Portrait of Christoph Reisser, 1885

Having spent twenty years in Rome, Anton Romako (1832–1889) returned to his hometown of Vienna in 1876, but did not manage to follow on from his success in Italy. During this last period of his life, the artist created his most daring works. Among them was this portrait: Christoph Reisser, the printing company owner and technical director of the Viennese newspaper Neue Freie Presse, was one of Romako’s most important promoters and commissioned the artist to create portraits of him and his wife. Romako depicted the married couple in three-quarter length against a monochrome but nuanced background. The stringent frontality links both depictions, though the artist made a clear distinction between the male and female portrait in terms of expression. Reisser, who averts his gaze from the beholder, is holding an issue of his newspaper in his left hand. The date visible on it suggests that both paintings had been completed by December 1885.

AS, 2021