“ Drawings now as before are reputed to be the domain of the enlightened connoisseur and art lover ” (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung April 4, 1992).

Rugendas I, Georg Philipp (1666 Augsburg 1742). Three horsemen. Two galloping, the left one walking. Pen drawing in black over pencil. Lower right inscribed with black pen  in italics : G. P. R. 1703. 121 x 173 mm.

Nagler, Monogramists, III, 279:  “the  italics  are  to  be  found  on  drawings”. – Mounted by old. – Laid onto large brown collection carton (43.4 x 32.5 cm) with white lining + wide stamped margin with German inscription “Collection Campe”, below “Georg Philipp Rugendas / Augsburg 27. XI 1666 - 19. V. 1742 / Pupil of I. Fischer (recte Fisches) / Famous Battle Painter.”, all in slightly paled white. – Predominantly in the white field feebly foxspotted, entirely disguised by the speed of the picture.

From  the  year  of  war  1703  as  so  decisive  for  Augsburg

within the Spanish War of Succession with especially its siege + occupation by the French-Bavarian troops (Dec. 15, 1703 – Aug. 16, 1704). “In the course of this siege Rugendas showed the courage and the intrepidity of the warrior; defying the dangers he dared to see from close what so far he only created from his imagination” (Nagler 1845 in the Künstler-Lexicon). Correspondingly storming ahead the gesture of the two galloppers, the left one furthermore with rifle.

This terrifically communicating speed of movement of the latters additionally increased by the comparably quiet outside left as antipole. Coming along absolutely unpretentiously this sketch, considered by Campe as worthy of his collection, reveals with a bang  “the  great  draughtsman  Rugendas”  who must have been

so Gode Krämer in the 1998 Augsburg Rugendas catalog with regard to a plenty of detail studies in which “there never are horses under the riders” (pp. 27 ff.).

And Anke Ch. Held in her 1996 catalog raisonné of the paintings + selected drawings:

“ Movements  difficult  to  represent ,  like (as here) of  horsemen  in  the  assault  are recorded with photographic exactness” (page 121).

Qualifications which fully confirm what hundred years earlier had Wilhelm Schmidt summing up

“ without doubt a first-rate talent, for not to say, a genius. Doubtless, set under better conditions, like living in the Netherlands about 1650, an artist … who would have

surpassed  all  his  horse  and  battle  competitors ”

(Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie XXIX [1889], p. 600).

As already 1803 Meusel stated in his “Biography of the Battle Painter Georg Philipp Rugendas” his engravings were  “a  true  dictionary  for  the  horse  draughtsman”  (after Held, p. 126).

And for the immediate 18^th century the drastic statement of the painter colleague Ferdinand Kobell from 1771 may stand, by which he differentiated the artistic Augsburg of the previous generation exemplarily:

(Decultot and other ed., Joh. Gg. Wille, Correspondence, Tübingen 1999, p. 486).

Present  execution  in black pen over pencil  of  the  standard  of  the  earlier  period : “Principally under the exact drawing in pen in black, later also brown ink there is an equally exact preparatory drawing in chalk, slightly beside the pen version …” (Krämer, op. cit., p. 32/II).

To encounter this drawing finally with a Campe provenance reaching over generations is its acme in its own right. For the merchant and Bavarian consul general Heinrich Wilhelm Campe (1770-1862), born in Deensen on the Weser, is garnished by a family bevy of publishing, book trading, and pedagogic importance. Branched in Hamburg, Brunswick, and Nuremberg, censure-seasoned publishers of Heine and young German literature, participants at Theodor Körner’s funeral. And by two of his three daughters he wrote publishing history of the finest. They became Madame Brockhaus + Madame Vieweg.

