The Nathanson Family
C.W. Eckersberg (Danish, 1783–1853)
1818
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Classification
- Painting
- Dimensions
- height 126 cm, width 172.5 cm, height 146.2 cm, width 193.1 cm
- Culture
- Danish
- Museum
- SMK – National Gallery of Denmark
- Rights
- Public Domain Mark: SMK waives its rights in this photograph, as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Tweens profiles and older: its subjects are known and suit older children. How works are placed
View at the SMK – National Gallery of Denmark
About this work
The merchant Mendel Levin Nathanson and his wife are greeted by their children after having had an audience with the Queen. With this family portrait Nathanson marked how the simpler lifestyles and values of the middle classes now set the tone in Denmark. The children seem to have been interrupted mid-dance, but in truth this scene does not depict a random moment. The family parade themselves and their bourgeois ways almost as if on stage. Nathanson had another, personal objective: He would have wished to show that he, being Jewish, was fully integrated in society. A leading figure within the integration of Jews in Denmark, he was also a great patron of Danish art and culture. During the years 1812-20 he was Eckersberg’s most important patron.
