Founding of the Monastery in Louka

Together with its counterpart painting Alexander the Great Outside Jerusalem, Winterhalder’s composition Founding of the Monastery in Louka is a reproduction of a no longer extant fresco created in 1765 by Franz Anton Maulbertsch for the summer refectory of the Premonstratensian monastery in Louka near Znaim. In 1763-1768, Josef Winterhalder the Younger was one of Maulbertsch’s students and collaborators, who remained faithful to his master’s painting style in his own art production; in his compositions, Winterhalder made ample use of visual citations from Maulbertsch’s paintings. The scene depicting the tale of Alexander the Great, who withdrew from conquering Jerusalem through his learning of the Old Testament prediction of his reign, alludes to the qualities of the hero who, owing to his spiritual awakening, changed his conduct. In the second composition, Conrad II Otto, Duke of Bohemia, accompanied by his mother and the Bishop of Prague, Jindřich Břetislav, is shown handing the foundation decree for the abbey in Louka to the canons of the Premonstratensian Order (1190) and laying its cornerstone in the valley of the Thaya river.