Rudolf von Alt

Interior of the Franciscan Church Salzburg

View of the Colosseum from the Arch of Constantine. Rome

Renaissance Style Town Hall

Saint Peter's Square. Rome

The old Spruce in Bad Gastein

View of Naples

The Piazza del Duomo in Como

View of the Alservorstadt 1872

Altaussee Lake and Face of Mount Trissel

The fish market of Rome

View of a Swiss Villa

View of Saint Charles Church and the Polytechnic Institute in Vienna

The Cathedral of Saint James in Sebenico

St Peter's from the Vatican Garden

Friesach in Carinthia

Salon in the Apartment of Count Lanckoronski in Vienna

The Japanese Salon, Villa Huegel, Hietzing, Vienna

The Library in the Apartment of Count Lanckoronski in Vienna, Riemergasse 8

Belvedere Palace, Vienna

Rudolf Ritter von Alt ( 28 August 1812 – 12 March 1905) was an Austrian landscape and architectural painter. Born as Rudolf Alt, he could call himself von Alt and bear the title of a Ritter (knight) after he gained nobility in 1889.

Biography

Born in Vienna, he was the son of the lithographer Jakob Alt (1789–1871) and the brother of the painter Franz Alt (1821–1914). He studied at the Akademie der bildenden Künste in Vienna. Hiking-trips through the Austrian Alps and northern Italy awoke a love for landscapes, and he painted with his brush using watercolors in a very realistic and detailed style. In 1833, inspired by a visit to Venice and neighbouring cities, he also made a number of architectural paintings.

View of Stephansdom, from the Stock-im-Eisen, 1832

Alt demonstrated a remarkable talent for expressing certain peculiarities in nature. He managed to paint nature authentically by focusing on the different hues of sky, the colour-tone of the air and the vegetation. His later works came closer to Impressionism. His perspectives on architecture were interesting, and he often chose everyday objects to paint. The painting of interior views also became one of his strong points, giving him attention in Vienna.

He visited and worked for a while in Rome and Naples; after that he visited the lakes of Lombardy, then Galicia, Bohemia, Dalmatia, Bavaria and then returned multiple times to Italy. In 1863 he went to the Crimea to paint some views of an estate of the Empress, and in 1867 he went to Sicily.

Alt died in Vienna in 1905. Most of his paintings are held by various museums in Vienna. The Albertina in Vienna hosted a retrospective exhibition from September 2005 to January 2006.

Notes

Regarding personal names: Ritter is a title, translated approximately as Sir (denoting a Knight), not a first or middle name. There is no equivalent female form.