Johann David Passavant (18 September 1787 – 17 August 1861) was a German

painter Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ai ...

curator A curator (from la, cura, meaning "to take care") is a manager or overseer. When working with cultural organizations, a curator is typically a "collections curator" or an "exhibitions curator", and has multifaceted tasks dependent on the parti ...

and

artist An artist is a person engaged in an activity related to creating art, practicing the arts, or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse refers to a practitioner in the visual arts only. However, th ...

.Dictionary of art
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Biography

Passavant was born in 1787 in

Frankfurt Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , "Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on its na ...

am Main,

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. His interest in the arts was evident by an early correspondence with the artist

Franz Pforr Franz Pforr (5 April 1788 – 16 June 1812) was a painter of the German Nazarene movement. Biography He was born in Frankfurt am Main. He received his earliest training from his father, the painter Johann Georg Pforr (1745–98), and his uncl ...

(1788–1812). He moved to

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

in 1809 to further his business interests. He returned to Frankfurt in 1824 where art history evermore occupied his interest. His ''Tour of a German artist in England'' (1833 in German; 1836 translated into English by

Lady Eastlake Elizabeth, Lady Eastlake (17 November 1809 – 2 October 1893), born Elizabeth Rigby, was an English author, art critic and art historian, who made regular contributions for the ''Quarterly Review''. She is known not only for her writing but also ...

) remains a significant source for art historians, as do his catalogues of

old master print An old master print is a work of art produced by a printing process within the Western tradition. The term remains current in the art trade, and there is no easy alternative in English to distinguish the works of "fine art" produced in printmakin ...

s, whose numbering is still followed by some collections. In the year 1839 he became Inspektor (curator) of the Städelsches Kunstinstitut in Frankfurt. There he acquired important works in the prints and drawing area, mounted exhibitions, and taught. Passavant developed the three principal genres of art writing important for the next two centuries: the scholarly artistic biography, the aesthetic travelogue, and the reference survey. As a historian, he followed the romantic tradition. His paintings include ''Holy Family with Elizabeth and John'' 1819, Staadtische Galerie im Staadelschen Kunstinstitut,

and ''A Visitation, Christ and the Samaritan'' c. 1820, Neue Nationalgalerie,

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

. He died in 1861 in Frankfurt am Main.

References

External links

Short biography and bibliography

Art as Existence
Gabriele Guercio - The MIT Press, 2006 {{DEFAULTSORT:Passavant, Johann David 1787 births 1861 deaths 19th-century German painters 19th-century German male artists German male painters Artists from Frankfurt Nazarene painters Burials at Frankfurt Main Cemetery