Monastery of San Francesco di Civitella in the Sabine Mountains

landscape

A native of Tyrol, Koch joined the Jacobins in revolutionary Strasbourg and conducted nature studies in the Swiss Alps before going to Rome, where he took classical art and literature as his guidelines. Gradually his approach developed from the pure landscape depictions of his Swiss watercolours to landscapes whose accessories and figures charged them with historical meaning. In art, as Koch put it, "history and nature...

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Monastery of San Francesco di Civitella in the Sabine Mountains

About the Artist

Joseph Anton Koch

1768 – 1839

Austrian painter, active mainly in Rome, where he settled in 1795. He was influenced by Carstens and worked with the Nazarenes on the decorations of the Casino Massimo (1825-29) in Rome, choosing Dante's Inferno for his subject, but is now best known for his landscapes. They were directly descended from the heroic and ideal landscape of Poussin, but have a distinctive Romantic flavour, particularly in his paintings of mountains.

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