ERLING ECKERSBERG
1808 – Copenhagen – 1889
A MALE MODEL SEEN FROM BEHIND
crayon conté on paper, 565 x 383 mm
inscribed: CW Eckersberg, Januar 1828, 20
This exceptionally lifelike study shows an athletic male model from behind. The anatomy is rendered with great precision and the muscles are perfectly defined through light and shade.
Erling Eckersberg executed this drawing between 16 and 31 January 1828. Although this study of a male nude is not signed, the artist’s name can be traced as the sheet bears the number “20” in the upper right corner. At the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen, such numbers were used to identify the student while keeping their identity anonymous to the judging committee; the numbers were reassigned for each competition. In this case, the number 20 had been assigned to Erling Eckersberg, the son of the academy professor of Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg. His name also appears on the sheet “C.W. Eckersberg” identifying him as the instructor overseeing this drawing session.
The practice of drawing and painting from the live model at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen was significantly developed after 1818, when Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg was appointed professor. Together with Johan Ludvig Lund, Eckersberg reformed the academy’s curriculum by placing greater emphasis on direct observation of the human body. While earlier training had largely relied on drawing from plaster casts of classical sculptures, Eckersberg introduced systematic study from live models, often working in natural daylight. Inspired in part by his training in Paris under Jacques-Louis David, this approach encouraged careful observation, anatomical accuracy, and a closer engagement with nature. During the 1820s and 1830s, these practices became a central element of academic training and played an important role in shaping the clarity, realism, and technical refinement characteristic of the art of the Danish Golden Age.
Erling Eckersberg was an artist active during the Danish Golden Age. Born in Copenhagen, he was the son of the influential painter Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg, whose professorship at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts shaped the artistic environment in which he grew up. Surrounded by artists from an early age, Eckersberg developed friendships with fellow painters such as Christen Købke and Martinus Rørbye, with whom he occasionally worked side by side and undertook study trips. While many of his contemporaries specialized primarily in painting, Eckersberg pursued a career in printmaking, training under the engraver O. O. Bagge and acquiring strong technical skills in etching, engraving, and lithography.
In 1834 Eckersberg received a three-year scholarship, enabling him to continue his studies in Paris. There he remained in contact with Danish artists, including Rørbye, during visits to institutions such as the Louvre. Eckersberg specialized in reproductive prints, translating paintings—particularly those by his father—into carefully executed engravings and lithographs. Through these works he contributed to the wider dissemination of Danish art at a time when printmaking played an important role in making images accessible to a broader public. His prints reveal the technical precision and clarity characteristic of Danish Golden Age graphic art.
Christen Købke, Erling Eckersberg tegnende, 1832, pencil on paper, 163 x71 mm, Statens Museum Copenhagen, inv.no. kksgb1641
I would like to thank Dr. Jesper Svenningsen for generously sharing his knowledge on Eckersberg and the working method at the academy.