Artists Biography
Friedrich Johannes Voltz
German 1817 - 1886Sometimes, he would paint the cows in Schleich's landscapes. He found employment as a lithographer but continued to paint Bavarian landscapes through the 1830s.
While visiting the Netherlands in 1841, he saw Der Junge Stier, a painting by Paulus Potter and, from there on, devoted himself primarily to animal painting. During a tour of Belgium and the Netherlands in 1846, he absorbed the style of the Dutch Stimmungsmalern ("mood painters"). He experimented with lighting, producing warm golden colors and cool silvery tones. In his later paintings, the animals are virtually treated as still-lifes, with the dramatic effects created by the play of light.
He died rather unexpectedly when an apparently innocuous foot ailment turned into a serious illness. Voltz was considered the greatest German animal painter until the appearance of Anton Braith. His paintings are on display in the Neue Pinakothek and the National Gallery (Berlin), among many others.