1361 - Peter Baumgartner (1834 Munich – 1911, ibid.)

Peter Baumgartner (1834 Munich – 1911, ibid.) “Naturalist on the Alpine Pasture.” Original title A humorous, narrative scene set in a richly furnished alpine hut reminiscent of a still life, in which two hikers—a student and an elderly scholar—who have set out to observe nature are conversing with the hospitable dairymaid. While the student, listening attentively, eats milk soup with bread at the table, the older man helps with the churning of butter. The genre painter Baumgartner is one of the leading figures of Munich painting in the second half of the 19th century. He studied at the Munich Academy and was a private student in the studio of Carl Theodor von Piloty. From the late 1860s onward, he increasingly turned to rural motifs from Upper Bavaria and Tyrol, repeatedly depicting the city dweller’s visit to the alpine pasture—a scene not without a certain humor. The painting was exhibited in 1883 under this title at the Dresden Academy Exhibition. Oil on wood. 24.5 cm x 31 cm. Framed. See the catalog of the Dresden Academy Art Exhibition of 1883, p. 16, no. 15; Boetticher, *Malerwerke*, no. 20. Provenance: Christie’s, New York, auction of February 14, 1996, lot 81; Neumeister, Munich, auction of July 1, 1998, lot 554. Oil on panel.