Georg Friedrich Kersting 

Georg Friedrich Kersting was a German painter best known for his Biedermeier-style interior paintings. He was born on 31st October 1785 in Gustrow, Germany and died on1st July 1847 in Meissen, Germany aged 61.

“The Embroiderer” (1813)
“On Sentry Duty at the Outpost” (1815)
“Caspar David Friedrich in his Studio” (1819)
“Portrait of Niccolò Paganini” (1829)

1785: Georg Friedrich Kersting was born on 31st October in Gustrow, Northeast Germany. His father was a glazier and the family were quite poor.

1805: He enters the academy of art in Copenhagen, Denmark and is heavily influenced by the clear style of the Danish School. He is awarded a silver medal in draughtsmanship.

1808: After leaving art school he moves to Dresden in Germany and begins to specialise in paintings of interiors in which his sitter is placed.

1810: He has become friendly with the painter Caspar David Friedrich and in July the two go on a walking tour through the Zittau Mountains and the Riesengebirge (literally “Giant Mountains” situated in the north of the Czech Republic). They both paint numerous sketches and observations from nature and it is thought likely that Kersting painted the figures in Friedrich’s “Morning in the Riesengebirge”.

1811: He is also a close friend of the painter Gerhard von Kügelgen and stays with him at his house on numerous occasions. He paints a portrait of him in his studio.

1812: He paints “The Embroiderer”, “The Elegant Reader” and “Man at a Desk” which uses the painter Louise Seidler as a model.

1813: Seidler helps him send several of his paintings to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe in Weimar. Goethe is impressed and recommends that the Grand Duke Charles Augustus buys “The Embroiderer” and he also encourages other sales by promoting a lottery. Kersting joins the volunteer Lützowsches Freikorps (Lutzow Free Corps) to try to help the Prussian Army expel Napoleon Bonaparte’s forces from Germany. He completes a full-length self-portrait wearing his uniform. He serves with the poet Karl Theodor Korner in the regiment.

1814: He moves to Poland and is employed as a drawing master. He paints “Man reading by Lamplight”.

1815: He paints “On Sentry Duty at the Outpost” which shows three rangers, including the artist Ferdinand Hartmann and Karl Theodor Korner (the latter was sadly killed in battle in 1813). He also paints “The Wreath Maker” and “Couple at the Window”.

1817: He paints “Embroidery Woman”.

1818: He returns to Meissen in Germany where he gets a job as the chief artist at the famous porcelain factory where he will work for the rest of his life. He becomes notable for painting the flowers on their models but also continues to paint oils on canvas. He marries and goes on to have four children.

1819: He paints “Caspar David Freidrich in his Studio” which is very popular when it is exhibited at the Dresden Kunstakademie. 

1827: He paints “At the Mirror”.

1829: His “Portrait of Niccolò Paganini” is said to completed in this year.

Georg Friedrich Kersting died on 1st July 1847 in Meissen. Germany and was buried in the city.

Georg Friedrich Kersting was influenced by his time at the Copenhagen Academy between 1805 and1808 where he was awarded silver medal in draughtsmanship. His early work created immediately after he finished his degree reflects the romantic views of landscapes at that time. His foundational training at the Academy emphasised sharp lines, clean compositions, and highly deliberate lighting and he was more subjective in his work than his great friend Caspar David Friedrich although the two shared a similar omantic attitude. The pair went on numerous hikes together and sketched directly from nature.

Another great influence was seventeenth century Dutch genre painting, and especially Jan Vermeer, and he liked to paint bourgeois subjects engaged in quiet tasks. His work was championed by his friend the painter Louise Seidler and earned the praise of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. This made him concentrate more on literary and historically inspired themes thereafter. Goethe recommended that the Grand Duke Charles Augustus purchase his work “The Embroiderer”.

During the Napoleonic wars he served in the Prussian Lützow Free Corps and this instilled in him a strong German-nationalist sentiment and he painted a variety of military and patriotic subjects. The painting “On Sentry Duty” of 1815 depicts three rangers, including the artist Ferdinand Hartmann and the writer Theodor Körner, who fought with Kersting and died in wars against the French.

The work he created while at the Meissen porcelain manufactory are known as the Biedermeier-style interior paintings. He returned to Meissen in 1818, where he married and had four children and became the chief artist at porcelain factory until his death. His most lasting works are his figures in interiors that borrow from seventeenth-century Dutch genre painting with characters often viewed from the back, although in contemporary settings.

While he was initially inspired by the older Friedrich many of Friedrich’s later works were inspired by him such as “Caroline at the Window”, widely considered as a response to Kersting’s intimate domestic scenes. Other Realists such as Adolph Menzel were inspired by his meticulous attention to the detail of physical objects, his atmospheric lighting and his settings of bourgeois daily life. He was also a major inspiration for the Dresden Romantic Circle who were impressed by the emotional features of his work, and continued to explore and adapt his thematic subjects. 

Complete list of the works of Kersting.