The Cleveland Museum of Art

• Full conservation statement
  For this work on wove paper, Schnorr von Carolsfeld established the composition as a line drawing using a pale silvery-gray graphite pencil. Then to shade and strengthen the wooded area at the center of the composition and the two figures in the left foreground, he went over the graphite with pen and gray-black ink using outline and a regimented system of hatching and crosshatching with a strong right-handed directional. Establishing two focal points with a second darker medium—in this case one that resembles dark graphite—does not however overwhelm the more delicately rendered elements, including the cursorily drawn landscape and trees on the left and detailed architecture representing the Thomasschule on the right. A sure and steady hand is evident in the detailed and complex architectural structures; it is also apparent that many of their rectilinear elements were gone over with a graphite line applied with the aid of a straight edge. The figure bearing a likeness to the artist in his youth shows numerous corrections in graphite to the proper left arm, leg, and foot.
  
  Several observations bring up the possibility that Schnorr von Carolsfeld made this drawing with the aid of a camera lucida, an optical drawing instrument recommended for mastering perspective and topographical accuracy in landscape, as well as capturing likenesses for portraiture. (Sir William Hyde Wollaston’s popular prism camera lucida was invented in 1807.) With this instrument an initial sketch is made by tracing a virtual image reflected on paper. (The camera obscura, an earlier optical drawing aid still in use at this time, works by casting a real image onto a surface which then can be traced.)
  
  When working with the camera lucida artists often drew over the initial sketch with a second linear medium to correct, reinforce, and realize a more finished drawing, but in doing so many of the subtle and quirky clues inherent to the camera lucida line were lost. Clearly a good portion of this composition was gone over, aligning with this practice.
  
  Therefore, it is the unmodified line seen in the tree growth in left background and defining the middle grassy bank that arguably bears the most compelling evidence of the use of a camera lucida. This portion of the composition captures the habit of a traced line—specifically a line tracing a tenuous reflected image—to meander falteringly through a view with awkward starts and stops and illogical transitions.
• Provenance
  Eduard Cichorius [1819–1907], Dresden, Germany

  Professor Ludwig Schnorr von Carolsfeld [1877–1945], Berlin, the artist’s grandson

  ?-1945

  Carl Heumann [1886–1945], Chemnitz, Germany

  1945–57

  Carl Heumann Estate

  November 29, 1957

  (Carl Heumann posthumous collection sale, Stuttgarter Kunstkabinett, no. 320, sold to Erhard Göpel), 1957

  1957–66

  Erhard Göpel [1906–1966], Munich, Germany

  1966-?

  By descent to his wife, Barbara Göpel [1922–2017], Munich, Germany

  1994-2019

  Private Collection, Germany

  2019–22

  (Daxer & Marschall Kunsthandels, Munich, Germany, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH)

  2022-

  The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH,
• Citations
  Deutsche Landscaftskunst, 1750–1850: Zeichnungen und Aquarelle aus der Sammlung Heumann, Chemnitz. Exh. Cat. Breslau: Schlesisches Museum der Bildenden Künste, 1933. Mentioned no. 135

  Zeichenkunst der deutschen Romantik. Exh. Cat. Wiesbaden: Nassauisches Landesmusuem, 1937. Mentioned: 30, no. 282

  Göpel, Erhard. “Deutsche Künstler zeichnen in Leipzig.” Leipziger Jahrbuch 14 (1939). Mentioned p. 134–36

  Kunst des 18. und 19. Jahrhunderts: Sammlung Heumann, Chemnitz. Stuttgart: Stuttgarter Kunstkabinetts, 1957. Mentioned: p. 66, no. 320; Reproduced: pl. 18

  Göpel, Erhard. “Eine unbekannte Ansicht Leipzigs” Neue Lepipziger Zeitung 249, no. 6 (September 6, 1933). reproduced

  Mehnert, Karl Hein. “Eine wiederentdeckte Stadtansicht: Zur Ausstellung Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld im Museum der bildenden Künste.” Leipziger Blatter 27 (Spring 1994). Reproduced: p. 74; Mentioned: p. 75.

  Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld, 1794–1872. Exh. Cat. Leipzig: Museum der Bildenden Künste, 1994. Mentioned: 197–98, no. 27; Reproduced: p. 97
• Exhibition History
  Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld, 1794–1872. Museum der Bildenden Künste, Leipzig (March 26–May 23, 1994); Kunsthalle Bremen, Germany (June 5–July 31, 1994).

  Zeichenkunst der deutschen Romantik. Nassauisches Landesmusuem, Wiesbaden, Germany (May–mid-July 1937)

  Deutsche Landscaftskunst, 1750–1850: Zeichnungen und Aquarelle aus der Sammlung Heumann, Chemnitz. Schlesisches Museum der Bildenden Künste, Breslau, Poland (1933).
• Cite this Page
  {{cite web|title=View across the Moat towards the Thomasschule and the Thomaskirche in Leipzig|url=false|author=Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld|year=1817|access-date=23 April 2024|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}