And while the paintings of the collection were sold at auction in Dresden in May 1863 – a first collection of 470 paintings + 1300 drawings had to help overcome a financial bottleneck – the drawings were parted among the daughters. Whereby the stock of the third daughter Sophie, married with the physician Prof. Hasse, had the longest duration due to intensive continued collecting activity and was dissolved only in 1930 with the Ehlers Collection and by chance remains of the Vieweg part. Among which five works of the elder Georg Philipp Rugendas, but not the present one. Created from military experience it survived several more attacks of the same kind and

with  its  300  years  now  here  and  today  passes  the  market  once  more

with a meantime stay in the old “famous Leipsic Heinrich Campe collection of drawings”.
Offer no. 15,180  /  price on request

Rugendas I, Georg Philipp (1666 Augsburg 1742). Assembling for the Ride. Two large companies in setting-out movement. Two brush drawings in varied grey up to brown over pencil.  Not  before  1730 . 190-193 x 237-238 mm.

On toned light HONIG laid paper, one of which with the cut word mark C & I HONIG as in use since 1730 and used by Rugendas also for his signed spectacular drawn “Cavalry Battle before the Fortress” of 1738 from his bequest (Biedermann, [Master Drawings of German Baroque], Augsburg 1987, no. 173 + Rugendas catalog Augsburg, 1998, ills. 22), there in addition with fleur-de-lis arms and the countermark IV standing for the French partner Jean Villedary (his own mark “IV ILLEDARY” on the younger Georg Philipp’s drawing of 1736).

At the back lower left numbered by old in brown ink 191/92, but barely originating from a sketchbook (“All drawings [in Augsburg] origin from dissolved sketchbooks”, Held, Gg. Ph. Rugendas, 1996, p. 121, as come to there 1855 with the family bequest after the death of the Brazilian Johann Moriz), though by its format corresponding with such as Gode Krämer imparts for these especially two obvious standard formats of Rugendas’ of c. 18 x 25 and c. 20 x 33 cm resp. (op. cit. Rugendas catalog p. 27). As throughout plain detail studies, frequently on both sides, they are out anyway, also those sheets lack any earlier numbering.

The chronological aspect set by the watermark, however,

For according to Krämer the “fact (goes) that except for the Berlin stock (of drawings in red chalk connected with the mezzotint production), some smaller and larger drawings for large thesis sheets and preparatory drawings similar to these for portraits of princes

practically  no  drawings  after  1720  were  found ;

and above all from the lack of any preparation by drawings for the paintings started again from 1735”. With the exception of just the above cavalry battle as being “quite at the end of his œuvre of drawings … secured for 1738 by signature and date” (op. cit., p. 34/III).

But also “composition studies – and just such one the one here is – have not survived that much and none which is to be joined directly with a later execution”, so Gode Krämer before on the group of small sketches of figures and parts of figures in chalk and pencil (p. 28/I), and as the latter obviously also is true for the pair here. Yet recourses to earlier works are obvious.

So we encounter both the two horsemen oriented straight ahead at the center of the main group of five acting to the right of the first sheet already in the opening sheet (Teuscher 31 with ills.; 24.5 x 39.5 cm) of the set of “Scenes of the Siege of the City of Augsburg” of 1705 where the decisive front figure – as such then here, too – is a general of the besieging troops giving orders, to whom the addressee pays his respect by uncovered head. Nothing of this here anymore, also the position of the latter’s horse made independent to now laterally. And only in the drawing a further horseman is placed rectangularly to the left. And this rectangular combination of two corresponds in its turn with the two horsemen in the school sheet Teuscher 296 of a trainer showing an examinee practicing the walk.

The horseman placed to the right of the general in the siege plate finally appears in the drawing shifted laterally right behind this, both times quite, though differently, covered. So in the etching he is visible from the chest only, in the drawing already from the seat. His horse there with almost complete head & front up to belly height, here, however, covered up to short below of the mane-line.

Also graphically treated reservedly the set-back group of three of the right picture field reminding only in traces of the correspondingly placed two officers of the print. Its hilly background with silhouette of Augsburg here only by simple wash as picture technical and additionally higher close-range scenery.

