Artists Resting in the Mountains

This watercolor constitutes a major work by Johann Christoph Erhard, produced during his stay in Vienna from 1816 to 1819. The year, recorded in his own handwriting, may either be read as 1817 or 1819. This is why the painting may be linked to Erhard’s trip to the Schneeberg Mountains and his travels to Salzburg and Berchtesgaden. Most likely, however, this is an ideal composition, assembled from various elements. The figure doing a drawing is most likely Erhard himself. The man asleep is a portrait of his Nuremberg friend Johann Adam Klein, who had taken Erhard along with him from home to Vienna. The twin beech trees symbolize their early bond of friendship. With this picture memento, Erhard takes up themes that were central to Romanticism: the revival of the landscape and artist friendships in general as well as the immediate experience of nature, in particular, by two befriended artist-ramblers.