Friedrich Overbeck

1789 Lübeck – 1869 Rome

Friedrich Overbeck was a painter and one of the most important members of the Nazarene movement. He began his artistic training in Lübeck with Joseph Nicolas Peroux and in 1806 went to Vienna to continue his studies at the Academy of the Arts. Together with Franz Pforr and Ludwig Vogel Overbeck moved to Rome in 1810, where he was joined by a company of like-minded artists, including Peter von Cornelius and Philipp Veit, who jointly housed in the old Franciscan convent of San Isidor. Together they attempted to renew German painting out of a religious spirit. In 1813 he converted to the Catholic faith. Overbeck rejected the numerous offers to take on a professorship in Germany and died in Rome in 1869.