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The traitor
(1885-1890)
- Medium
- oil on canvas
- Measurements
- 100.4 × 150.5 cm
- Inscription
- inscribed in red paint l.r.: P. Joanowitch (a underlined, anowitch underlined)
- Accession Number
- p.318.1-1
- Department
- International Painting
- Credit Line
- National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Purchased, 1890
This digital record has been made available on NGV Collection Online through the generous support of Digitisation Champion Ms Carol Grigor through Metal Manufactures Limited - Gallery location
- 19th Century European Paintings Gallery
Level 2, NGV International - About this work
-
Paul Joanowitch was born in Vršac, a Serbian town which was at that time part of the Austrian Empire. He studied in Vienna and Munich until 1886 when he went to Paris, then to Egypt, Turkey and the Caucasus. His pronounced taste for Orientalist subjects, highly keyed in both colour and emotion, was already evident from his student days. The traitor was painted between 1885 and 1890. While not referring to a particular historical event, it serves as a warning to those intent on treachery. What is unmistakeable is the excitement, confusion and potential danger of the confrontation taking place. In 1906, this painting was voted by the public as the ‘sixth-best’ painting in the NGV Collection.
- Subjects (general)
- Human Figures Relationships and Interactions
- Subjects (specific)
- conflict (general sense) gesture men (male humans) narrative art Orientalism traitors warriors weapons
- Provenance
-
Exhibited, The New Zealand and South Seas Exhibition, Dunedin, 1889–90; with H. Koekkoek & Sons (dealer), Melbourne, 1890; exhibited, Autumn Exhibition, H. Koekkoek & Sons, Melbourne, 1890, no. 126[1]; from where purchased for the NGV, 1890.
[1] See Catalogue of a highly important collection of high-class modern pictures : exhibited by H. Koekkoek & Sons of 72 Piccadilly, London, W., at the Koekkoek Gallery, 331 & 333 Collins Street, Melbourne, Melbourne: Mason, Firth & McCutcheon, Printers, 1890, no. 126, p. 26, accessed via State Library of Victoria, http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/107431. Purchased with Vaclav Brožik’s The defenestration, 1618 (La Defénestration, 1618) (p.316.1-1).
Exhibited: The New Zealand and South Seas Exhibition, Dunedin, 1889–90; Autumn Exhibition, H. Koekkoek & Sons, Melbourne, 1890, no. 126
- Frame
- Original, maker unknown
