Joseph Reinhardt – Antique Swiss Engraving – The Wine Mistresses of Bern (Sold)

Joseph Reinhardt

1749 – 1829

 Costumes des sommelieres de Berne – Costumes of the Wine Mistresses of Bern

Two doting Bernese women fill the glass of a handsome young Swiss farmhand who reclines on a wooden bench after a hard days work.

The well-known 18th Century Swiss artist Joseph Reinhardt was a successful Lucerne portraitist and religious painter who also produced a famous series of outstanding engravings onSwiss folkloric themes.  As a young man, Reinhardt studied in Italy (in Lucca and in Rome) where after his money ran out, he also worked for a time as one of the Swiss Guards at the Vatican. After returning to Luzern, he earned a living painting religious works, including several large altarpieces. Gradually he also began to gain reputation as a portraitist.Between 1796 and 1802 Reinhardt traveled through Switzerland to document national costumes for his famous major cycle of prints on Swiss peasants.