Cleveland Museum of Art

Portrait of Carl Philipp Fohr

Samuel Amsler

Date

1818

Medium

engraving and etching on wove paper

Culture

Germany, 19th century

Department

Prints

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

This print was made by two artists as a memorial to their friend—a fellow German artist—who drowned while swimming in the Tiber River in Rome. Such “friendship portraits” were common in the early nineteenth century, especially among artists who lived or worked together as they traveled through Europe. Samuel Amsler used the technique of engraving to refer to Germany’s distinguished history in that medium, and he also clothed his friend in Renaissance garb. Such connections to the past were aspects of the Romantic ideal shared by the artists. This print was made to commemorate the friendship between the two artists who made it, and the sitter, who had drowned while swimming in the Tiber River in Rome.

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