Ludwig Guttenbrunn

Ludwig Guttenbrunn (1750 – 15 January 1819) was an Austrian artist who worked in the latter part of the 18th century and early 19th century. He specialized in portraiture and history painting.[1]

Guttenbrunn was born either in Vienna, or in Krems (it is not known which).[2] He studied painting under Martin Johann Schmidt. By 1770 he was working for the Esterházy family, where he painted portraits of the reigning prince, Nikolaus Esterházy,[3] and possibly the portrait of Joseph Haydn seen and discussed below. He also created decorative paintings for Nikolaus’s new palace at Esterháza.[3]

By 1772 he had moved to Rome, where he had been sent to study by Prince Esterházy (he did not return to the Esterházy court, however). He continued to work as a portrait painter, later moving to Florence.[3] He executed a self-portrait which hangs in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence.[4]

In 1789 he moved to London. Shortly after arrival, or perhaps on the way, he produced the portrait of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France, shown below.[3] According to Robbins Landon, Guttenbrunn was successful in London, and his “name is encountered frequently in the newspapers”. Robbins Landon quotes an advertisement from the Morning Herald, 24 April 1794, which reads:

[Guttenbrunn’s] Exhibition of Ancient and Modern Pictures, No. 4 Little Maddx-street four doors down from New Bond-street, is now open every day … [Among the portraits is that of] the late Queen of France taken from life in the year 1789.[5]
(The Queen had been guillotined by the revolutionary government the previous year.)

In 1795, on the recommendation of the Russian envoy in London, he moved to St. Peterburg, then later to Moscow.[3] His portrait of Alexej Kurakin, shown below, dates from his stay in Russia.

He is known to have been in Dresden in 1806, then after 1807 back in Rome.[3] Guttenbrunn’s last attested painting dates from 1813.