The River Elbe at Moonlight

Johan Christian Clausen Dahl

1788 Bergen – 1857 Dresden

Grey wash and white gouache over pencil and black chalk. Size of sheet: 15.2 x 20.2 cm. Signed and dated: aften d(en) 3. Octbr. 1833. Dahl.

Provenance: Dr. Hille, rector in Dresden (presented to him by the artist on 24 December 1838 according to a handwritten note by Dahl on the verso); Boguslaw Jolles (Vienna and Dresden, second half of the nineteenth century) (Lugt, 381); Private collection, Oslo

The present work is a preparatory drawing for the small oil painting Die Elbe im Mondschein, dated (two days later) the 5th October 1833 (Berlingen Billedgaleri inv. 933, cat. 177. See Bang, vol. 2, no. 733, cat. no.16; Guratzsch, cat. no. 54).

The drawing was first presented by the artist to Dr. Hille in Dresden in 1838. Hille must have been a close friend, as he owned four paintings by Dahl.

This sublime work shows all the characteristics of a true German Romantic landscape drawing and reflects the ideas of artists like Caspar David Friedrich, with whom Dahl shared a house in Dresden for many years (1823 - 1840).

Such fine examples of Dahl´s draughtsmanship appear on the market very rarely, especially with this kind of popular subject.

Bought by a museum, Northern America.