A brilliant German artist who remained true to the ideas of the creative union “Nazarenes” until the end of his life.

Johann Friedrich Overbeck (July 3, 1789 – November 12, 1869) was a famous German artist of the 19th century, an outstanding master of the religious genre. Johann Friedrich Overbeck also devoted a significant part of his work to portraiture and occasionally engaged in the manufacture of engravings. Most of his paintings are written on biblical themes. The biography of the master is closely connected with Rome, where he lived for almost 60 years.

Johann Friedrich Overbeck was one of the founders of the St. Luke’s Union, an artistic association of German artists, which is better known to art connoisseurs under the name “Nazarenes” or “Nazarenes”. The followers of this trend persistently urged their colleagues to abandon the ideas of classicism and return to the basics of painting of the late Middle Ages and the Early Renaissance.

Biography of Johann Friedrich Overbeck

Johann Friedrich Overbeck was born on July 3, 1789 in the port city of Lübeck in northern Germany. His father Christian Adolf was a hereditary lawyer, popular poet and composer, successfully translating from various European languages and was considered one of the best German diplomats of his era.

The future artist was fond of drawing since childhood and at the age of fifteen he began attending private painting lessons with Nikolaus Perua. Immediately after graduating from high school in 1806, Friedrich left his father’s house forever and went to Vienna, where he became a student at the local art academy.

Under the guidance of Professor Heinrich Füger, Overbeck studied in the capital of Austria for four years, and then left the academy. With a group of like-minded people, he went to Rome. The friends settled in an empty Franciscan monastery, where they began to lead an ascetic life following the example of medieval religious communities.

creative career

The young people organized the “Union of St. Luke” and vowed to devote themselves to a noble goal – the true revival of religious art. This idea so captivated Friedrich Overbeck that in 1813 he converted from Lutheranism to the Catholic faith.

Despite the ironic attitude on the part of colleagues and most of their compatriots, the “Nazarenes” very soon achieved wide recognition. In 1816, members of the union received a large order from the Prussian ambassador in Rome, Jacob Bartholdi, to fresco the walls of his new country residence. In addition to Overbeck, Peter Cornelius, Philipp Veit and Wilhelm von Schadow took an active part in the work. The young painters coped brilliantly with the order and in a year created a cycle of frescoes dedicated to the life of the biblical character Joseph.

The painting of the House of Bartholdi brought the “Nazarenes” the well-deserved fame, and from that moment on, Overbeck and his friends no longer lacked customers. But by the beginning of the 1820s, their creative association began to disintegrate, and most of the participants eventually returned to Germany. One of the few who remained in Rome until the end of his life was Johann Friedrich Overbeck, who turned out to be the most devoted follower of the ideas of a creative union.

Personal life

The family life of the artist cannot be called particularly happy. In 1818 he married Anna Rosenkratz, who became the mother of his three children. The two daughters of the master died in early childhood, and the only son did not even live to be twenty years old. The painter until the end of his days remained a deeply religious person and courageously accepted the blows of fate.

Despite numerous invitations from Germany, Friedrich Overbeck categorically did not want to return to his homeland. He turned down offers to head first the Munich, then the Düsseldorf and finally the Frankfurt art academies, remaining faithful to religious art. Although by the 1830s, the era of the dominance of romanticism had begun in European painting, and then it was replaced by the era of realism. The artist had great authority among his colleagues and was recognized as the patriarch of German fine art.

Johann Friedrich Overbeck lived a long life and died in Rome on November 12, 1869 at the age of 80. His remains are still buried in the ancient Catholic Church of San Bernardo alle Terme, located in the very center of the Italian capital.

Johann Friedrich Overbeck is one of the best artists of the religious genre in the history of German art. He devoted his whole life to writing beautiful works of art and achieved well-deserved recognition.