Children Receiving their Breakfast

Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller is the most remarkable Austrian artist of the Biedermeier period. He became famous for portraits, still lifes, and landscapes. It was not until his later age that he became engaged in genre painting – especially village life scenes. His multi-figural scenes evidence his bravura, adding incredible vividness to the paintings. In addition to idyllic renderings of folk feasts and customs, Waldmüller also painted children at work, shelters of the destitute, and distribution of food to the poor. These ‘paintings of poverty’ may be rightfully regarded as the expression of his criticism of the social situation in society.