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67-572: He specialized in history paintings ; generally crowded group scenes. His subjects were typically from classical mythology or the Old Testament . He was born in Munich , in the Electorate of Bavaria . According to the biographer, Arnold Houbraken , he was one of the three grand masters of art named "Karel", or "Carl" (the other two were Karel Dujardin and Karel Marat , usually called Carlo Maratta). He

134-542: A Loth painting that had been looted by the Nazis was found after a search of more than 80 years by the family of Jewish Czech industrialist Johann Bloch. Changes in the title and attribution had made the search particularly difficult. [REDACTED] Media related to Johann Carl Loth at Wikimedia Commons History painting History painting is a genre in painting defined by its subject matter rather than any artistic style or specific period. History paintings depict

201-482: A long time, especially during the French Revolution , history painting often focused on depictions of the heroic male nude. The large production, using the finest French artists, of propaganda paintings glorifying the exploits of Napoleon , were matched by works, showing both victories and losses, from the anti-Napoleonic alliance by artists such as Goya and J. M. W. Turner . Théodore Géricault 's The Raft of

268-632: A moment in a narrative story , most often (but not exclusively) Greek and Roman mythology and Bible stories , opposed to a specific and static subject, as in portrait , still life , and landscape painting . The term is derived from the wider senses of the word historia in Latin and histoire in French, meaning "story" or "narrative", and essentially means "story painting". Most history paintings are not of scenes from history , especially paintings from before about 1850. In modern English, "historical painting"

335-756: A number of narrative scenes collected on sarcophagi and in paintings in the Catacombs of Rome . Miracles are very often shown, but the Crucifixion is absent until the 5th century, when it originated in Palestine , soon followed by the Nativity in much the form still seen in Orthodox icons today. The Adoration of the Magi and the Baptism are both often found earlier, but the choice of scenes

402-615: A readily identifiable image tended to be preferred. Devotional practices such as the Stations of the Cross also influenced selection. The miracles of Christ did not score well on any of these counts. In Byzantine art written names or titles were commonly included in the background of scenes in art; this was much less often done in the Early Medieval West, probably not least because few laymen would have been able to read them and understand

469-582: A scene from the Life with an anti-Catholic scene. But otherwise scenes from the Old Testament and parables were more often seen. Of the thirty or so parables of Jesus in the canonical Gospels , four were shown in medieval art almost to the exclusion of the others, but not normally mixed in with the narrative scenes of the Life , though the page from the Eadwine Psalter ( Canterbury , mid 12th century) illustrated here provides an exception to this. These were:

536-636: A single bird's eye view image of Jerusalem; another is illustrated here. In Protestant areas production of paintings of the Life stopped very soon after the Reformation , but prints and book illustrations were acceptable, as free from the suspicion of idolatry . Nonetheless, there were surprisingly few cycles of the Life . Lucas Cranach the Elder made a famous propaganda set of the Passion of Christ and Antichrist (1521), where 13 matched pairs of woodcuts contrasted

603-640: A unique higher status. The group in art are: Annunciation, Nativity, Presentation, Baptism, Raising of Lazarus , Transfiguration, Entry into Jerusalem, Crucifixion of Jesus, Harrowing of Hell, Ascension, Pentecost, Dormition of the Theotokos ( Death of the Virgin ). After the Early Christian period, the selection of scenes to illustrate was led by the occasions celebrated as Feasts of the Church , and those mentioned in

670-556: Is St Mark's Basilica in Venice where a 12th-century cycle of mosaics originally had 29 scenes of the miracles (now 27), probably derived from a Greek gospel book . The scenes originating in the apocryphal Gospels that remain a feature of the depiction of Life of the Virgin have fewer equivalents in the Life of Christ , although some minor details, like the boys climbing trees in the Entry to Jerusalem , are tolerated. The Harrowing of Hell

737-458: Is a moment in a narrative. The genre includes depictions of moments in religious narratives, above all the Life of Christ , Middle eastern culture as well as narrative scenes from mythology , and also allegorical scenes. These groups were for long the most frequently painted; works such as Michelangelo 's Sistine Chapel ceiling are therefore history paintings, as are most very large paintings before

