Friedrich Bernhard Westphal (5 October 1803, Schleswig – 24 December 1844) was a German-Danish

genre painter Genre painting (or petit genre), a form of genre art, depicts aspects of everyday life by portraying ordinary people engaged in common activities. One common definition of a genre scene is that it shows figures to whom no identity can be attached ...

and illustrator. He was also known by his nickname Fritz Westphal.

Life

Thorvaldsens modtagelse på Toldboden, 17 September1838

From 1821 to 1826 he studied at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen alongside Carl Andreas August Goos, Hermann Wilhelm Bissen, Harro Harring and the Norwegian landscape painter Thomas Fearnley. In 1823 he took Fearnley on a hike through Schleswig-Holstein. In 1827 he returned to his birthplace and produced a lithograph of J. F. Fritz's 'Four Seasons' sequence in

Flensburg Flensburg (; Danish, Low Saxon: ''Flensborg''; North Frisian: ''Flansborj''; South Jutlandic: ''Flensborre'') is an independent town (''kreisfreie Stadt'') in the north of the German state of Schleswig-Holstein. Flensburg is the centre of the ...

. In 1828 he studied in

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...

and from May 1829 alongside Fearnley in

Dresden Dresden (, ; Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; wen, label=Upper Sorbian, Drježdźany) is the capital city of the German state of Saxony and its second most populous city, after Leipzig. It is the 12th most populous city of Germany, the fourth larg ...

, where he befriended the genre painter

Joseph Petzl Joseph Petzl (23 December 1803, Munich – 23 April 1871, Munich) was a German genre painter of the Biedermeier school. He has left a collection of drawings documenting his everyday life, love affairs and travels, now in the Münchner Stadtmu ...

– both Westphal and Petzl recorded their artistic, romantic and everyday lives in diary-like drawings. Petzl was a major influence on Westphal, who began painting small genre works in the

Biedermeier The ''Biedermeier'' period was an era in Central Europe between 1815 and 1848 during which the middle class grew in number and the arts appealed to common sensibilities. It began with the Congress of Vienna at the end of the Napoleonic Wars in ...

style, sometimes reflecting recent historical events such as the

Tyrol Tyrol (; historically the Tyrole; de-AT, Tirol ; it, Tirolo) is a historical region in the Alps - in Northern Italy and western Austria. The area was historically the core of the County of Tyrol, part of the Holy Roman Empire, Austrian Emp ...

ese struggle against the

Austrian Empire The Austrian Empire (german: link=no, Kaiserthum Oesterreich, modern spelling , ) was a Central-Eastern European multinational great power from 1804 to 1867, created by proclamation out of the realms of the Habsburgs. During its existence, ...

and the Greeks suffering from cholera epidemics. He also painted scenes from Danish contemporary history, such as

Bertel Thorvaldsen Bertel Thorvaldsen (; 19 November 1770 – 24 March 1844) was a Danes, Danish and Icelanders, Icelandic Sculpture, sculptor medallist, medalist of international fame, who spent most of his life (1797–1838) in Italy. Thorvaldsen was born in ...

's return to Copenhagen (1838), Frederick VI's funeral procession (1840) and the anointing of

Christian VIII Christian VIII (18 September 1786 – 20 January 1848) was King of Denmark from 1839 to 1848 and, as Christian Frederick, King of Norway in 1814. Christian Frederick was the eldest son of Hereditary Prince Frederick, a younger son of King Frederi ...

(1840). Aftershocks of the 1830 French

July Revolution The French Revolution of 1830, also known as the July Revolution (french: révolution de Juillet), Second French Revolution, or ("Three Glorious ays), was a second French Revolution after the first in 1789. It led to the overthrow of King ...

in the

Kingdom of Saxony The Kingdom of Saxony (german: Königreich Sachsen), lasting from 1806 to 1918, was an independent member of a number of historical confederacies in Napoleonic through post-Napoleonic Germany. The kingdom was formed from the Electorate of Saxon ...

caused both Petzl and Westphal to move to Schleswig. In summer 1832 Westphal went on a hike through Norway and from 1837 onwards he began to produce illustrations for books by the Danish writers Christian Winther,

Heinrich Hertz Heinrich Rudolf Hertz ( ; ; 22 February 1857 – 1 January 1894) was a German physicist who first conclusively proved the existence of the electromagnetic waves predicted by James Clerk Maxwell's Maxwell's equations, equations of electrom ...

and

Carsten Hauch Johannes Carsten Hauch (12 May 1790 – 4 March 1872) was a Danish poet. Biography Hauch was born in Frederikshald in Norway. His father was the Danish bailiff in Smaalenene, Frederik Hauch. His mother, Karen Tank was sister of Norwegian shi ...

. Hoping to travel to Italy, Westphal returned to Copenhagen to compete for the academy's Great Gold Medal, whose prize was a scholarship to go to Rome, but lost the 1837, 1839 and 1841 competitions for it. He then became a "costumier" at the Royal Danish Theatre in Copenhagen. After his death his sister Sophie tried to keep his memory alive by publishing "Genre-Bilder in Bildern und Tönen von Fritz Westphal" in 1852 – it contained 32 of his poems and 10 of his lithographs.

Works

* ''Portrait of Westphal's master baker'', c. 1825. 22 x 18 cm. Stiftung Schleswig-Holsteinische Landesmuseen, Schloss Gottorf, Schleswig. * ''Sappho'', c. 1828. Stiftung Schleswig-Holsteinische Landesmuseen,

Schloss Gottorf Gottorf Castle (german: Schloss Gottorf, da, Gottorp Slot, Low German: ''Gottorp'') is a castle and estate in the city of Schleswig, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. It is one of the most important secular buildings in Schleswig-Holstein, and ...

, Schleswig.
''Winter''
drawing, c. 1828. Städt. Museum Schleswig.
''Self portrait''
c. 1828. Städt. Museum Schleswig.
''The Möwenpreis''
1836. 82 x 101,5 cm. Städt. Museum Schleswig. * ''David Playing the Harp for Saul'', 1837. Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts
''King Valdemar testing Little Else''
1838. 82 x 97,5 cm.

National Gallery of Denmark The National Gallery of Denmark ( da, Statens Museum for Kunst, also known as "SMK", literally State Museum for Art) is the Danish national gallery, located in the centre of Copenhagen. The museum collects, registers, maintains, researches and han ...

* ''Christ at Emmaus'', altarpiece, 1838. Aastrup Church
''Thorvaldsen's Return to Copenhagen in 1838''
c. 1840. 71,5 x 100 cm. Thorvaldsen-Museum, Copenhagen.

Bibliography (in German)

* Ernst Schlee: ''Leben und Treiben im alten Schleswig.'' Flensburg 1972. * Ulrich Schulte-Wülwer: ''Der Maler Friedrich Bernhard Westphal.'' In: Nordelbingen – Beiträge zur Kunst- und Kulturgeschichte Schleswig-Holsteins, Bd. 61, 1992, S. 65–110. * Ulrich Schulte-Wülwer: ''Gezeichnete Tagebücher zur Zeit des Biedermeier – Fritz Westphal und Joseph Petzl.'' Heide 1993,
Westphal on GBV
{{DEFAULTSORT:Westphal, Friedrich Bernhard 1803 births 1844 deaths 19th-century painters of historical subjects 19th-century Danish painters Danish male painters 19th-century German painters 19th-century German male artists Danish lithographers 19th-century Danish illustrators German lithographers German illustrators People from Schleswig, Schleswig-Holstein German genre painters German history painters Danish genre painters Danish history painters 19th-century Danish male artists