Frank Duveneck
Frank Duveneck was born to German immigrants in Covington, Kentucky. As a teenager, he apprenticed in an altar-building shop in Cincinnati, where his teachers encouraged him to travel to Germany to study. His training at Munich’s Royal Academy of Fine Arts helped him develop a confident painting style. After a trip to Venice in 1877, Duveneck started his own painting school in Munich, guiding his students (known as the “Duveneck Boys”) around Europe’s art capitals, including Venice and Florence.
What is the impact of appropriation?
Influenced by Dutch old masters, Duveneck painted contemporary subjects using fluid brushwork and strong tonal values. The painterly, seemingly unfinished quality of this work contrasts with the more polished style of realism promoted in many art schools in Paris. The harem—a secluded, female-only space in a Muslim household—was a popular Orientalist subject because of its associations with exoticism, sexuality, and voyeurism.
Museum purchase, gift of Peter McBean
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