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804-407: Is above another who only produces fruit, flowers or seashells. He who paints living animals is more than those who only represent dead things without movement, and as man is the most perfect work of God on the earth, it is also certain that he who becomes an imitator of God in representing human figures, is much more excellent than all the others ... a painter who only does portraits still does not have

871-846: Is buried in the church of San Luca, Venice . His works are mostly in Germany and Italy. Other museums with works by Loth include the Art Institute of Chicago and the National Gallery, London . Burghley House in England has two large paintings in the chapel. Isaac Blessing Jacob is on long-term loan to the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles, having recently been reclaimed by the Bloch family, originally from Brno, Czechoslovakia. In 2023

938-636: Is generally not used in art history in speaking of medieval painting, although the Western tradition was developing in large altarpieces , fresco cycles, and other works, as well as miniatures in illuminated manuscripts . It comes to the fore in Italian Renaissance painting , where a series of increasingly ambitious works were produced, many still religious, but several, especially in Florence, which did actually feature near-contemporary historical scenes such as

1005-539: Is notable for still not containing, among its thirteen scenes, a Crucifixion, and the Works contains eight miracles in its thirteen scenes. Neither of these features was to be typical of later art, but they are comparable to features of cycles in smaller objects of the period such as carved caskets and a gold pendant medallion of the late 6th century. For the rest of the Early Medieval period illuminated manuscripts contain

1072-453: Is sometimes used to describe the painting of scenes from history in its narrower sense, especially for 19th-century art, excluding religious, mythological, and allegorical subjects, which are included in the broader term "history painting", and before the 19th century were the most common subjects for history paintings. History paintings almost always contain a number of figures, often a large number, and normally show some typical states on that

1139-425: Is the painting of scenes from secular history, whether specific episodes or generalized scenes. In the 19th century, historical painting in this sense became a distinct genre. In phrases such as "historical painting materials", "historical" means in use before about 1900, or some earlier date. History paintings were traditionally regarded as the highest form of Western painting, occupying the most prestigious place in

1206-520: Is very variable. The only Late Antique monumental cycles to have survived are in mosaic : Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome has a cycle from 432–430 on the birth and infancy of Christ together with other scenes from the Life of the Virgin , the dedicatee of the church. Sant'Appollinare Nuovo in Ravenna has cycles on opposite walls of the Works and Passion of Christ from the early 6th century. The Passion

1273-670: The Gothic period the selection of scenes was at its most standardized. Emile Mâle 's famous study of 13th-century French cathedral art analyses many cycles, and discusses the lack of emphasis on the "public life [which] is dismissed in four scenes, the Baptism, the Marriage at Cana, the Temptation and the Transfiguration, which moreover it is rare to find all together". Early Christian art contains

1340-793: The Impressionists (except for Édouard Manet ) and the Symbolists , and according to one recent writer " Modernism was to a considerable extent built upon the rejection of History Painting... All other genres are deemed capable of entering, in one form or another, the 'pantheon' of modernity considered, but History Painting is excluded". Initially, "history painting" and "historical painting" were used interchangeably in English, as when Sir Joshua Reynolds in his fourth Discourse uses both indiscriminately to cover "history painting", while saying "...it ought to be called poetical, as in reality it is", reflecting

1407-612: The Life of the Virgin with that of Jesus. Subjects showing the life of Jesus during his active life as a teacher, before the days of the Passion, were relatively few in medieval art, for a number of reasons. From the Renaissance, and in Protestant art, the number of subjects increased considerably, but cycles in painting became rarer, though they remained common in prints and especially book illustrations. The main scenes found in art during

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1474-643: The Nicene Creed , both of which were given prominence by the devotional writers on whose works many cycles appear to be based. Of these, the Vita Christi ("Life of Christ") by Ludolph of Saxony and the Meditations on the Life of Christ were two of the most popular from the 14th century onwards. Another influence, especially in smaller churches, was liturgical drama , and no doubt also those scenes which lent themselves to

1541-446: The Passion of Christ : large (7 scenes before 1500, with a further 5 in 1510) and small (36 scenes in 1510) cycles in woodcut , and one in engraving (16 scenes, 1507–1512). These were distributed all over Europe, and often used as patterns by less ambitious painters. Hans Memling 's Scenes from the Passion of Christ and Advent and Triumph of Christ are examples of a large number of scenes, in these case over twenty, shown in

