Paul Friedrich Meyerheim German, 1842-1915

Meyerheim hailed from a famous family of Berlin painters, going back to his grandfather Karl Friedrich. Paul studied under his father Friedrich Eduard, who taught at the Berliner Akademie, before travelling widely in Germany, Tyrol, Switzerland and Holland, and spending a year in Paris.

His itinerant lifestyle is reflected in the subject of the present work, depicting a travelling tinker who has taken on work in a hamlet mending the villagers' kettles and pots. As in Knaus's The Conjuror (lot 16), the outsider becomes the centre of attention and a subject of fascination for the children.

The Tinker epitomises Meyerheim's abilities as a draughtsman and his mastery over colour, from the expressions of the figures to the shining metal and tin of the pots and pans. Meyerheim took particular pride in painting animals, here in the form of the two harnessed oxen, which were almost always part of the staffage in his paintings.