Generally the composition of the picture follows most different premises. There the main group accompanied by the direct train as center of the subject before the circle of siege in front of the partly burning town. Here a left-side determined detail-like fullness of picture of an elegant company with civilian train chatting with each other before the immediate setting-out as palpably mediated on the side of the horses. Between the scenes once & now there lies a whole generation.

The  second  one  of  the  drawings  presents itself by its optical reference to the first in composition, technique, size, and paper as pendant, supported also by the numbering at the back. Above all, however, it is dominated by the same “general”, though here in walk to the left straight ahead and in such a manner with visible sword. In the absence of a left-sided neighborhood he looks into the distance there. And contrary to the general of the siege-scenery riding a piebald here then

quoting  Wouwerman  mounted  on  a  white  horse  on  both  sheets

as mark of dominance. Rectangular to him a lady in the side-saddle whose outstretched left, but only this, quotes the sutler riding a mule of the siege-etching Teuscher 35. And quite marginally the outstretched right of the horseman outside left reminds of that of the left horseman in Teuscher 32.

To the knowledge here, agreed with after review of photos by Dr. Krämer, custodian em. of the Municipal Art Collections Augsburg and curator of the above 1998 Rugendas exhibition, per oral utterance, at the same time remarking that, as here, the closely and prominantly seen group also were a characteristics of the late paintings, they are according to all the above

So Mrs. Held (op. cit., p. 127) reminds of horse pairs of equal composition and size from the end of the 1690s partly known from contemporary after-engravings only, whose careful execution, especially also with regard to wash and “(ground zones) indicated by shadow and lines” – the second one of present drawings treated with great variety – would suggest the hypothesis of autonomous works.

On this Gode Krämer op. cit., page 26/I:

“ … there  are  only  few  autonomous  drawings  of  him .

Almost his complete work of drawings is virtually serving, consists of studies, sketches, re-drawings, copy and proof drawings by own hand, which prepare own paintings, etchings, and mezzotints or printed works of other artists. ”

And when with respect to the quality of his painting Held mentions “his already early marked talent for

tender , atmospheric  moods

which mitigates the (there) martial content of his pictorial themes” (p. 142), so just likewise present drawings are determined by

the  softness  of  their  brush  technique ,

deliberately still raised by the toned paper ground. The latter then also partially absorbs the browning particularly at the back of about 4 cm of the respective right margin of the subject as well as with the second sheet 3 cm at the lower margin front side and conveys as not improper patina of three lively centuries. Otherwise of impeccable final freshness.

That these Rugendas in addition are of  civil  picture content inevitably makes them additionally wall-efficient (averted from the sun!) for today’s horse-fancier and with regard to the due to the period in their majority martial scenes especially desirable for the collector. For, so Held, op. cit., page 127:

“ Rugendas’ interest in horses is … (just) not only conditioned by the martial theme of his work. It is also consequence of a hippological interest growing since the 16^th century that manifests itself especially in the 17^th century in numerous illustrated textbooks on the ‘high school’. Now and then these were illustrated by well-known battle painters as e. g. Charles Parocell  ”

For  the  latter  then  here + today 

making them so precious.

Without glass + frame
Offer no. 15,181

Verschuring, Hendrik (Gorkum 1627 – near Dordrecht 1690). Resting Hunters, partly dismounted, with their hounds in front of an inn, before of that landlord and landlady welcome a carriage and pair. One of the hunters has his falcon on the right running into the landscape, enthusiastically accompanied by his dog. But also the rider in front left shown from back should hold a falcon on his left. The sketched mountain chain in the distance localizing probably the Roman Campagna. Brush-drawing in several shades of grey wash and a little black over traces of black chalk. Inscribed at lower left with the grey brush: H. verschuring. f.. 250 x 348 mm.

lower right and on the added former old mounting resp. (Lugt 1041 b + c. The former was used until 1920, the other since 1921.

