Άνδρες και Γυναίκες της Ανατολής

000072 Anton Robert Leinweber, Men and Women of the East, 1897, oil on canvas, 93 × 72 cm

The German artist Anton Robert Leinweber was born in Bohemia, studied at the Academies of Munich, Prague and Dresden, lived for many years in North Africa (Tunisia) and became one of the most remarkable German Orientalist painters of the time. Orientalism was an artistic movement of the 19th century (prominent until the first decades of the 20th century) and popularized as a result of the expansion of Europeans in the Near and Middle East. Orientalists were primarily interested in painting genre scenes, and latter the landscape of these regions. This painting depicts a group of young girls and two men under a green pergola. The figures are dressed in clothes typical of the Ottoman empire. Two women are sitting on a colourful carpet, while around them can be seen their slippers and various metal utensils. Two men and another young woman are sitting on the bench on the right. The younger man is holding a cigarette in his hand. Although the context of the meeting is unclear, the scene is taking place in a cheerful atmosphere. Possibly the artist is depicting a family scene (with the women enjoying the security and privacy offered by the garden, especially the pergola). The work is in the spirit of 19th-century academic art, although Leinweber adopts a realistic approach and some impressionistic features (e.g. in the depiction of the ground in front and the foliage).