Masterfully portrait of a Egyptian fellah ( peasant) from Theben was executed by prominent German orientalist Georg Macco (1863 Aachen - 1933 Genoa).

As well as his Great-great-uncle, the historical and portrait painter Alexander Macco (1767-1849), which had portrayed in 1802 the Queen of Prussia Louise of Mecklenburg-Strelitz and was a close friend and admirer of Beethoven and Goethe, decided also Georg Macco for an artistic career. He studied from 1880 to 1887 at the Art Academy in Düsseldorf under Eugen Gustav Dücker and Johann Peter Theodore Janssen and made drawings for the works of his brother Hermann Friedrich Macco. Then he moved to Munich to study and undertook numerous trips, who provided him with inspiration and motives for his works of art from here. Thus, series of paintings emerged from the Alpine high country, Norway and Spitsbergen and Italy. Although it was still rare at that time, to deal with Oriental motifs, his numerous works that had arisen in the course of his Oriental trips to Athens, Constantinople, Baalbek, Jerusalem, Cairo and Mecca were particularly Maccos soon to the most sought after in his artworks. Georg Macco is exhibited in the Rudolfinum in Prague, as well as since the Alpine Museum Munich, 1888 with several works in the Municipal Museum Dusseldorf, the Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum in Aachen, Germany. Some of his works in Aachen are on the list of the "shadow Gallery", so the paintings, which had been captured during the war as spoils and it hoped now, some in the inventory of the Art Museum of Simferopol to find these images at the recent rediscovery.Macco created his paintings especially in gouache painting technique as well as with oil paint, and less often with water color. The works impress by their expressionist way of expression and her masterful portrayal of colour and light effects as well as sense of details and moods.

Literature: Hans Vollmer : Artist´s lexicon. III, 1956, 281; Thieme/Becker "Lexicon of artists from antique to contemporary" XXIII, 1929, 508

Inscription: signed lower right and titled Theben, on the back of the canvas - antique label of a exhibition in Saarbrucken and indistictly original artist´s label; on the stretcher - German original title : " Fellacher in Theben".

Technique: oil on canvas, Antique gilt frame.

Measurements: unframed w 13 3/4" x h 18 7/8" (35 x 48 cm), framed w 25 1/4" x h 30 1/3" (64 x 77 cm).

Condition: very good original condition.