Franz Defregger (30 April 18352 January 1921) was an Austria

Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

n artist known mostly for his genre and history painting

History painting

History painting is a genre in painting defined by subject matter rather than an artistic style, depicting a moment in a narrative story, rather than a static subject such as a portrait...

s.

He was born in Ederhof at Stronach, in Tyrol

County of Tyrol

The County of Tyrol, Princely County from 1504, was a State of the Holy Roman Empire, from 1814 a province of the Austrian Empire and from 1867 a Cisleithanian crown land of Austria-Hungary...

, the son of a prosperous farmer. In 1860, following his father's death, Franz sold the family's farm and went to Innsbruck

Innsbruck

- Main sights :- Buildings :*Golden Roof*Kaiserliche Hofburg *Hofkirche with the cenotaph of Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor*Altes Landhaus...

, where he studied with the sculptor Michael Stolz. He went to Munich in 1861 to study under Hermann Dyck

Hermann Dyck

Hermann Dyck , a Bavarian painter, born at Würzburg in 1812, studied architectural and genre painting at Munich. His works are original and of great humour, and are neatly and carefully executed. The satirical designs for the Fliegende Blätter, in reference to the rage for monuments, are incomparable...

 and Hermann Anschütz

Hermann Anschütz

Hermann Anschütz was a German painter and professor at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Munich.Anschütz was born in Koblenz. It is traced, that he lived at Promenade Straße 1 in Munich around 1850. He died in Munich, where he was buried on the Old Southern Cemetery .-External links:* * -...

. In 1863 he travelled to Paris, where he continued his artistic education autodidactically by a routine of figure drawing

Figure drawing

In art, a figure drawing is a study of the human form in its various shapes and body postures - sitting, standing or even sleeping. It is a study or stylized depiction of the human form, with the line and form of the human figure as the primary objective, rather than the subject person. It is a...

 and a thorough study of the museums, art collections and studios. On 8 July 1865 he returned to Munich, where from 1867 to 1870 he studied alongside Hans Makart

Hans Makart

Hans Makart was a 19th century Austrian academic history painter, designer, and decorator; most well known for his influence on Gustav Klimt and other Austrian artists, but in his own era considered an important artist himself and was a celebrity figure in the high culture of Vienna, attended with...

 and Gabriel Max in the studio of history painter Karl von Piloty

Karl von Piloty

Karl Theodor von Piloty was a German painter.Von Piloty was born in Munich. His father, Ferdinand Piloty , enjoyed a great reputation as a lithographer. In 1840, Karl was admitted as a student of the Munich Academy, under the artists Karl Schorn and Julius Schnorr von Karolsfeld...

.

Defregger became one of the leading genre painters in Munich, and became a professor of history painting at the Munich Academy, where he continued to teach until 1910. He died in Munich

Munich

Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...

in 1921.