Joseph Beavington Atkinson

“ Overbeck was mentor in the movement; a fellow-labourer writes: “ No one who saw him or heard him speak could question his purity of motive, his deep insight and abounding knowledge; he is a treasury of art and poetry, and a saintly man.” ”

“ The young artist left Lübeck in March 1806, and entered as student the academy of Vienna, then under the direction of F. H. Füger, a painter of some renown, but of the pseudo-classic school of the French David. Here was gained thorough knowledge, but the teachings and associations proved unendurable to the sensitive, spiritual-minded youth. Overbeck wrote to a friend that he had fallen among a vulgar set, that every noble thought was suppressed within the academy and that losing all faith in humanity he turned inwardly on himself. ”

“ Overbeck belongs to eclectic schools, and yet was creative; he ranks among thinkers, and his pen was hardly less busy than his pencil. He was a minor poet, an essayist and a voluminous letter-writer. His style is wordy and tedious; like his art it is borne down with emotion and possessed by a somewhat morbid “ subjectivity.” His pictures were didactic, and used as means of propagandas for his artistic and religious faith, and the teachings of such compositions as the “ Triumph of Religion and the Sacraments ” he enforced by rapturous literary effusions. ”