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| Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg (1783–1853) | ||||||||||
| A Danish painter of historical and genre subjects, sea-pieces, architecture, and portraits, Eckersberg was born at Blaakrog, Varnęs, in South Jutland. He studied first in Aabenraa and Flensburg, and in 1803 entered the Academy at Copenhagen, where he won the gold medal in 1809 for his Death of Jacob. The following year he went to Paris and entered David’s studio, and in 1813 he visited Rome. He remained abroad until 1817, during which time his ideas underwent a complete transformation, and his artistic personality finally emerged in crystalline clarity. Despite a superficial sympathy for the classicism of his time, which he encountered first as a pupil of David and later through friendly association with Thorvaldsen in Rome, Eckersberg's character as an artist formed around his faculty for reproducing external nature, a talent owed to his extraordinary powers of observation. This fixity of vision was so intense that it approached genius. His Danish character is evident in his portraits, for which he received many commissions, though he continued to devote much time to seascapes. From the 1820s, he developed a particular passion for the sea and for ships. He was interested in mechanics and construction, and in shipping he found a wide field for these interests. In 1817 he became a member of the Academy in Copenhagen, to which he presented The Death of Balder. The following year Eckersberg became one of its professors, devoting great care, with much success, to the development of rising artists’ talents. In 1827 he was made Director of the Academy. Between 1818 and 1828 he executed a series of historical pictures relating to the House of Oldenburg in the palace of Christiansborg. Dubbed ‘the father of Danish painting', he was the most successful and influential Danish painter of the first half of the 19th century. Eckersberg died in Copenhagen. | ||||||||||
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Art