“ They  figure  on  the  better  sheets  only ”

Also technically a characteristic pictorial work of this Wouwerman influenced master, whose own horses found their followers especially among the artists in northern Germany (see Gerson, Ausbreitung und Nachwirkung der holländischen Malerei des 17. Jhdts., 2^nd ed., p. 220). Verschuring himself also unmistakable in his dogs and the easiness of the composition.

According to Houbraken with eight years already pupil of an otherwise unknown Dirk (?) Govaertsz in Gorkum or probably also Utrecht, then there of Jan Both, famed for his Italian landscapes and from 1646 to 1654 own stay in Italy:

“ Of the many Dutch artists under the Italian sun can be named only the more known. In the forties we meet in Rome … H. Verschuring …

Hendrik Verschuring stayed for about ten years (1647/57) in Rome, and when he then wanted to return home via Paris he there met the son of the mayor ‘Maarzeveen’, who induced him to a second Italian voyage. So three more years were added ”

(Gerson op. cit. p. 165 f.).

Subsequently in Gorkum again he found his end in a seastorm near Dordrecht.

“ … produced many drawings, … mostly washed … These leaves are dealt with many wit and served the artist as studies for his paintings ”

(Nagler), in which he had in the small sizes

(L. J. Bol, Holländische Maler des 17. Jhdts. nahe den großen Meistern, 1969, p. 266).

Especially in the heaven mostly only fine foxing, but hardly disturbing since corresponding with the paper tone. – Set into an acidfree passepartout with gilt stamped artist’s name and dates.

Without glass + frame
Offer no. 28,863  /  price on request

Ridinger, Johann Elias (Ulm 1698 – Augsburg 1767). An Old Horse’s Upper Jaw-Bone as seen from Below. Fully executed study in grey and brown water colours over graphite. Inscribed by old hand in brown ink below left: Oberer Pferdekiefer (Upper Jaw-Bone). Ca. 1765. 257 x 145 mm.

Fully  accomplished  study  on fine slightly toned laid paper with large watermark Rope-waving Acrobat on a Globe balancing on a Platform, similar to Heawood 1364 + 1365, but a bit larger and much finer and more detailed. The paper itself corresponding to those Dutch papers Ridinger used only

“ for  the  fine  illumination ”  for  the  colored  works

since „it is the most decent and best for such a task“ as he states in the preface of his “Main Colours of the Horses”.

Left of the inscription traces of deleted date or year (…9?). – Below right inscribed by old hand with pencil: Joh. Elias Riedinger (sic!) f. – Regarding the “e” possibly by the hand of Jolle or earlier corresponding to the erroneous spelling spread during the first half of the 19th century and beyond.

Verso traces of previous mounting at the corners and narrow stripes at the middle of side margins. A needle-pin-small puncture restored and nearly invisible from the front. Otherwise absolutely fresh. – Set into an acid-free passepartout with gilt stamped artist’s name and dates.

Unparalleled  within  the  Weigel  drawing  portfolios  described  by  Thienemann

and also not among the about 1849 works comprehended in the 829-lot Ridinger section in Weigel’s Catalogue of left drawings of 1869. Just so missing in the inventory of 234 drawings of a “Fine Collection of Drawings … by Joh. El. Ridinger from the Possession of a well-known Collector” sold at auction in 146 lots by Wawra in Vienna on May 19 ff, 1890 resp.

Only the legendary album of the Counts of Faber-Castell containing 95 drawings – for the most part purchased about 1830 directly from the Ridinger heirs and thus not gone through Weigel’s hands – contained an “Animal Jaw Drawing” dated 1718 as together the earliest one of the album. Thus  thematically  in  the  Ridinger œuvre  nearly  matchless ,

completely  executed  anatomical  study

of extraordinarily artistic and collectable fascination, only in the age picking up again what 45 years before the youth once occupied and now wished to be formulated as

The  Horse-Buyer’s  First  Sight

For besides the jaw of Faber-Castell’s – not described in detail – there is in Ridinger’s complete œuvre of drawings as well as engravings nothing to be traced that could be drawn up for comparison regarding format and richness of details.

