(Vienna 1802–1875)
A Family Portrait in front of the Weilburg in Baden, signed, dated (incised) Fertbauer (1)839, oil on canvas, 68.5 x 79 cm, framed

Provenance:
Private Collection, Austria.

The present lot is an unusually large format for the Viennese Biedermeier painter Leopold Fertbauer, who preferred small formats for his individual and group portraits.
The painting probably portrays the Viennese doctor Johann Christian Schiffner (1779-1857) with his wife Emilie, née Prohaska, and their son and daughter. Schiffner became a secondary physician at the Imperial and Royal General Hospital in 1806. In 1815, he became a primary physician and took over the management of the psychiatric ward known as „Narrenturm“.
In the centre, leaning against the fence, stands the successful doctor with his daughter lovingly grasping his arm. To the right of them sits his wife, who has taken off her straw hat to her left and directs her gentle gaze towards the family dog, which is trying to jump into her lap. Only the young boy looks directly at the viewer while resting casually on a rock. Behind him, the view opens onto Weilburg Castle near Baden. The castle complex, which is no longer preserved today, was commissioned by Archduke Charles from the architect Joseph Kornhäusel on the slope of a hill in the Helenental valley at the foot of the Rauheneck ruins. He had the castle built between 1820 and 1823 for his young wife Henriette von Nassau-Weilburg, who gave the complex her name.