Oil on light cardboard, laid on cardboard
28,5 x 38 cm (11,2 x 14,9 in)

PROVENANCE: Collection Johann Friedrich Lahmann, Bremen and Dresden.
Collection Walther Unus (that is Walther Heinrich 1872 Berlin - 1939 Rome), Berlin.

Christian Friedrich Gille at first studied landscape engraving at the Dresden Academy of Art under Johann Gottfried Abraham Frenzel, who soon discovered his artistic talent. In the late 1820s, by that time Christian Friedrich Gille had turned to oil painting, he joined the studio of Johann Christian Clausen Dahl and remains active in Dresden the following years. Numerous works with topographic contents are proof of these activities. As of the mid 19\up5 th century he put more emphasis on painting in oil, thus his graphic was eclipsed. Landscape depictions in the manner of Dahl are among the artist’s favorite subjects, whereas oil sketches occupy a special position in the artist’s creation. With great deal of artistic freedom and impartiality he managed to walk new paths within 19\up5 th century Dresden art. He delivered particular proof of an impressive ability to abstract. In 1874 one of his oil paintings was accepted into the collection of the Dresdner Gemäldegalerie according to the resolution of the academic council, however, the artist and his oeuvre did not take root within his lifetime. After suffering from an illness for a long time Christian Friedrich Gille died at an old age and penniless in 1899.

Largely unrecognized in his lifetime, his works did not receive the deserved acknowledgment before the early 20\up5 th century. The Dresden art lover and collector Johann Friedrich Lahmann (1858-1937), who acquired a vast amount of oil studies and drawings by the artist, played a decisive role. The interest of Lahmann, who counted among the most important personalities of the Dresden high society in terms of art and art history, felt obliged merely to qualitative criteria and was largely unimpressed by the contemporary preferences of the art market. The most important works by the artist are in possession of public collections, e.g the ‘Staatliche Kunstsammlungen‘ in Dresden as well as the Kunsthalle in Bremen, the native town of Johann Friedrich Lahmann. Both collections were a beneficence to a large extent, part of it also originates from Lahman’sgenerous inheritance. In total Lahman had collected some 400 works by Christian Friedrich Gilles. A large share of this collections was called up in an auction at Rudolph Lepke in Berlin in 1938, , which is why the character of this unique collection is past recovery. [CM].