Pedro Weingärtner

Pedro Weingärtner (Porto Alegre, July 26, 1853 – Porto Alegre, December 26, 1929) was a Brazilian painter, draftsman and engraver.

The son of German immigrants, he was probably introduced to the art by his father, who was an amateur draftsman. At the age of 24 he decided to dedicate himself to painting and went to study in Europe at his own expense. After some time it happened to be financed by the emperor Dom Pedro II. He spent several years attending famous academies and receiving guidance from distinguished teachers. After finishing his preparation he installed an atelier in Rome, but he traveled frequently to Brazil, where he made many exhibitions and knew the fame, being considered one of the best Brazilian painters in activity. In his last years he settled down in Porto Alegre, but it happened to face the competition of the painters of the new generation, inclined to the modernist aesthetic.

He lived in a period of profound changes in the society and culture of the West, in which two radically different models of civilization clashed. He was a faithful and disciplined follower of the most conservative academic principles, but did not remain oblivious to the changing world around him, and his vast and polymorphous work is a sensitive reflection of the contradictions of his time. His style fuses neoclassical, romantic, naturalistic and realistic elements, expressed in landscapes, genre scenes and portraits, also focusing on classical and mythological themes. His most notable contribution to Brazilian art is perhaps his paintings of regional inspiration, portraying immigrants and gauchos in their typical activities, which have great aesthetic and documentary value, being a pioneer in this thematic field. He owned a refined technique that paid close attention to detail, and which at times approached photographic fidelity. He also left several works in metal engraving, another field in which he was a forerunner in Brazil.