1608-702: The Raphael Cartoons . In painting, the Life was often shown on one side of a church, paired with Old Testament scenes on the other, the latter usually chosen for pre-figuring the New Testament scene according to the theory of typology . Such schemes were later called the Poor Man's Bible (and in book form the Biblia Pauperum ) by art historians, and were very common, though most have now vanished. After stained-glass became important in Gothic art , this medium

1675-665: The Wise and Foolish Virgins , Dives and Lazarus , the Prodigal Son and the Good Samaritan . The Labourers in the Vineyard also appear in Early Medieval works. From the Renaissance the numbers shown widened slightly, and the three main scenes of the Prodigal Son – the high living, herding the pigs, and the return – became the clear favourites. Albrecht Dürer made a famous engraving of

1742-412: The hierarchy of genres , and considered the equivalent to the epic in literature. In his De Pictura of 1436, Leon Battista Alberti had argued that multi-figure history painting was the noblest form of art, as being the most difficult, which required mastery of all the others, because it was a visual form of history, and because it had the greatest potential to move the viewer. He placed emphasis on

1809-471: The "Intimate Romantic", and in French it was known as the "peinture de genre historique" or "peinture anecdotique" ("historical genre painting" or "anecdotal painting"). Church commissions for large group scenes from the Bible had greatly reduced, and historical painting became very significant. Especially in the early 19th century, much historical painting depicted specific moments from historical literature, with

1876-425: The 19th century. The term covers large paintings in oil on canvas or fresco produced between the Renaissance and the late 19th century, after which the term is generally not used even for the many works that still meet the basic definition. History painting may be used interchangeably with historical painting , and was especially so used before the 20th century. Where a distinction is made, "historical painting"

1943-532: The East this was more common; the 6th-century Byzantine Sinope Gospels has an unframed miniature at the bottom of every surviving page, and this style of illustrating the Gospels continued to be found in later Greek Gospel books, compelling the artist to devote more pictures to the Works . Scenes with miracles were more often found in cycles of the life of Saint Peter and other apostles, from late antique sarcophagi to

2010-924: The English Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood continued to regard history painting as the ideal for their most ambitious works. Others such as Jan Matejko in Poland, Vasily Surikov in Russia, José Moreno Carbonero in Spain and Paul Delaroche in France became specialized painters of large historical subjects. The style troubadour (" troubadour style") was a somewhat derisive French term for earlier paintings of medieval and Renaissance scenes, which were often small and depicting moments of anecdote rather than drama; Ingres , Richard Parkes Bonington and Henri Fradelle painted such works. Sir Roy Strong calls this type of work

2077-554: The French state, but after the fall of Napoleon in 1815 the French governments were not regarded as suitable for heroic treatment and many artists retreated further into the past to find subjects, though in Britain depicting the victories of the Napoleonic Wars mostly occurred after they were over. Another path was to choose contemporary subjects that were oppositional to government either at home and abroad, and many of what were arguably

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2144-530: The French term peinture historique , one equivalent of "history painting". The terms began to separate in the 19th century, with "historical painting" becoming a sub-group of "history painting" restricted to subjects taken from history in its normal sense. In 1853 John Ruskin asked his audience: "What do you at present mean by historical painting? Now-a-days it means the endeavour, by the power of imagination, to portray some historical event of past days." So for example Harold Wethey 's three-volume catalogue of

2211-570: The Latin. The difficulties this could cause are shown in the 12 small narrative scenes from the Gospel of Luke in the 6th-century St. Augustine Gospels ; about a century after the book was created captions were added to these images by a monk, which may already misidentify one scene. It was around this time that miracle scenes, which had often been prominent in Early Christian art , became much more rare in

2278-488: The Medusa (1818–1819) was a sensation, appearing to update the history painting for the 19th century, and showing anonymous figures famous only for being victims of what was then a famous and controversial disaster at sea. Conveniently their clothes had been worn away to classical-seeming rags by the point the painting depicts. At the same time the demand for traditional large religious history paintings very largely fell away. In

2345-582: The Middle Ages are: These scenes also could form part of cycles of the Life of the Virgin : In Byzantine art a fixed group of twelve scenes were often depicted as a set. These are sometimes described as the "Twelve Great Feasts", although three of them are different from the twelve modern Great feasts in the Eastern Orthodox Church . Neither group includes Easter/the Resurrection, which had

