Jørgen Roed
Olive Grove from Tivoli near Rome, 1839
Oil on canvas, 36 x 49 cm.
Inventory number: 0178NMK
Gift from Lizzie and Ejler Ruge’s Art Foundation and New Carlsberg Foundation, 1992
Like many Danish Golden Age painters who stayed in Italy in the years between 1835-1845, Jørgen Roed visited the countryside around Tivoli and Olevano east of Rome on multiple occasions. This landscape study is probably from an area in the mountains immediately outside Tivoli. The depiction of the dry landscape with the silver-green olive trees in the harsh afternoon sunlight is objectively observed, and is marked by the still unfinished character of the sketch. Perhaps this is due to the fact that the painting was, in fact, painted out in front of the subject, on the small dusty path that leads through the olive grove.
Jørgen Roed (1808-1888)
Jørgen Roed joined the Art Academy at the age of fourteen as a student of the portraitist Heinrich Hansen. He later studied under C.W. Eckersberg and for many years, he was interested in architecture painting, which he practiced during his study abroad in Italy in the period 1837-1841. Here, he also carried out many landscapes and received commissions for altarpieces from patrons at home in Denmark. After his return, he supported himself primarily as a portraitist for financial reasons, but it was the earliest paintings that would be of most significance in the future. Roed carried out numerous artist portraits, among others of Wilhelm Marstand and Herman Wilhelm Bissen.