The  several  parts  and  areas  of  the  jaw-bone  numbered  up  to  37

comparable to the drawings for the first plates of the „Main Colours“ on possible omission of the numbers 1, 3, 6, 8 + 29.

The scientific theme of just this drawing – far more than at the studies of the sketchbooklets largely to be understood as artistic exercises and copies – quite according to his efforts to impart always and above all knowledge, too.

much more than hunting in all its rich variety, culminating in the posthumously completed suite of the „Wondrous Stags and Other Animals“ with the unusual forms of antlers and other variations of nature and those famous coloured works that the master himself saw as the zenith of his enormous work: the „Kingdom of the Animals“ the already mentioned “Main Colours” and the coloured 2^nd edition of the “Monkeys”, Th. 541-550.

when the preparations for the coloured works were advanced enough to purchase the Dutch paper that is not to be found in any of the other works. Relating to the papers Heawood quotes for the first one – “Amsterdam, c. 1769” used for Tirion’s Nieuwe Atlas, the maps of which, however, dating from 1753. The second in the fly leaves of an Ortelius in the British Library, and with the addition ZOONEN in an Ortelius, too, of the Royal Geographic Society. Besides these Heawood mentions a quite similar watermark used by Van der Ley about 1770.

Boguslav  Jolle  started soon after 1870 to collect drawings which he brought together on many travels at home and abroad over the next two decades. If he took over the jaw-bone from the Domela Nieuwenhuis collection (Lugt 356b) as the source of a large part of his German drawings must kept open by now. His own 1567-lot collection was sold at auction by Helbing in Munich in 1895. Whether the Horse’s Upper Jaw-Bone was among them and whether Helbing took it over for himself (see his Ridinger catalogue above) cannot be traced by now, too. All in all beside the jaw of 1718 here then and now his

Without glass + frame
Offer no. 28,861  /  price on request

Ridinger, Johann Elias (Ulm 1698 – Augsburg 1767). The Trotting. Open place in front of the ruins of an once imposing estate with group of four horses and six grooms under supervision of the equerry. Finely bordered pen and brown ink with grey wash. (1722.) 214 x 340 mm.

The original drawing before being side-inverted for the preparation of the etching for plate 3 – Th. 608 – of the first riding school as the wonderful evidence of the perfection of style Ridinger had already reached in the early age of 24 as stated repeatedly already with regard to others of his early works.

So Nebehay 88,2 in respect of the 1721 drawing to Th. 1: “Hence this drawing is of importance for the knowledge of his style already perfect in young years.” And generally Thienemann for the capabilities after his return – not before 1719 – from the three-year stay in the house of Baron/Count Metternich in Regensburg: “… so that all connoisseurs admired him for his skill and power reached as well in historic as animal pieces.” And in such a way corresponding with

“ In art great caliber is present in its perfection from the beginning .

Also  the  first  works  of  an  artist  have  this  caliber

already in themselves , in their originality , in their perfect shape . There is nothing of that development of the artist of which there is so much speaking .

There  is  not  any  development  of  the  great  caliber  in  art “

(Gershom Scholem in his 1958 laudatory on Samuel Josef Agnon quoted after Itta Shedletzky in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung of March 7, 2007).

The etchings for the 23-sheet-suite, however, were done by Johann Daniel Hertz and Johann Balthasar Probst for Jeremias Wolff, all situated in Augsburg, who published the suite in 1722. Signature and date of the drawings – with these now 18 leaves are known to have overcome to us – to be found on the title: JOH: ELIAS: RIDINGER: invenit et delineavit Anno 1722. Manner and typing of the inscription quite according to that of an Alexander-the-Great-drawing of 1723.