2412-613: The Prodigal Son amongst the pigs (1496), a popular subject in the Northern Renaissance , and Rembrandt depicted the story several times, although in at least one of his works, The Prodigal Son in the Tavern , a portrait of himself "as" the Son, revelling with his wife, is like many artists' depictions, a way of dignifying a genre merry company or tavern scene. His late Return of the Prodigal Son (1662, Hermitage Museum , St Petersburg )

2479-554: The ability to depict the interactions between the figures by gesture and expression. This view remained general until the 19th century, when artistic movements began to struggle against the establishment institutions of academic art , which continued to adhere to it. At the same time, there was from the latter part of the 18th century an increased interest in depicting in the form of history painting moments of drama from recent or contemporary history, which had long largely been confined to battle-scenes and scenes of formal surrenders and

2546-518: The art of the Western Church. However, some miracles commonly used as paradigms for Christian doctrines continued to be represented, especially the Wedding at Cana and Raising of Lazarus , which were both easy to recognise as images, with Lazarus normally shown tightly wrapped in a white shroud, but standing up. Paintings in hospitals were more likely to show scenes of the miraculous cures. An exception

2613-450: The best painters above all on their production of large works of history painting (though in fact the only modern (post-classical) work described in De Pictura is Giotto 's huge Navicella in mosaic). Artists continued for centuries to strive to make their reputation by producing such works, often neglecting genres to which their talents were better suited. There was some objection to

2680-552: The best-received. From 1760 onwards, the Society of Artists of Great Britain , the first body to organize regular exhibitions in London, awarded two generous prizes each year to paintings of subjects from British history. The unheroic nature of modern dress was regarded as a serious difficulty. When, in 1770, Benjamin West proposed to paint The Death of General Wolfe in contemporary dress, he

2747-474: The choice of scenes for the remainder of the Middle Ages became largely settled in the Western and Eastern churches, and was mainly based on the major feasts celebrated in the church calendars. The most common subjects were grouped around the birth and childhood of Jesus, and the Passion of Christ , leading to his Crucifixion and Resurrection . Many cycles covered only one of these groups, and others combined

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2814-1153: The classic statement of the theory for the 18th century: Celui qui fait parfaitement des païsages est au-dessus d'un autre qui ne fait que des fruits, des fleurs ou des coquilles. Celui qui peint des animaux vivants est plus estimable que ceux qui ne représentent que des choses mortes & sans mouvement; & comme la figure de l'homme est le plus parfait ouvrage de Dieu sur la Terre, il est certain aussi que celui qui se rend l'imitateur de Dieu en peignant des figures humaines, est beaucoup plus excellent que tous les autres ... un Peintre qui ne fait que des portraits, n'a pas encore cette haute perfection de l'Art, & ne peut prétendre à l'honneur que reçoivent les plus sçavans. Il faut pour cela passer d'une seule figure à la représentation de plusieurs ensemble; il faut traiter l'histoire & la fable; il faut représenter de grandes actions comme les historiens, ou des sujets agréables comme les Poëtes; & montant encore plus haut, il faut par des compositions allégoriques, sçavoir couvrir sous le voile de la fable les vertus des grands hommes, & les mystères les plus relevez. He who produces perfect landscapes

2881-700: The genre. In the Raphael Rooms in the Vatican Palace , allegories and historical scenes are mixed together, and the Raphael Cartoons show scenes from the Gospels, all in the Grand Manner that from the High Renaissance became associated with, and often expected in, history painting. In the Late Renaissance and Baroque the painting of actual history tended to degenerate into panoramic battle-scenes with

2948-423: The highest perfection of his art, and cannot expect the honour due to the most skilled. For that he must pass from representing a single figure to several together; history and myth must be depicted; great events must be represented as by historians, or like the poets, subjects that will please, and climbing still higher, he must have the skill to cover under the veil of myth the virtues of great men in allegories, and

