1011 - Eberhard Hückstädt, Epigramm with self-portrait, mixed media on paper, 2001

Eberhard Hückstädt, Epigramm with self-portrait, mixed media on paper, 2001 (b. 1936 Potsdam), mixed media on paper, mounted on a support sheet, signed lower centre, dated „28 III 2001“ centre right, inscribed verso in another hand, catalogue raisonné number 4250. On a green cart with red wheels stands a white and brown piebald horse; on it sits a rider with a pig's head in a dark green coat, a red cloak and a dark feathered hat. Beneath the horse stands a small figure in blue dungarees over a blue shirt and red shoes, a painter's palette and brushes in his hands – the self-portrait of Hückstädt. Several lines in old script run across the sheet, among them „Junker: Herr, könnt Ihr mich im Konterfei auf meinem hohen Roß als Jäger malen?“, at the lower edge a place name with the date „9. Febr. 1797“. With a certificate of the Galerie Hohmann, Walsrode, dated 16 October 2001. Good condition. Image 35 x 22 cm (HxW), mount, behind glass, framed, overall size 62.5 x 52.5 cm (HxW) Eberhard Hückstädt was born in Potsdam in 1936, studied until 1964 at the Academy of Fine Arts in Dresden under Heinz Lohmar and Rudolf Bergander and then worked freelance in Dresden and in Schwedt on the Oder; in 1984 he moved to Hanover. His works are held by the Galerie Neue Meister in Dresden, the Kunstarchiv Beeskow and the municipal museum of Schwedt, among others. The epigram, originally the inscription on a votive gift, developed in antiquity into a brief and pointed poetic form and became a favourite vehicle of mockery and maxim in the German Baroque; the combination of pointed text and image has a long tradition in printmaking.