Portrait of Beethoven

[Maurice Colgan]

Hofrat, Isn't Beethoven actually standing in the portrait? Obscene?

The painting is a romanticised portrait of Beethoven, probably a copy of another portrait.

I wouldn't lose any sleep over it if I was you. Artistic licence has no bounds. You should see the mess I made of my latest Beethoven portrait..it will be painted over!
http://irelandtoo.blogspot.com

[Peter]

Does anyone on this forum believe that Beethoven sat for a portrait while making a hand gesture which would have been considered most obsene, if not blasphemous, in Beethoven's time?

I've no doubt the portrait is of 20th century origin, but would a horizontally pointed finger have been considered obscene in the 19th century? I'm no expert on the history of finger gestures, I suppose it's a whole new science!

[Maurice Colgan]

News of the Beethoven print makes google.com Beethoven news :-)

http://news.google.com/news?um=1&tab...en&q=beethoven

Maybe someone somewhere will have a clue?

[Peter]

News of the Beethoven print makes google.com Beethoven news :-)

http://news.google.com/news?um=1&tab...en&q=beethoven

Maybe someone somewhere will have a clue?

Yes I saw this - hopefully your quest will now reach a wider audience and produce a result - Good luck.

[Maurice Colgan]

Thanks Peter, yes the audience is growing. Just this morning yours truly was invited to talk about Kate Bush to Valerie Vetter of Anna Livia FM Radio Dublin.

Along with a lot more music topics the conversation lead to the Beethoven portrait...accidently on purpose of course. :-)

We can keep it topical with a click or two
http://news.google.com/news?um=1&tab...en&q=beethoven

[Maurice Colgan]

Radio LM FM Ireland covered the Beethoven portrait story yesterday morning.

This morning an edited photo of it appears in the tabloid "Irish Daily Star" newspaper...so that's 110,000 copies of the Beethoven portrait ! Maybe 400,000 will read the little piece?
http://irelandtoo.blogspot.com

[Maurice Colgan]

The story is just too good to let go :-)

An interesting resource http://www.lebrecht.co.uk/bin/lebrec...arch=BEETHOVEN

[Hollywood]

An interesting resource http://www.lebrecht.co.uk/bin/lebrec...arch=BEETHOVEN

I checked out this site and found a mistake. If you look on page 2, the top row and the fourth picture, they have the caption "Heiligenstadt (Vienna) - parish square with the Beethoven house, where Ludwig van Beethoven wrote his famous 'Heiligenstadt Testament' to his brothers on 6 October 1802." This is not the Heiligenstadt Testament house. The house shown in this picture is a house where Beethoven lived in briefly in 1817 and is located at Pfarrplatz #2. The Testament house is located not far from here at Probusgasse #6. Is there a way to notify someone on this website to their address mistake?

[Maurice Colgan]

Hollywood, well spotted. you can telephone them here +44 20 7625 5341

Or get their email address on the offending webpage.

[Hollywood]

Maurice, I sent them an e-mail pointing out this Beethoven address error. I'm curious to see if I hear back from them and if they correct this mistake.

[Hollywood]

Well, I just checked my GMX e-mail and I received an answer from them. Here is what they wrote:

"Dear Andrea,

Thank you for your email and for spotting this error. We will make sure that
this caption and any other captions that may have the same mistake are
ammended as soon as possible. It may, however, take up to several weeks for
the changes that we make on our database to be visible online.

Best wishes and greetings to Heiligenstadt,

Angelika Pirkl
Picture Library Assistant"

Cool! I'm so glad I was able to get a such a quick response and that they will correct this error.

[Maurice Colgan]

Good work Hollywood! That kind of response is heartwarming. I'm still waiting for a reply about the Beethoven portrait..... maybe they haven't got a clue.

[makir35]

OMG there's some kind of creature thing with two arms hovering over his left shoulder (our right).

[Michael]

On the copy of the photo posted on 30th May above, there seems to be a woman's face on the LEFT of the painting which doesn't seem to appear in an earlier posting. Is it a reflection of someone which came out on the photograph or is it in the actual painting?

[Maurice Colgan]

Do you guys mean the transparent Flute playing Nymph emerging from a waterfall?



EDIT. Michael I see the face you speak for the first time this morning! When I was posting this http://www.oldandsold.com/cgi-bin/eab.cgi?msg=10019 the face is in the painting intentional or not?
The picture can be enlarged to show every detail. Only the last name of the artist remains indistinct