit the graphic effect of the sheet. Like many works by the Nazarenes, Naeke's painting also shows colouristic weaknesses, as the colour is not used as a sensual, optical phenomenon, but is instead subordinated to the plastic-linear framework. Thus20, the Nazarene friend Athanasius Count Raczynski, who later adopted a Düsseldorf orientation, preferred the uncoloured after-engraving to the painting, because "it reproduces everything beautiful without containing the embarrassing." Incidentally, the engraving and preparatory drawing show Naeke's drawing style at the height of his late maturity. The drawing by the forty-eight-year-old Dresden academy professor, now heavily yellowed and marred by stains, can be described as the legacy of his aesthetic credo, as he died a few months after completing this work. It is a Nazarene's commitment to the line as a medium of expression and to the human figure as