Template:POTD/2023-06-06
Picture of the day archives
:
2023 June
<
2023 June 5
2023 June 7
>
Picture of the day
The Interior of the Palm House on the Pfaueninsel Near Potsdam
is the title of two oil-on-canvas paintings by
Carl Blechen
, completed between 1832 and 1834. Both depict four
odalisques
as they relax in a palm house (which was destroyed by fire in 1880) at the royal retreat of
Pfaueninsel
near Berlin, but have different angles of view and compositions. The works were commissioned by
King Frederick William III of Prussia
and are now in the
Hamburger Kunsthalle
and the
Art Institute of Chicago
, with an 1832 color study for the work found in the
Alte Nationalgalerie
in Berlin. This picture shows the Chicago version of the painting, which was gifted by Frederick William to his daughter
Alexandra Feodorovna
, the wife of
Emperor Nicholas I of Russia
. It remained in the Russian imperial collection until around 1917, became part of a Swiss collection around 1920, and was owned by private collectors prior to its purchase by the Art Institute of Chicago in 1996.
Painting credit:
Carl Blechen
Archive
–
More featured pictures...