Lambert Krahe

William Lambert Krahe ( born March 15, 1712 Dusseldorf, † November 2, 1790 ) was a German painter and art collector.

Life

Born the son of an electoral clerk in Dusseldorf Krahe held since 1737, initially in the wake of his patron, the imperial ambassador Ferdinand von Plettenberg, in Rome. In the " Eternal City ", he formed together with Anton Raphael Mengs at Marco Benefial for artists, furthermore with Pierre Subleyras, worked as an art agent and began building his extensive art collection. From 1749 Krahe was supported by the Elector Carl Theodor of the Palatinate, on whose behalf he painted altarpieces for the 1752 Jesuit church in Mannheim. Since 1756, he headed the Düsseldorf Art Gallery, 1753 as the successor of the late painter Gerhard Joseph Karsch. The art-loving Cardinal Alessandro Albani had recommended him to do the elector. Later, the elector appointed him also to arrange the painting galleries in Mannheim and Munich new. 1761/62 he was commissioned for a ceiling painting in the library hall and another for the ballrooms in Benrath Castle. In the same year 1762, he opened an art school. From it went forth in 1773, founded by the Elector Carl Theodor Düsseldorf Art Academy, whose first director, Krahe was. Five years later, Krahe sold his art collection to the mountainous land stands. Now used as study material of the Academy students.

In his last years, Lambert Krahe was prevented by an eye condition in the exercise of his art. He died on February 11, 1790 in Dusseldorf.

Krahe's son was the early classical architect Peter Joseph Krahe. The Bavarian court painter Moritz Keller Hoven learned the art of painting at Lambert Krahe. Also, the Palatine court painter Johann Wilhelm Hoffnas (1727-1795) was one of his students.

Work

Krahe nature and scope of extraordinary collection includes approximately 15,000 drawings and 22,000 prints from the 15th to the 19th century and is today one of the world's most important collections of Baroque drawings. It is located since 1932 as a permanent loan from the Art Academy in Dusseldorf at the Museum Kunst Palast in Dusseldorf; smaller convolutions keep the Wallraf -Richartz Museum in Cologne and the Louvre. The centerpiece of the collection is Italian graphic, including works by Raphael, Michelangelo, and Paolo Veronese, but especially larger complexes of artists such as Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Pietro da Cortona and Giuseppe Passeri. Also German and Dutch artists of the 16th and 17th centuries are represented, among them Albrecht Altdorfer and Peter Paul Rubens. Nicolas Poussin, Jean Charles Frontiers and Gaspard Dughet be mentioned for the French 17th and 18th century. One of the highlights of Krahe's printmaking collection include Dürer's woodcut and engraving consequences, engravings of Martin Schongauer and Rembrandt's etchings.