Findelkind

Gabriel von Max (1840–1915) was an Austrian painter who began his studies in Prague at the Academy of Fine Arts where he studied parapsychology, Darwinism, and Asiatic philosophy. From 1863 to 1867 he studied painting at the Munich Academy under the tutelage of Karl Theodor von Piloty.

Fueled by his studies in Darwinism, Max shared his residence outside of Munich with a menagerie of monkeys who were part of his family and who often became the subject matter in many of his paintings. Common themes in Max’s work included love, religion, death, and the beyond.

In this painting, Findelkind, Max abandons his primate subject for a more human exchange between a newborn and a nun. Findelkind means abandoned or found child, typically used to describe a baby given up by its mother shortly after birth. In this painting Max retreats from the darker palette of the Piloty school and uses a more muted palette with fewer, clearer colors. The result is a stunning depiction of an abandoned baby clinging to the nun who is trying to provide some solace to the newborn, highlighting Max’s themes of love and religion.

- Heidi Werber

P.S. The little newborn in this painting is sweet and fragile ... See cute babies in art from Rubens to Cassatt here. <3