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Lot Essay
Ernst came from a family of distinguished artists. His father, Leopold Ernst, was a painter and architect who designed cathedrals. Rudolf entered the Weiner Akademie der Bildenen Künste in 1869. In 1874, he went on a study trip to Rome, and from there moved to Paris. He sent his first painting to the Paris Salon in 1877. Like Ludwig Deutsch, Ernst began his artistic career as a portraitist, and he did not make his debut as an Orientalist painter until 1885 upon his return from his first visit to Spain and Morocco. Ernst was familiar with the cultures he depicted, and had visited Morocco, Turkey and the Moorish palaces of Spain.
Above all other Orientalist painters, Ernst was a craftsman who used his exotic subject matter primarily as a vehicle through which to express his technical mastery of surface texture and colour. Like Deutsch, he had a strong sense of plasticity and form, which was best expressed through his depictions of artefacts. His concern was not extreme ethnographic accuracy (indeed he frequently juxtaposed objects from different cultures) but to dazzle his wealthy patrons with paintings that have an almost tactile, three-dimensional quality.
Ernst's usual mastery contrasts of textures and colours can be seen in the present lot. With almost photographic precision, the artist paints the silken robes of the figures, the beautiful carpets and the various objects. Most of the objects Ernst includes in his paintings were from his own personal collection. Similar to Jean-Léon Gérôme and Deutsch, with whom he was close friends, Ernst had gathered a sizeable group of artefacts, tiles, lamps, pottery, silks, satins and kaftans from his travels to Moorish Spain, Morocco, Tunis and Istanbul during the 1880s. In fact, Ernst's studio, crammed full of these artefacts, resembled a stage-set.
The present work is dedicated Leon Roger-Milès (1859 – 1928) an art critic, historian and lawyer. He founded Le Monde Poétique and collaborated on several magazines, including Le Figaro illustrated and Revue des Deux Mondes. In 1898, Roger-Milès introduced Rudolf Ernst to the French public in the most glowing terms: nothing that the artist touched, he enthused, 'remained innocent of beauty, whether it was a painting, a piece of music or a ceramic.' (C. Juer, Najd Collection of Orientalist Paintings, London, 1991, p. 74).
Above all other Orientalist painters, Ernst was a craftsman who used his exotic subject matter primarily as a vehicle through which to express his technical mastery of surface texture and colour. Like Deutsch, he had a strong sense of plasticity and form, which was best expressed through his depictions of artefacts. His concern was not extreme ethnographic accuracy (indeed he frequently juxtaposed objects from different cultures) but to dazzle his wealthy patrons with paintings that have an almost tactile, three-dimensional quality.
Ernst's usual mastery contrasts of textures and colours can be seen in the present lot. With almost photographic precision, the artist paints the silken robes of the figures, the beautiful carpets and the various objects. Most of the objects Ernst includes in his paintings were from his own personal collection. Similar to Jean-Léon Gérôme and Deutsch, with whom he was close friends, Ernst had gathered a sizeable group of artefacts, tiles, lamps, pottery, silks, satins and kaftans from his travels to Moorish Spain, Morocco, Tunis and Istanbul during the 1880s. In fact, Ernst's studio, crammed full of these artefacts, resembled a stage-set.
The present work is dedicated Leon Roger-Milès (1859 – 1928) an art critic, historian and lawyer. He founded Le Monde Poétique and collaborated on several magazines, including Le Figaro illustrated and Revue des Deux Mondes. In 1898, Roger-Milès introduced Rudolf Ernst to the French public in the most glowing terms: nothing that the artist touched, he enthused, 'remained innocent of beauty, whether it was a painting, a piece of music or a ceramic.' (C. Juer, Najd Collection of Orientalist Paintings, London, 1991, p. 74).