Ridinger – Johann Georg Bergmüller (Türkheim, Swabia, 1688 – Augsburg 1762). IOH. ELIAS RIDINGER / Pictor et Scalptor (sic!) Augustanus / solertissimus Naturae Indag(ator) / ejusque in Animalium praeser(tim) / Delineatione Æmulator / felicissimus / natus Vlmae Suevorum / d. XVI. Febr. A.S. MDCXCVIII / Ars Artifici(s) Amic(us). Half-length portrait, sitting, with brushes + palette as medallion in easel mirror held by Diana sitting to the right, seeing before the artistic eye a royal stag already on the canvas as it lies together with a boar as Diana’s bag below a pedestal. Sitting on the latter and intimately turned to the master a hooded falcon together with lateral hawked heron as well as shot wild goose. And center below a Ridinger hound for sure. The whole set before woody background. Mezzotint by Johann Jacob Haid (Kleineislingen 1704 – Augsburg 1767). Inscribed: I. G. Bergmüller invent. / I. Iac. Haid ad vivum pinx. fecit et excud. A. V., otherwise as above. 15⅝ × 10½ in (39.7 × 26.7 cm).
Thienemann XX, 2; Schwarz, portraits, 3 + ills.; Le Blanc 94; Silesian Ridinger collection at Boerner XXXIX, 2057 ( “Esteemed fine sheet … Rare”, 1885 ! ); Reich auf Biehla 2 (1894); Helbing XXXIV (1900), 2; Schoeller Collection 523 ( “Very fine mezzotint … Rare”, 1921); Schwerdt III (1928), 133; Ridinger exhibition catalogs: Augsburg (1967) 81 + ills. 1 as well as 82; Kielce (1997) 1 + frontispiece; Darmstadt (1999) I.2 + ills. – Niemeyer, (The Vanitas Symbolism with Joh. El. R.) in L’Art Macabre 2 (2001), 94 ff.
Not in the Coppenrath Collection (1889/90) + at Rosenthal (1940).
Marvelous impression of this just optically already that great sheet with margins laterally 2 , top + below 2.5 cm wide as for the velvety mezzotint allowing by the way only smallest satisfying editions (Sandrart 1675: “50 or 60 … clean impressions”) expressly worth mentioning. – From the front only partially lightly noticeable weak lateral pleat on the level of the lower pedestal. The white margin only touched by a little smudging.
Offer no. 15,185 / price on application