The scenery, dominated by the horse trotting at the longe on the right, subtitled in the etching “In many the pace is correct …”.

While on the left a horseman only mounts his horse, held by the groom, the one and only already mounted one trains his own, good to look in the middle distance beyond the longe.

of 1913 (Lankheit 839, 27 x 29.3 cm).

Worked by Marc in the year of the “Tower of the Blue Horses” as one of the icons of the modernity, “the richest (year of his) creativeness” (Christian von Holst). And along with the simultaneous woodcut “Lion Hunting after Delacroix” the work stands for that time of that

“ well is to speak of a literal entry of the rider into the œuvre of Marc … The animalizing of art aimed at again and again by Marc by abstracting insight into the horse’s and the remaining animal world’s nature … now tips over repeatedly

into  the  revival  of  the  unity  of  horse  and  rider

… He presents himself as „Blue Rider“ by a postcard to Else Lasker-Schüler of 1912, who stands beside and behind resp. of his horse and blends into a unity with him (from the view here in anticipation of the „powerful rhythmic depiction“ of the „Riding Scene after Ridinger“) … The hound below right (on the latter) which may remind the onlooker rather of a hunting scene, is owed likewise to Ridinger’s “Riding Art” (comp. the corresponding hounds on the sheets 5, 18 and 22). It looks back as it would see where his master, the rider, stays away. An eager atmosphere of departure determines the scene

making  of  Ridinger’s  background  figure  of  the  rider

the  proper  protagonist .

The rider and the horse form a unity in their extreme impulse of motion. Although

with  Ridinger  Marc  picks  up  a  specialist  of  the trained  horse

it does not go for him on behalf of an artificial symbiosis of man-animal articulating itself especially by training of the horse in the artificial paces”

(Andreas Schalhorn). And

(von Holst).

But by which in regard of Ridinger the matter doesn’t rest by no means. For already his oil “Playing Weasels” – Hoberg-Janssen 144 with ills. – worked two years before, 1911, reveals the knowledge of quite several Ridinger coppers from entirely different sets. Marc shows two weasels, of which the one, bowed over a bough, looks down upon the other sitting in raised attitude. The foliage besides of an eccentricity as in this ostensible density used by him only still on the two “Acts under Trees”, H.-J. 143, of the same year. For the thematic primer detonation stands Ridinger’s small sized sheet “The Weasels”, Th. 479, of 1740 as sheet 89 of the set “Design of Several Animals”. Also here two playing ones, but both on the earth in completely different surroundings. The latter Marc splitted up. And took the attitude of the two animals from sheet 86 of the set, the two pine martens Th. 476 (available here also its pendant with the two beech martens Th. 475). The young one of them, bowing over a low bough like at Marc and looking at the dam standing on the hind paws against the trunk, baiting with a captured bird. But the bizarre foliage – and as such one Sälzle characterized it expressly in his 1980 edition of the preparatory drawings to the following set – as rather rarer for Ridinger, too, he took over from sheet 19, Th. 181, of the concurrent suite of the “Illustration of the Fair Game with the Respective Traces and Scents” with the marten on the tree at the same attitude and a weasel on the ground shown, however, neutrally.

Thus  Marc  formulated  his  „Playing Weasels“  just  so  by  means  of  three  Ridinger  copies  as the latter on his part his “The Amusement of the Shepherds” after Watteau, Th.-Stillfried 1397, composed from four models of the French. That finally the foliage as more typical for Ridinger was not unfamiliar to Marc shows the right group of trees of his forest picture „The Würm near Pipping“ from 1902/03, H.-J. 15 with ills. By the way a lithograph of the same name has been preceded to the oil of his „Playing Weasels“ in 1909/10.

But also the par force scenery on the watercolor “Ried Castle” worked one year later – Holst, ills. 11, p. 29 – stands for a further example of Marc’s occupation with Ridinger,

which  in  this  plurality  has  been  missed  till  now .

