Samuel Amsler
Samuel Amsler (17 December 1791 - 18 May 1849), a
Swiss engraver, was born at
Schinznach, in the
canton of
Aargau. He studied his art under
Johan Heinrich Lips (1758–1817) and
Karl Ernst Hess, at
Munich, and from 1816 pursued it in
Italy, and chiefly at
Rome. In 1829, he succeeded his former master Hess as professor of
engraving in the Munich academy. The works he designed and engraved are remarkable for the grace of the figures, and for the wonderful skill with which he retains and expresses the characteristics of the original paintings and statues. He was a passionate admirer of
Raphael, and had great success in reproducing his works. Amsler's principal engravings are: ''The Triumphal March of
Alexander the Great'', and a full-length ''
Christ'', after the sculptures of
Thorwaldsen and
Dannecker; the ''
Entombment of Christ'', and two ''
Madonnas'' after Raphael; and the ''Union between Religion and the Arts'', after
Overbeck, his last work, on which he spent six years.
His portrait album, now in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, includes a fine head of the poet Friedrich Rückert.(1) A family portrait of Amsler by
Wilhelm von Kaulbach is now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.(2)The portrait on the right is also by von Kaulbach (1833).
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