3015-544: The last great generation of history paintings were protests at contemporary episodes of repression or outrages at home or abroad: Goya 's The Third of May 1808 (1814), Théodore Géricault 's The Raft of the Medusa (1818–19), Eugène Delacroix 's The Massacre at Chios (1824) and Liberty Leading the People (1830). These were heroic, but showed heroic suffering by ordinary civilians. Romantic artists such as Géricault and Delacroix, and those from other movements such as

3082-399: The like. Scenes from ancient history had been popular in the early Renaissance , and once again became common in the Baroque and Rococo periods, and still more so with the rise of Neoclassicism . In some 19th or 20th century contexts, the term may refer specifically to paintings of scenes from secular history, rather than those from religious narratives, literature or mythology. The term

3149-449: The lives of the great, or of scenes centred on unnamed figures involved in historical events, as in the Troubadour style . At the same time scenes of ordinary life with moral, political or satirical content became often the main vehicle for expressive interplay between figures in painting, whether given a modern or historical setting. By the later 19th century, history painting was often explicitly rejected by avant-garde movements such as

3216-475: The many other subjects in art showing the eternal life of Christ, such as Christ in Majesty , and also many types of portrait or devotional subjects without a narrative element. They are often grouped in series or cycles of works in a variety of media, from book illustrations to large cycles of wall paintings, and most of the subjects forming the narrative cycles have also been the subjects of individual works, though with greatly varying frequency. By around 1000,

3283-467: The mid-nineteenth century there arose a style known as historicism , which marked a formal imitation of historical styles and/or artists. Another development in the nineteenth century was the treatment of historical subjects, often on a large scale, with the values of genre painting , the depiction of scenes of everyday life, and anecdote . Grand depictions of events of great public importance were supplemented with scenes depicting more personal incidents in

3350-523: The mysteries they reveal". By the late 18th century, with both religious and mytholological painting in decline, there was an increased demand for paintings of scenes from history, including contemporary history. This was in part driven by the changing audience for ambitious paintings, which now increasingly made their reputation in public exhibitions rather than by impressing the owners of and visitors to palaces and public buildings. Classical history remained popular, but scenes from national histories were often

3417-648: The novels of Sir Walter Scott a particular favourite, in France and other European countries as much as Great Britain. By the middle of the century medieval scenes were expected to be very carefully researched, using the work of historians of costume, architecture and all elements of decor that were becoming available. An example of this is the extensive research of Byzantine architecture, clothing, and decoration made in Parisian museums and libraries by Moreno Carbonero for his masterwork The Entry of Roger de Flor in Constantinople . The provision of examples and expertise for artists, as well as revivalist industrial designers,

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3484-403: The only painted scenes to have survived in quantity, though many scenes have survived from the applied arts, especially ivories, and some in cast bronze. The period of Christ's Works still seems relatively prominent compared to the High Middle Ages . Although this was the period when the Gospel book was the main type of manuscript to receive lavish illumination in this period, the emphasis

3551-433: The paintings of Titian (Phaidon, 1969–75) is divided between "Religious Paintings", "Portraits", and "Mythological and Historical Paintings", though both volumes I and III cover what is included in the term "History Paintings". This distinction is useful but is by no means generally observed, and the terms are still often used in a confusing manner. Because of the potential for confusion modern academic writing tends to avoid

3618-427: The paintings that shouted loudest got the attention". Orientalist painting was an alternative genre that offered similar exotic costumes and decor, and at least as much opportunity to depict sex and violence. Life of Christ in art The life of Christ as a narrative cycle in Christian art comprises a number of different subjects showing events from the life of Jesus on Earth. They are distinguished from

3685-470: The phrase "historical painting", talking instead of "historical subject matter" in history painting, but where the phrase is still used in contemporary scholarship it will normally mean the painting of subjects from history, very often in the 19th century. "Historical painting" may also be used, especially in discussion of painting techniques in conservation studies, to mean "old", as opposed to modern or recent painting. In 19th-century British writing on art

3752-422: The prevailing historical narrative of national history in the popular mind. In France, L'art Pompier ("Fireman art") was a derisory term for official academic historical painting, and in a final phase, "History painting of a debased sort, scenes of brutality and terror, purporting to illustrate episodes from Roman and Moorish history, were Salon sensations. On the overcrowded walls of the exhibition galleries,

3819-430: The set of three huge canvases on The Battle of San Romano by Paolo Uccello , the abortive Battle of Cascina by Michelangelo and the Battle of Anghiari by Leonardo da Vinci , neither of which were completed. Scenes from ancient history and mythology were also popular. Writers such as Alberti and the following century Giorgio Vasari in his Lives of the Artists , followed public and artistic opinion in judging

3886-415: The term, as many writers preferred terms such as "poetic painting" ( poesia ), or wanted to make a distinction between the "true" istoria , covering history including biblical and religious scenes, and the fabula , covering pagan myth, allegory, and scenes from fiction, which could not be regarded as true. The large works of Raphael were long considered, with those of Michelangelo, as the finest models for

3953-455: The terms " subject painting " or "anecdotic" painting were often used for works in a line of development going back to William Hogarth of monoscenic depictions of crucial moments in an implied narrative with unidentified characters, such as William Holman Hunt 's 1853 painting The Awakening Conscience or Augustus Egg 's Past and Present , a set of three paintings, updating sets by Hogarth such as Marriage à-la-mode . History painting

4020-468: The victorious monarch or general perched on a horse accompanied with his retinue, or formal scenes of ceremonies, although some artists managed to make a masterpiece from such unpromising material, as Velázquez did with his The Surrender of Breda . An influential formulation of the hierarchy of genres, confirming the history painting at the top, was made in 1667 by André Félibien , a historiographer, architect and theoretician of French classicism became

4087-412: Was also used, usually with a small medallion for each scene, requiring a very compressed composition. The frescos on the walls of the Sistine Chapel showing the Lives of Christ and Moses are an unusual variant. From the 15th century prints had first scenes, then whole cycles, which were also one of the most common subjects for blockbooks . Albrecht Dürer produced a total of three print cycles of

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4154-400: Was firmly instructed to use classical costume by many people. He ignored these comments and showed the scene in modern dress. Although George III refused to purchase the work, West succeeded both in overcoming his critics' objections and inaugurating a more historically accurate style in such paintings. Other artists depicted scenes, regardless of when they occurred, in classical dress and for

4221-499: Was not an episode witnessed or mentioned by any of the Four Evangelists but was approved by the Church, and the Lamentation of Christ , though not specifically described in the Gospels, was thought to be implied by the accounts there of the episodes before and after. Vernacular art was less policed by the clergy, and works such as some medieval tiles from Tring can show fanciful apocryphal legends that either hardly ever appeared in church art, or were destroyed at some later date. By

4288-512: Was on depicting Evangelist portraits , and relatively few contained narrative cycles; these are in fact more common in psalters and other types of book, especially from the Romanesque period . Where there were cycles of illustrations in illuminated manuscripts, these were normally collected together at the start of the book, or of the Gospels, rather than appearing throughout the text at the relevant places, something hardly found in Western manuscripts at all, and slow to develop in printed bibles. In

4355-485: Was one of the motivations for the establishment of museums like the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. New techniques of printmaking such as the chromolithograph made good quality reproductions both relatively cheap and very widely accessible, and also hugely profitable for artist and publisher, as the sales were so large. Historical painting often had a close relationship with Nationalism , and painters like Matejko in Poland could play an important role in fixing

4422-401: Was the dominant form of academic painting in the various national academies in the 18th century, and for most of the 19th, and increasingly historical subjects dominated. During the Revolutionary and Napoleonic periods the heroic treatment of contemporary history in a frankly propagandistic fashion by Antoine-Jean, Baron Gros , Jacques-Louis David , Carle Vernet and others was supported by

4489-818: Was the son and pupil of Johann Ulrich Loth  [ de ] and was possibly influenced by Giovan Battista Langetti . He was once commissioned to paint for the emperor Leopold I in Vienna and worked together with Pietro Liberi in Venice, where he lived from 1663 until his death in 1698. His brother Franz (1639–1710) was also a painter in Venice and Germany and often collaborated with Carl. He had numerous pupils, including Michael Wenzel Halbax  [ de ] , Santo Prunati , Johann Michael Rottmayr , Hans Adam Weissenkircher , Daniel Seiter , and Baron Peter Strudel . He attracted well-to-do artists, such as Cornelis de Bruijn and Jan van Bunnik , who made trips especially to visit his studio. Willem Drost and Jan Vermeer van Utrecht were among his close friends. He

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