Exhibited: The Nivaagaard Collection, “Venskabsportrætter fra Rom”, 2016, Cat. No. 29, mentioned p. 50, ill. p. 49.

Provenance: Circolo Scandinavo / The Scandinavian Association in Rome (Inv. No. A II 10).

Claus Anton Kølle began his artistic career as an apprentice decorative painter. He was subsequently admitted to The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, where he continued his studies. During his time at the Academy in Copenhagen, he also temporarily experimented with both figure painting and landscape painting. He exhibited several portrait and figure paintings, but landscape painting ultimately became his preferred motif. This proved to be the right choice, and in 1860, he was awarded a two-year travel scholarship from the Academy for his work.

Kølle set off the same year he received the scholarship, spending the majority of the two years in Rome and its surroundings areas. In the present portrait, Kølle has depicted the Danish art historian Philip Weilbach. Weilbach arrived in Rome in 1860 and worked during his two years in the city as secretary for the Scandinavian Association, where he likely met C. A. Kølle, who was also in Rome during the same period.

From 1883 until his death, Weilbach worked as a librarian and secretary at the Academy in Copenhagen. Simultaneously, Weilbach gathered extensive material on Danish artists, which culminated in Weilbachs Arkiv (Weilbach's Archive), that later formed the foundation for the Danish artist lexicon still named after him today, known as Weilbachs Kunstnerleksikon (Weilbach's Artist Lexicon).