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Property from the Arthur Feldman Collection MICHAEL WILLMANN KÖNINGSBERG 1630 - 1706 LEUBUS RECTO AND VERSO : SAINT MICHAEL THE ARCHANGEL SLAYING SATAN

pen and brown ink and point of the brush and grey wash over black chalk (recto), point of the brush and grey wash, heightened with white, over black chalk (verso)

PROVENANCE

Rudolf Peltzer (L.2231);
Brno/Feldmann inventory number 3198
CATALOGUE NOTE

The bold and energetic brushwork of this drawing bears a strong resemblance to Willmann's drawing of the Death of Priam, in an American private collection (see Drawings from the Holy Roman Empire 1540-1680, exhibition catalogue, Princeton University Art Gallery, et al., 1982, cat. no. 77). In his exhibition catalogue description of that drawing, Thomas daCosta Kaufmann points to the artist's 'free use of pen', and his 'broad and bold application of washes...in places creating deep tonal patches'. Our drawing certainly demonstrates this painterly approach to the use of wash, which ranges from delicate touches in the shaft of light above Saint Michael to full, jabbing brush-strokes in the lower part of the composition, fusing Satan with his surroundings and dragging him into the depths below.

Willmann was born in Königsberg, and visted the Netherlands and Prague, before settling in Berlin, where in 1655-6 he was court painter to the Elector Friedrich Wilhelm I of Brandenburg. In 1660-61, however, Willman entered the Cistercian monastery at Leubus in Silesia, and remained there until his death, producing various cycles of decorative paintings for churches in that region.