(Prenzlau 1737–1807 Florence) The Port of Livorno, with the rescue of castaways in the foreground and a battleship of the imperial Russian fleet under Admiral Count Orlow in the background, signed and dated lower right: J. P. Hackert. f. vue du Port de Livorno 177.?, oil on panel, 27 x 41 cm, framed Provenance: European private collection We are grateful to Dr. Claudia Nordhoff, Rome, for confirming the attribution of the present painting (verbal communication). There is larger version of this topographical view, which features different staffage, (see C. Nordhoff and H. Reimer, Jakob Philipp Hackert, Berlin, 1994, vol. I, p. 136, fig. 61, vol. II, p. 56, cat. no. 135). In the course of the painting’s recent restoration, it was possible to identify the battleship put to sea in the background as a Russian frigate, due to its flags. In 1771, one year after defeating the Turks in the naval battle of Chesme, Admiral Orlow and his fleet were staying in Livorno. It was decided to have this triumphant victory over the Ottoman Empire painted for propaganda purposes and Hackert was entrusted with the depiction of the battle and additional views of the fleet and the port of Livorno. This major commission represented a milestone in Hackert’s career and eventually established his international reputation. Hackert had accepted under the condition that he should be allowed to travel to Livorno in order to be able to study the anchoring fleet in detail in situ. Since he had never witnessed a ship exploding, a frigate that was no longer in use was loaded with gunpowder and blown up off the coast of Livorno. It seems that the scope of Orlow’s commission went beyond Hackert’s personal capacities. J. H. W. Tischbein wrote: ‘When Philipp Hackert had so much work to do for Admiral Orlow, for whom he painted, among other pictures, the port of Livorno, he sought the assistance of Wutki (Michael Wuttky), who skilfully painted the figures…’ (quoted from Nordhoff, vol. II, p. 29). The present painting was most probably among those commissioned by Orlow. A larger version of this composition, with different staffage from that in the present work and which was formerly preserved in Pavlovsk Castle, may be a later variant. Further variants were sold by Lempertz, Cologne in 1979, and in the Schäfer Collection in Schweinfurt until 2005. Johann Philipp Hackert started out as an artist in the workshop of his father, Philipp Hackert. From 1758 on, he studied at the Berlin Academy, where he first attracted attention with two topographical views in 1761. Baron Olthoff became Hackert’s patron and invited him to Rügen, where he decorated Olthoff’s estate of Boldevitz with wall paintings. Between 1765 and 1768, Hackert sojourned in Paris, where he was inspired by the landscape and marine painter Claude Joseph Vernet and the engraver Johann Georg Wille. In 1768, Hackert travelled to Italy, where he established contacts with the patrons Johann Friedrich Reiffenstein and Sir William Hamilton in Rome and Naples. He soon acquired a reputation as a significant landscape painter. In 1768 he was appointed court painter to King Ferdinand IV of Naples. That same year, the artist encountered Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, who held him in high esteem and took drawing lessons from him. After Hackert’s death, Goethe devoted a biographical sketch to him. Hackert was an outstanding Classicist landscapist and an artist known throughout Europe.

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