page_title: Oswald Achenbach
section_title: Later Years
hierarchical_section_title: Oswald Achenbach / Life / Later Years
context_page_description: Oswald Achenbach was a German painter associated with the Düsseldorf school of painting. Though little known today, during his lifetime he was counted among the most important landscape painters of Europe. Through his teaching activities, he influenced the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. His brother, Andreas Achenbach, who was twelve years older, was also among the most important German landscape painters of the 19th century. The two brothers were humorously called "the A and O of Landscapes".
context_section_description: Achenbach gave up his professorship at the Institute in 1872. He had submitted his resignation once before, in 1869 but withdrew it.  Achenbach had felt that his teaching constrained his own artistic work.
  In the following years, Achenbach made numerous trips. The last big trip to Italy began in early summer 1882 and he visited Florence, Rome, Naples, and Sorrento. In 1884 and 1895 he took trips to Northern Italy. He had planned a trip in 1897 to Florence, but canceled it due to illness.
  In 1897 Achenbach was made an honorary citizen of Düsseldorf in recognition of his over 50 years of engagement in various Düsseldorf institutions and associations. For many years he had been one of the leading personalities in the city. This high social position had also involved a very large and ostentatious house where he hosted artists, writers, scholars, military officers and members of the nobility. Among his most prominent guests and patrons was Karl Anton, Prince of Hohenzollern. Running such a household was expensive and necessitated Achenbach to produce many paintings.  As a well-recognized artist, it was easy for him to find buyers. The larger number of his paintings, led to repetitions in the subject matter and motifs.  As early as the 1860s reviewers accused him of "painting to death" certain subjects.
caption: Constantine's Triumphal Arch in Rome, 1886. Alte Nationalgalerie, Berlin.
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