R. Wasmann, In South Tyrol, 19th-century, Pencil

Rudolf Friedrich Wasmann (1805 Hamburg - 1886 Meran): In South Tyrol, 19th century, Pen drawingTechnique: Pen drawing over Pencil on PaperInscription: Inscribed on the backing: "In memory of St. Nicolas - Fr. Wasmann".Date: 19th centuryDescription: Our drawing from the South Tyrolean region, probably made around 1840, is one of a series of drawings created by the artist in the years following his three-year trip to Italy from 1835. What is special and interesting about Wasmann's drawing style is that he uses pen and pencil analogously to oil paint. As in his oil sketches, he concentrated here on pure form and light. The detail of the individual elements evaporates in favour of a totality determined by the materiality of the light. Like highlights, he uses the pen to emphasise the outlines of the trees and figures. The landscape and the architecture in the background dissolve in the light, the delicate pencil hatchings express the atmosphere of distance, and the white of the paper blends into this colour regie. Wasmann put the immediate conception of landscape before the Nazarene ideal early on after his first training in Dresden from 1825 with Gustav Heinrich Naeke. Although the Nazarene influence was to continue, for example in Munich under Peter von Cornelius from 1829 and through Friedrich Overbeck from 1832 in Rome, where he also converted to Catholicism, his conception of nature corresponds to the spontaneous, the experienced moment, which is to be perceived and captured in its fleetingness. Thus his oil sketches of the Tyrolean regions seem related to those of Blechen, who also found a dissolution of form under the Italian sun. Wasmann is also almost nervous in this drawing, intent on fleetingness. Through his direct approach to reality, which does not break with the concreteness of the detail, Wasmann, together with Blechen and Gille, proves to be an early pioneer of German open-air painting.Keywords: Church, Country Life, Landscape, Regional, 19th century, Romanticism, Landscape, Italy, Size: 13,5 cm x 19,7 cm (5,3 x 7,8 in)Condition: Good condition. Age-appropriate.