Figure 1.--Here we see a well-to-do Austrian family on a mountin holiday, the Eltz family. The children my be what made for outdoor activity clothes in the 1830s, but the adults seem to be wearing clothes more suitable for a fashionable salon.

Waldmüller painted a lot of genre images. This painting has the look of a genre image, but is actually a commissioned family portrait. The family is that of Dr. Josef August Eltz in 1834. It is unusual in that most family portrait were painted in or near the home. Here we have the family on vacation in the mountains. The family seems very well dressed for a mountain vacation. In addition to the mountain scenery we have wonderful details on how a well-to-do Austrian family dressed. We are not sure if this was affected by a montain vacation or this was simply their normal every day attire. The adults seem to be wearing normal attire, hardly chosen for outdoor mountain wear. Dr. Eltz wears a dark coat as was common at the time. He also wears light trousers, and dark cravats for daywear. The women's and girls' sleeves were gigantic, as large as they would ever get--huge gigot sleeve. The boys wear buff-colored belted knee-length tunics with yokes and full sleeves over trousers. We suspect that this was seen as outfits suitable for the nountains nd outdoor activities. The girls wear white dresses with colored aprons, again we suspect this was seen as outdoor activity wear--at least for boys in well-to-do families. Waldmüller left us several peasant genre images and peasant children clearly did not wear tunics.

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Created: 12:17 AM 6/29/2017
Last updated: 12:18 AM 6/29/2017