Puszta Evening, c. 1865

In his painting Puszta Evening of c. 1865, Johann Gualbert Raffalt (1836–1865) emphasizes, through the sheer horizontality of the canvas and the strongly foreshortened watercourse, the endless wideness of the Hungarian landscape. Draw wells and tents are evidence of human life, but fit in with the surrounding nature in scale. The oil painting is dominated by earthy colors and fascinating contrasts of dark and light that result from the evening light, the dark clouds, and the reflections on the water.
Raffalt, who was nicknamed “Puszta painter” already in his lifetime, studied at the Vienna Academy and was one of the main exponents of the Szolnok school, founded by August von Pettenkofen (1822–1889), an Austrian-Hungarian artists’ colony based in the Hungarian town of Szolnok.

AGW, 2021