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Joseph Bernhard Einsle (Göggingen 1774-1829 Augsburg) Portrait of a gentleman, smoking a pipe and seated at a table with a glass of beer and a white carrot 8.6 cm. (3 1/2in.) diameter image 1
Joseph Bernhard Einsle (Göggingen 1774-1829 Augsburg) Portrait of a gentleman, smoking a pipe and seated at a table with a glass of beer and a white carrot 8.6 cm. (3 1/2in.) diameter image 2
Joseph Bernhard Einsle (Göggingen 1774-1829 Augsburg) Portrait of a gentleman, smoking a pipe and seated at a table with a glass of beer and a white carrot 8.6 cm. (3 1/2in.) diameter image 3
Lot 15Ф,Y

Joseph Bernhard Einsle
(Göggingen 1774-1829 Augsburg)
Portrait of a gentleman, smoking a pipe and seated at a table with a glass of beer and a white carrot 8.6 cm. (3 1/2in.) diameter

Old Master Paintings
3 December 2025, 14:00 GMT
London, New Bond Street

£5,000 - £7,000

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Joseph Bernhard Einsle (Göggingen 1774-1829 Augsburg)

Portrait of a gentleman, smoking a pipe and seated at a table with a glass of beer and a white carrot
signed, inscribed and dated 'Einsle pinx. Mörsburg 26 Sept: 1815.' (far right)
gouache on ivory, tondo
8.6 cm. (3 1/2in.) diameter

Footnotes

Please note, this lot has been registered in accordance with the Ivory Act (Section 10) (Registration number 23K8KPM8) and cannot be imported into the USA or any country within the EU.


Provenance
Acquired in the late 1920s in Germany, by the grandparents of the present owner

Thanks to his numerous dated and inscribed miniature portraits, it is possible to put together some key dates and places in the life of the miniaturist Johann Bernhard Einsle. He is first recorded as a painter in Augsburg in 1796, by 1803 he had painted a portrait of the Elector of Wűttemburg and in 1810, the artist moved with his family from Augsburg to the lakeside town of Kostanz. After the death of his parents in 1817, he then moved back to Augsburg. During his stay in Kostanz, Einsle appears to have carried out numerous commissions in the surrounding area. For example, in 1815, Einsle portrayed a gentleman, Carl von Merßburg, presumably Meersburg, just across the lake from Kostanz (see Rainer Rückert, 'Der Porträt-Miniaturmaler Joseph Bernhard Einsle (1774-1829)', Weltkunst, 1 November 1984, p. 3208, cat. no. 30).

This fascinating miniature depicts a gentleman, with his sporting rifle, almost undoubtedly a flintlock, and holding his pipe, seated at a table with a white carrot and a glass of beer before him. The signature and inscription tell us that it was painted in Mörsburg in 1815. Presumably then this portrait was painted in Mörsburg Castle, south of Kostanz and just outside Wintertur in the present Swiss Canton of Zurich. Given the prominence of the items displayed on the table, it may be that the sitter was somehow involved in the production of white carrots for which this region of Switzerland is known.

Additional information