The quotes from Christian von Holst (Ed.), Franz Marc – (Horses). Catalogue of the 2000 exhibition of the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart – special issue 2003 – , pp. 122, 250 f. + 165 f. with illustrations 151 f., 208 + 9. – See i. a., too, Franz (Ed.), Franz Mark – (Powers of Nature, Works) 1912-1915. Catalogue of the exhibition in Munich + Münster, 1993, nos. 138 f. with ills. pp. 300 f.

The ruins reminding at Ridinger of southernly patterns and thus surely a reverence to Italy to where this was on the point of going to during his apprenticeship at Ulm only a few years ealier.

Although Ridinger created five riding schools with 111 etchings altogether, one has to go back to Weigel’s inheritance listed in the 1869 Catalogue of a Collection of Original Drawings including a Special Section “Johann Elias Ridinger’s Bequest in Drawings” to find a few (12)  painterly  drawings  belonging to this part of his rich œuvre, partly dated 1744 to 1760 (nos. 816-827).

The 19-sheet lot 828 may well have consisted of studies just as in view of riding schools no. 318 with its 305 leaves “Studies, Outlining(s) and executed Drawings of Horses and their Races, Riding School, in black and red chalk resp., pen and ink, of the years 1717 to 1760”. Otherwise the works in question would surely have been included within the section of “Riding School” of lots 816 ff.

Also within the 234 drawings contained in 146 lots of the “Fine Collection of Drawings and Engravings by Joh. El. Ridinger of the Possession of a renown Collector” sold at the Wawra auction in Vienna on May 19 ff, 1890 not one painterly drawing on this theme is to be found.

According to our admittedly not complete but comprehensive archive there are only those bare preparatory drawings and studies which appeared single or in groups on the market since Weigel. As a more comprehensive collection at last a lot of chalk drawings of which 26 belonged to the Small Riding School of 1760/61 traded hereself in 1987.

This only interupted by two earlier events, followed by the one here:

In 1986 “Prince Johannes of Thurn und Taxis contributed five drawings for Ridinger’s New Riding School for the tombola of the Ball of the Press in Bonn. This prize was the only one not entered in the ball’s almanack with its worth. “Connoisseurs therefore assumed that

(Bonner General-Anzeiger May 26, 1986).

Five years later a set of 16 completely executed original drawings in the same direction as the etchings of the 23-leaved New Riding Skills of 1722 debuted with an estimation of 360,000 marks at an auction. All mounted at the beginning of the 19^th century and fancily bordered on the mounting paper in black ink, on the sides additionally with a  line  of  horseshoes  crescending  from  top  and  bottom . This finally mounted on a wooden frame and than framed in black and bronze frame.

This stock counted up to the recent time at least 18 works, but was decimated by two by way of separation. These – see the following item 28,072 – presented in the same kind as described above. For more timeless presentation the black and bronze frames have been removed (but are still available, of course), the drawings themselves set into acidfree passepartouts with gilt stamped artist’s name und dates, covering also the additional edging as being not originally intended by Ridinger.

In such a way then are

Painterly  Ridingschool-Drawings  Paramount  Ridinger-Rarities .

The condition of the one said here is quite fine. The tender edging not any more covering in all places, here and there somewhat cut away also. The almost uniform slight browness in no way a nuisance to the general impression. That the plasticity was diminished a bit – supposedly by influence of light – attracting attention only by comparison with the parallel drawing. And generally enthusing the vigour of the drawing itself mirroring the youthfulness of the artist himself.

