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拍品專文
As punishment for excessive pride in her large family, the goddess Leto ordered the death of Niobe’s fourteen children. Seven daughters and seven sons were slain with arrows by Artemis and Apollo respectively. After the massacre Niobe wept until she eventually turned to stone (Metamorphosis, Book 6, lines 144-312). Johann König captures the chaos and bloodshed of this scene, with mounted riders fleeing the barrage of arrows in every direction and the twisting bodies of the slain mounting in the foreground.
Little is known of König’s early training as an artist. He is first documented in Rome around 1610 and must have visited Venice where he made a copy if Veronese’s Marriage at Cana. In Rome it is likely he encountered another German émigré, Adam Elsheimer, who had a significant impact on König’s work. Particularly notable is Elsheimer’s use of large figural groups in the foreground with realistic, yet poetic, landscapes in the distance, a compositional tactic König employs on a number of occasions, including in the present work. The bright colors and exacting finish are characteristic of the works for which König is best known, cabinet pictures of historical and mythological themes. The figures in the foreground are closely related to other cabinet pictures of this type, The Sacrifice of Noah (fig. 1), and The Brazen Serpent (fig. 2).
This painting will be included in Gode Krämer’s forthcoming catalogue raisoneé on the artist (private communication with the present owner, 2022).
Little is known of König’s early training as an artist. He is first documented in Rome around 1610 and must have visited Venice where he made a copy if Veronese’s Marriage at Cana. In Rome it is likely he encountered another German émigré, Adam Elsheimer, who had a significant impact on König’s work. Particularly notable is Elsheimer’s use of large figural groups in the foreground with realistic, yet poetic, landscapes in the distance, a compositional tactic König employs on a number of occasions, including in the present work. The bright colors and exacting finish are characteristic of the works for which König is best known, cabinet pictures of historical and mythological themes. The figures in the foreground are closely related to other cabinet pictures of this type, The Sacrifice of Noah (fig. 1), and The Brazen Serpent (fig. 2).
This painting will be included in Gode Krämer’s forthcoming catalogue raisoneé on the artist (private communication with the present owner, 2022).