EUGENE VON GUERARD (1811-1901)
Mount Bogong (1,986 m - 6 515ft)
Australia (Victoria)
In Spring in the valley of the Mitta Mitta with the Bogong Ranges in the distance, 1863, oil on canvas 43.5 × 69.3 cm, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
The mountain
Mount Bogong (1,986 m- ) is the highest point in the state of Victoria in Australia, in the Victorian Alps south of the Australian Cordillera. The first ascent was made in 1854 by a botanist, Baron Sir Ferdinand von Mueller. His name is of aboriginal origin and means "the fat guy".
In winter the summit serves as a ski resort but the snow periods are limited.
The foot of the mountain is covered with thick forests of Eucalyptus delegatensis up to an altitude of 1,300 meters. from 1,300 meters to 1,800 meters, of Eucalyptus pauciflora wood and over alpine meadows.
The Bogong is also the name of a butterfly that reproduces in the region and whose larva was consumed by the aborigines.
The painter
Johann Joseph Eugene von Guerard was an Austrian-born artist, active in Australia from 1852 to 1882. Known for his finely detailed landscapes in the tradition of the Düsseldorf school of painting, he is represented in Australia's major public galleries, and is referred to in the country as Eugene von Guerard. In 1852 von Guerard arrived in Victoria, Australia, determined to try his luck on the Victorian goldfields. As a gold-digger he was not very successful, but he did produce a large number of intimate studies of goldfields life, quite different from the deliberately awe-inspiring landscapes for which he was later to become famous. Realizing that there were opportunities for an artist in Australia, he abandoned the diggings and was soon undertaking commissions recording the dwellings and properties of wealthy pastoralists.
By the early 1860s, von Guerard was recognized as the foremost landscape artist in the colonies, touring Southeast Australia and New Zealand in pursuit of the sublime and the picturesque. He is most known for the wilderness paintings produced during this time, which are remarkable for their shadowy lighting and fastidious detail. Indeed, his View of Tower Hill in south-western Victoria was used as a botanical template over a century later when the land, which had been laid waste and polluted by agriculture, was systematically reclaimed, forested with native flora and made a state park. The scientific accuracy of such work has led to a reassessment of von Guerard's approach to wilderness painting, and some historians believe it likely that the landscapist was strongly influenced by the environmental theories of the leading scientist Alexander von Humboldt. Others attribute his 'truthful representation' of nature to the criterion for figure and landscape painting set by the Düsseldorf Academy.
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2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau
