Lot 1338 | Hans Thoma | Landscape of the Upper Rhine

THOMA, HANS
1839 Bernau - 1924 Karlsruhe

Title: Landscape of the Upper Rhine.
Technique: Oil on canvas.
Measurement: 50 x 78,5cm.
Notation: Monogrammed and dated lower right: 1916 HTH (lig.).
Frame: Framed.

Provenance:
Private ownership, Germany.

Intimately connected with nature, the pair of shepherds, placed by Hans Thoma in a gentle hilly landscape, gaze across the Rhine valley. An idyllic landscape opens up before their eyes, inviting the viewer to explore. In finely graduated nuances of blue and green, the river winding in gentle bends, the broad horizon and the trees, grasses and meadows combine to form a harmonious whole. The violet-coloured meadow flowers and the spotted off-white flock of sheep stand out and bring the landscape to life. Apart from the pair of shepherds, the only signs of human habitation in the landscape are the built-up island, which can be reached via a bridge, and the occasional recognisable architectural feature.
Hans Thoma was a German painter from Bernau in the Black Forest whose career began out of economic hardship. Without an education, he initially secured his financial livelihood through smaller commissioned works, such as landscapes and portraits, before his talent was recognised by lucky coincidence and he was awarded a scholarship to the Grand Ducal Academy in Karlsruhe. His encounter with the works of Gustave Courbet and the Barbizon School during a study trip to Paris had a formative influence on his artistic development. It is hard to believe, but the paintings that followed, especially large-format landscapes in harmoniously calm colours, which Hans Thoma showed at the Kunstverein Karlsruhe, met with rejection from the public. Undeterred in his own style, he went to Munich, where he met like-minded artists in Victor Müller, Wilhelm Leibl, Arnold Böcklin and Wilhelm Tübner, among others. After Thoma finally achieved the success he had longed for in Munich in 1890, he came full circle when he was appointed director of the gallery and professor at the art school in Karlsruhe. In 1909, thus during his life time, a museum was opened for Thoma in the Karlsruhe Kunsthalle.
In this painting from 1916, whose subject is repeated in two other versions, Hans Thoma sensitively succeeds in depicting idyllic life in rural simplicity. With a restrained gaze, he composes a landscape that carries the magic of a pre-modern place of longing right up to the present day.