The Brothers Eberhard. 1822

Johann Anton Ramboux

1790 Trier – 1866 Cologne

Chalk lithograph on white wove paper. Sheet size: 32.2 x 34.8 cm. Winkler. 648,2. Exh. Cat. Unter Glas und Rahmen, cat. no. 10.

Excellent and precise impression of warm tonality. Partly with narrow margins and partly trimmed to the image. Three small needle holes in the margin and some thin backed-up areas on verso, hardly visible on recto (the largest measuring 6mm). Otherwise very well preserved.

The double portrait of the Eberhard brothers (a painter and a sculptor) is the most important print by Ramboux. Moreover, it is certainly an outstanding early Nazarene lithograph, combining the iconography of friendship so important in German Romanticism with a brilliant execution of the technique of lithography. In spite of its rarity, this lithograph has repeatedly been illustrated in the art historical literature on German Romanticism and its graphic arts. In the Mainz catalogue, Unter Glas und Rahmen, 1993-4 the number of known impressions after Winkler has been extended by the addition of a listing contained in a dealer’s catalogue (Lutz Riester, A Miscellany of Old Master Prints, London/Freiburg 1992, p.108). We should like to add to this list several examples known to us that have since appeared on the art market. Winkler gives 10 examples recorded summarily by location; in addition we should like to list the additional examples with an indication of print-technical detail, where we have seen the originals or where such information is given in the literature.

In German public collections (10 examples, Winkler 648.2);
Dept of Prints and Drawings, Basel (2 examples, Riester, loc.cit.);
Private collections (2 examples, Riester, loc.cit.);
Foundation Emilie Linder, Olten ( 1 example, with a light brown plate);
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (1 example, with a light-brown plate, formerly art market Freiburg);
Private collection, Munich, 1991 (1 example, mounted on chine collé);
Art market Düsseldorf, 1991(1 example, mounted on chine collé);
Art market Freiburg, 1992 ((1 example, mounted on chine collé, previously art market Southern Germany);
Landesmuseum Mainz (1 example, on white wove paper with a light-brown plate, Estate Veit inventory no. 2039);
Private collection, London (1 example; on white wove paper);
Auction Cologne, 2000 (1 example, on brown wove paper, discoloured by acid in support).

With our example this listing would give 23 impressions overall. That is certainly not the final number of extant prints and it would be desirable, over the next few years, to extend the list with examples from public and private collections outside Germany.

The print exists in three different printed forms:
I. on white wove paper
II. printed in light-brown on white wove paper (some descriptions also indicate that there is a version printed with colour plate onto mounted chine collé. We have not seen these examples).
III. Chine collé on white wove paper.

The lithograph was ‘....printed 1822 by Johann Anton Selb in a few examples only... According to an article on the brothers Eberhard in Abendblatt zur Neueren Münchner Zeitung of 19 April 1859 (no. 93) the lithograph had ‘recently been issued’ by F.Gypens Kunstverlag, Munich. This may explain the use of different types of paper and perhaps even that of the colour plate.’ (Exh. cat., Glas und Rahmen, p.33).

Chinese paper is particularly capable of absorbing printer’s ink. Thus, even if the printing on Chinese paper is a difficult process, it is a popular solution for plates that have been in use for some time and that show signs of wear such as scratches and tired impressions. Furthermore, if one assumes that the stone remained unused for some 37 years between the two editions, the chine collé impressions here described under III most likely belong to the edition of 1859.

We are grateful to Dr. Stephan Seeliger, Munich, for his help in cataloguing this print.

Bought by a museum, UK.