Johann Gottlieb Prestel Sold at Auction Prices

Painter, copperplate engraver

Johann Gottlieb Prestel , also Johann Amadeus Prestel (born November 18, 1739 in Grönenbach , † October 5, 1808 in Frankfurt am Main ) was a German engraver and painter .

After only a very short schooling, Prestel apprenticed to a carpenter in his hometown. Already during his education he distinguished himself by his artistic abilities. As a journeyman he went to the obligatory "Walz" and came to Venice in 1760 at the age of 21.

There he made the acquaintance of Giuseppe Nogari , who accepted him as a student. Later, Prestel switched to Jacques Wagner with Nogari's recommendation. In the years 1767 to 1770 Prestel lived and worked in Rome . There he studied (and copied) mostly the masters of antiquity; but he also influenced the works of Pompeo Batonis .

In the spring of 1770 Prestel returned to Germany and settled as a freelance painter in Nuremberg . In 1775 he accepted the offer of Johann Caspar Lavater and went to Zurich to do various commissioned works, mostly portraits.

Later Prestel returned to Nuremberg, where he imitated drawings of famous masters as engravings and later also colored. Less in his own creativity than in these replicas lies his strength and meaning.

Prestel was with the graphic designer Maria Katharina Prestel , born in Nuremberg. Höll (* Nuremberg 1747, † London 1794) married, with whom he created extensive portfolio works with reproductions of master drawings.

In 1793 Prestel went to Frankfurt am Main and died there at the age of nearly 69 years on October 5, 1808.