2-743-611 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

The Brothers Eberhard, 1822. In 1822, Johann Anton Ramboux accompanied the Eberhard brothers to Munich, where he executed this double portrait lithograph. Because he intended the print to be a gift to the sitters, only a small number of impressions were produced. This exceedingly rare work is an exquisite example of early German lithography, a technique which had only been invented in 1798. Ramboux, who had been a student of the French painter Jacques Louis David (1748-1825), lived in Rome between 1816 and 1822. There he befriended a group of German artists who had formed the Brotherhood of St. Luke (also called the Nazarenes). They inhabited a deserted monastery and lived a life of study and Christian devotion. Their art strove to restore the pious purity of early 16th-century Italian and German painting, emulating the strong draftsmanship of Raphael (1483-1520) and Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528). Such an emphasis on skillful drawing is evident in this lithograph: Ramboux beautifully modeled the two heads in light and shade.