Dictionary of


Art  &  Artist



 

Christoph Ludwig Agricola

 

Agricola Christoph Ludwig

(b Regensburg, 1667; d Regensburg, 1719).

German painter. He travelled to England, the Netherlands, France and Italy, working for longer periods in Rome, Naples and Augsburg. He was strongly influenced by French landscape painters active in Italy, such as Gaspard Dughet and Claude Lorrain. In Agricola’s paintings the balanced arrangement of the picturesque landscape elements creates a lucid pictorial structure, and unusual light effects, such as twilight or the darkness before a storm, are used to convey a particular mood. The small scale of his figures expresses the contrast between human frailty and the forces of nature. He painted with lively local colours, especially ochres and deep greens for the rich tones of earth and vegetation. The multicoloured costumes of his figural staffage provide pictorial accents and reveal the romantic orientation of his paintings. Scenes of country people at work, for example Landscape with a Millstone (Dresden, Gemäldegal. Alte Meister), express his yearning for a return to nature. Paintings representing the life of nomadic Orientals, such as Evening Landscape with Praying Turks (Brunswick, Herzog Anton Ulrich-Mus.), show an increasing interest in exotic motifs that may have been a consequence of the Turkish invasions of Central Europe. Agricola’s concept of landscape is an early expression of Baroque Romanticism in German painting. His pupils and followers included Christian Hilfgott Brand, Fabio Ceruti (d 1761) and Johann Alexander Thiele (1685–1752).

SCENE DE MARCHE