“ He was a disciple of the painter Schadow, and, on Schadow’s appointment to the presidency of a new academy in the Rhenish provinces in 1828, followed that master to Düsseldorf. Hildebrandt began by painting pictures illustrative of Goethe and Shakespeare; but in this form he followed the traditions of the stage rather than the laws of nature. He produced rapidly “Faust and Mephistopheles” (1824) , “Faust and Margaret” (1825) , and “Lear and Cordelia” (1828) . He visited the Netherlands with Schadow in 1829, and wandered alone in 1830 to Italy ”