Lot 45: FRIEDRICH MARTERSTEIG

FRIEDRICH MARTERSTEIG GERMAN 1814 - 1899 LUTHER AUF DEM REICHSTAGE ZU WORMS (MARTIN LUTHER BEFORE THE HOLY ROMAN EMPEROR CHARLES V AT THE DIET OF WORMS) signed and dated F. Martersteig 1847 centre right; indistinctly inscribed and dated 1847 on the stretcher oil on canvas 156 by 274cm., 61 ½ by 108in.

Berlin, Berliner Akademie, Kunstausstellung, 1848

Friedrich von Bötticher, Malerwerke des 19. Jahrhunderts, Dresden 1901, vol. 1, p. 983, no. 13

Galerie Ravené, Berlin
Acquired by the family of the present owner circa 1910

The general assembly, or Diet, of the Imperial States of the Holy Roman Empire met at the small town of Worms, on the Rhine, between 28 January and 25 May 1521. It was presided over by the Emperor, Charles V (1500-58). The Diet is renowned for the appearance of Martin Luther before the assembly to defend his 95 theses and other writings attacking the established church and thus considered one of the foundation stones of the Protestant Reformation. This dramatic meeting saw Luther face a large crowd, confirm his beliefs, and then flee while private conferences were held to determine his fate.

Martersteig depicts Luther before the enthroned Charles V, who is attended by his guards, his secretary, Alfonso de Valdes, and his advisor, Mercurino di Gattinara. Opposite him, behind Luther, and wearing red, ermine-bordered robes and hats, sit the Electors of Saxony, of Brandenburg, and the Elector Palatine of the Rhine, and behind them, in his cardinal's hat, the Pope's emissary Girolamo Aleandro. Charles V issued the Edict of Worms on 25 May 1521, denouncing Luther as a heretic, who should be arrested, and banning the reading and study of his works. Luther went into hiding in the Wartburg Castle with the help of Frederick III, Elector of Saxony, and re-emerged after the furore had subsided.

Martersteig was a noted Weimar history painter who studied in Düsseldorf for several years under Friedrich Wilhelm Schadow and Ferdinand Hildebrandt and later, in Paris, where he came under the influence of Paul Delaroche and Ary Scheffer. Martersteig adopted subjects for his pictures largely from the history of the Protestant Reformation and the Thirty Years' War. The third centenary of the Reformation made artistic interpretations of events in Martin Luther's life very popular in the nineteenth century, and Martersteig painted at least six works taking Luther as the subject.