Platzer Johann Georg

Born on 25 (24?) June 1704: Johann Georg Platzer (or Plazer), Austrian painter and draftsman who died on 10 December 1761.



He was born in a family of painters in South Tyrol, taught first by his stepfather Josef Anton Kessler [–1721] and then by his uncle Christoph Platzer, court painter in Passau. In 1724 he painted an altarpiece for the church of Saint Helena in Deutschnofen. Probably after 1726 he went to Vienna, where he enrolled at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste and became a friend of Franz Christoph Janneck. Perhaps because of a stroke that impeded his work, he returned to Saint Michael in Eppan by 1755.


     Platzer produced a great number of small paintings, mostly on copper. He was the most important master of the conversation piece in 18th-century Austria and his cultivated embourgeoisé public was fascinated by the virtuoso manner, lively colors and innumerable details of his compositions. According to the principles of decorum, he chose his models and style to suit the subject-matter: for historical scenes and allegories he took his models from antiquity, the Renaissance and Flemish Baroque art, as in Samson’s Revenge. In his genre scenes and especially his conversation pieces, influences of the French Rococo and the Netherlandish cabinet painters are evident, while in his scenes of artists’ studios, such as Sculptor’s Workshop, his academic knowledge is revealed. The repeated use of architectural motifs in his works is derived from northern Italian quadratura painting.

Although his work is eclectic, it has a characteristic personal touch that distinguishes it from the comparable, though calmer and less detailed work of Janneck.