Rudolf Koller

Rudolf Koller, 1844, self-portrait at 16

Rudolf Koller (21 May 1828 – 5 January 1905) was a Swiss painter.[1] He is associated with a realist and classicist style, and also with the essentially romantic Düsseldorf school of painting.[2] Koller's style is similar to that of the realist painters Gustave Courbet and Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot. Considered Switzerland's finest animal painter, Koller is rated alongside George Stubbs, Rosa Bonheur and Théodore Géricault. While his reputation was based on his paintings of animals, he was a sensitive and innovative artist whose well-composed works in the "plein air" tradition, including Swiss mountain landscapes, are just as finely executed.[3][4]

He has been described as "the painter of the Swiss national animal", because of his paintings of cows in Swiss landscapes.[5] He is considered, along with Frank Buchser and Gustave Eugène Castan [fr], to be one of the most important Swiss painters of the 19th century.[6] The Gotthardpost, or The St Gotthard Mailcoach, is one of his most famous paintings. It depicts a mail coach, drawn by white horses, speeding along a mountain road.[2][7]

  1. ^ "Johann Rudolf Koller". Netherlands Institute for Art History. Retrieved 17 September 2014.
  2. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference hauptman was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ "Rudolf Koller". www.hls-dhs-dss.ch. Retrieved 17 September 2014.
  4. ^ "Brooklyn Museum Quarterly". The Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences. Retrieved 17 September 2014 – via Internet Archive.
  5. ^ Blocher, Christoph (2 January 2012). "Rudolf Koller – Künstler des schweizerischen Nationaltiers" (PDF) (in German). Retrieved 17 September 2014.
  6. ^ "Rudolf Koller (1828-1905); Renowned Swiss Artist of Horses - PhelpsSports.com". Retrieved 17 September 2014.
  7. ^ [His most celebrated painting is the St Gotthard Mailcoach (1873; Zurich, Ksthaus), which depicts a coach at full speed attempting to stop suddenly for a herd of cattle obstructing the narrow road.]