21. Joseph Roos (Rosa)
(1726-1805)

Vast Mountainous Landscape with Herds and Herdsmen

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Roos, Vast Mountainous Landscape with Herds

Vast Mountainous Landscape with Herds and Herdsmen

Drawing in soft pencil and brown wash on laid paper with a Honig watermark, 252 x 357 mm., signed in pencil “Rosa f. 1759”, and inscribed by another hand in brown ink “No. 17”, ex collection: p.m. (not in Lugt). Roos, or Rosa, came from a family of painters, being the grandson of Rosa da Tivoli, the nephew of Rosa di Napoli and the son of Gaetano Rosa. Born in Vienna, he became the director of the Imperial Academy there and most of his paintings are in Schonbrunn Palace in Vienna. He followed closely in the steps of his familial predecessors, spending time in Italy, but concentrating more on landscape per se, rather than the animals dwelling there. He was a superb draughtsman, as this drawing clearly shows, capturing the vastness of mountain scenery and the play of light and shadow with freedom and spontaneity and implying detail rather than notating it. The location of this scene is not specified. It could, in all probability, be Italy, but just as likely, Switzerland, Austria or even southern Germany. The drawing speaks of scenery, not nationality.

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