J. Joachim. Portrait of the twelve-year-old violinist by Suzette Hauptmann, 1843

Joseph Joachim

Fine portrait of the twelve-year-old violinist by Suzette Hauptmann

executed in pencil, a half-length drawing showing the child prodigy with his violin and bow, inscribed in the lower right-hand corner "Joseph Joachim / 1843" 

14.2 x 10cm, on paper, laid down on card, glazed (overall size 17.8 x 11.2cm), with a manuscript inscription, quoting the first verse of a poem by Herman Grimm (1899), in an unidentified hand on a strip of paper, now loose, below the image, [Leipzig,] 1843, some discolouration, some fraying of the paper border

THE ICONIC PORTRAIT OF THE YOUNG VIOLIN PRODIGY.

This famous drawing dates from 1843, the year Joachim commenced his studies with Mendelssohn in Leipzig. While there, Joachim also received lessons in composition from the violinist and Thomaskantor Moritz Hauptmann; it was his wife Suzette, daughter of the painter Marianne von Rohden (1785-1866), who executed the present portrait. A notable feature of the drawing, with regard to Joachim's instrument, is the absence of a chin rest which, although invented by Spohr already around 1820, did not gain general popularity until many years later.

The later-added manuscript inscription below the drawing is a quotation of the first verse of a seven-verse poem by Herman Grimm ('Joseph Joachim. Zur Erinnerung an den 17. März 1839'), dating from April 1899, celebrating the sixtieth anniversary of Joachim's public début, at the Adelskasino in Pest, on 17 March 1839:

  Vor sechzig Jahren, als es Frühling war,

  Da stand ein Kind in lichtem Lockenhaar,

  Vielhundert Augen sah es auf sich blicken,

  Sie schienen Muth ihm freundlich zuzunicken:

  Die kleine Geige nahm es unter's Kinn,

  Den Bogen setzt' es auf die Saiten hin:

  An diesem Abend klang zum erstenmal

  Dein Saitenspiel im weitgedrängten Saal... 

LITERATURE:

A. Moser, Joseph Joachim: ein Lebensbild (Berlin, 1898), facing p.19.

PROVENANCE:

Formerly in the collection of the Berlin pianist, composer and conductor Ernst Rudorff (1840-1916)