The virginity of both the drawings offered here as well as that other part offered formerly can be supposed as being a lot more ancient than back to Weigel. Just as other works of the early twenties Ridinger did not engrave himself, e. g. for the group of Alexander and Pharaoh, for which the drawings cannot be traced neither with Weigel, who took over the artistic estate in 1830, nor otherwise, the drawings for the Riding School of 1722 seem to have been passed over to the publisher. Later on they obviously went their own way without touching the documented market. To this

attraction  of  being  preservated  extraordinarily

comes – since nevertheless artistically complete – the fascination of great earlyness accompanied by being embedded within the evolution of cultural history:

“ Art history looks at Ridinger not only as the perfectionist of the hunting engraving of the 18^th century, but  also  the  masterly  interpreter  of  the  depiction  of  the  rider  and  the  horse …

It should … be remembered that the pure artistic interest in the horse is a main part of western art history since antiquity, since the origin of the Parthenon frieze … Only in the renaissance the (equestrian art) flourished with new liveliness. First in the frescos of Benozzo Gozzoli and Vittorio Carpaccio, in the drawings of Pisanello and Leonardo da Vinci … It was reserved to the Dutch to develop masterly realism in depicting the horse …

With this we are at the preconditions for the art of Ridinger. It can be assumed that he became acquainted with Dutch horse pictures in Augsburg. They were available in engravings and were sometimes copied as well. From such models which might have been mediated to him by his tutor Rugendas and from the indepth study of the animals theirselves he developed his quite personal mastery in depicting the horse.

One  feels  the  pleasure  about viewing the living creature, about the harmonic concurrence of anatomy and movement, about the inner symmetry of horse and rider, last but not least also by the elegance of attitude characterizing all engravings of Ridinger ”

(Herbert Schindler in the introduction of the 1975 facsimile edition of the Small Riding School (an exemplaire de luxe of the latter here in stock).

If there is the question of elegance then there should also be mentioned Karl Sälzle, who in 1980 prefaced the edition of the facsimile of drawings for the Fair Game set by saying:

To this now then the chance here. In absolute quality ,

Without glass + frame
Offer no. 28,071  /  price on request

Ridinger, Johann Elias (Ulm 1698 – Augsburg 1767). The Redop at the Wall right. Wide place with a group of four riders, of which one redops with the assistance of an instructor and a groom. In the middle another instructor bringing a groom before the equerry entering the scene from the portal of a ruin. In the front a boar hound following the redop, closely beside another one standing, as not accidentally, see below. Pen and brown ink with grey wash with slight pencil sketch in the upper left. (1722.) 210 x 336 mm.

Here now the instruction of the redop, described in the etching as “In the saddle one shall pose straight and upright …”.

The ruins reminding again of southernly the reverence to Italy quoted already above.

Intentionally in any case the boar hounds as we find such, obviously thought as trademark, also on the sheets of his Alexander cycle of the same early years. So such one chases along in the battle turmoil of the “Siege of the Capital Halicarnassos” (Th. 917) as well as one swims along on the “Tigris Crossing” (Th. 918). And “Ridinger hounds” take part then, too, on the 1723 drawing “Alexander at the Hyphasis in the Indian Punjab in autumn 326 BC”. By the way placed always next to the signature.

The condition at first glance dominated by a wipe-trace left of the ruins which irrespective of an undermixed slight green hue might have been caused by the artist himself since the sketch of a horse shimmers through. Thus granting

In the upper part of this wipe small outbreaks, perhaps caused by a worm. Additionally a small, nearly invisible discolouration accompanied by a small wormhole at the right margin. A small brown spot in the lower middle and tiny foxing in the heaven of no interest. The drawing itself of wonderful plasticity. And generally enthusing the vigour of the drawing itself mirroring the youthfullness of the artist himself.

Without glass + frame
Offer no. 28,072  /  price on request

„ im Internet habe ich in Ihrem Katalog das vorgenannte Werkverzeichnis … gefunden …

Mit Interesse habe ich auch Ihren offenen Brief an die Herausgeber der Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung vom 24.7.2003 gelesen, zumal ich (bei früherer Gelegenheit) … mir … von der Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung den Vorwurf des ‚Kulturglobalisten‘ gefallen lassen mußte … “

(Herr A. G., 8. Dezember 2003)