Leisure hours 1875

Gabriel von Max, an artist working around the turn of the 20th century, created this painting, titled *Leisure Hours*, with oil on canvas. The image of a woman reading to her friend is a demonstration of cultural ideals in the West. The German art academies, like their counterparts across Europe, had long promoted a hierarchy of genres, elevating history painting, with its moralizing content, above scenes of everyday life. The tastes of the buying public, however, frequently favored these anecdotal images, often sentimental and eroticized. The painting’s aesthetic recalls the Nazarene movement. The movement's artists desired to reject what they considered a superficial neo-classicism, and return to art that expressed spiritual values. To understand the conditions that shaped art like this, we can look to sources like exhibition reviews, biographies of artists, and the records of the official Salons. Understanding art means placing it within a complex web of institutions, social expectations, and cultural forces.