The Waterfalls at Terni

1779 · Private collection

landscape

Hackert's output shows how his landscapes, which initially suggest the Baroque, become increasingly "classical". However, unlike other contemporaries, who dismissed him in contempt as a "veduta painter" and probably also because he made no secret of his commercial success, Hackert remained faithful to topographic accuracy in his landscapes. This greatly appealed to his buyers who wanted to take their experience of Italy home with them.

About the Artist

Jacob Philipp Hackert

1737 – 1807

German landscape painter, part of a family of painters, active in Italy from 1768. He studied in Berlin under the French painter Le Sueur, who taught him in the classical Baroque style of Dutch landscape, but when he moved to Rome he became one of the "Roman Germans" to turn to Poussin and apply the Neoclassical principles to landscape painting. In 1786 he became court painter to Ferdinand IV of Naples. He was a sensitive upholder of the ideal landscape tradition of Claude, which he seasoned with touches of Romanticism . Much of his prolific output was devoted to views of famous sites, which were eagerly sought by foreign visitors to Italy. He came from a family of artists and often collaborated with his brother Johann Gottlieb Hackert (1744-73). Goethe met Hackert in 1787 and wrote his biography in 1811.

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