(Vienna 1756–1811)
Two still lifes of flowers with grapes and a bird’s nest,
oil on panel, each 79 x 58 cm, framed (2)

Provenance:
Private collection, Vienna

We are grateful to Ursula J. A. de Goede-Broug of the RKD, for suggesting the attribution to Drechsler on the basis of photographs.

Ursula de Goede-Broug dates the present paintings to the first decade of the 19th century and compares them to a signed still life of flowers dated to 1807. As G. and M. Frodl point out in their book about flower painting in Vienna (see Vienna, 2010, p. 161), Drechsler, who had been trained as a porcelain painter at the Vienna Porcelain factory, ‘took up oil and watercolour painting in the 1780s and in his flower pictures achieved superior quality by harking back to Dutch models, particularly to Rachel Ruysch and Jan van Huysum. His paintings, whose realism of detail and elegant arrangements influenced an entire generation of Viennese flower painters, were also coveted by collectors beyond Austria’. Drechsler, who soon became Vienna’s most important flower painter, was extremely successful. G. and M. Frodl: “However, no one was a match for him when it came to the delicate lightness of his brushwork, which became Drechsler’s “signature”. The light-coloured appearance of his bouquets of flowers does not rely on […] the “classics” of the 17th century, but on the late phase of Dutch flower painting, such as on Jan van Huysum and the Dutch artists of the late 18th century who had caused a furore in Paris, like Jan van Os and the Van Spaendonck brothers’. In 1807, Drechsler was appointed head of the Academy’s newly established Department of Flower, Fruit and Animal Painting, which also included a ‘School of Flower Drawing’. During this decade he arrived at the acme of his career. His works, by which he established a benchmark for this specifically Viennese genre, mark the first heyday of Viennese flower painting.