A Few Grassi Trifles

The Viennese painter Joseph Mathias Grassi (1757–1838) has recently entered the spotlight owing to a supposed miniature portrait of Mozart that has been attributed to him. Since there have been doubts and uncertainties regarding Joseph Grassi's correct middle name which is incorrectly given as "Maria" in a book, recently published by the Mozarteum in Salzburg, I take the opportunity to present a few primary sources pertaining to Grassi and his family. Although the basic genealogical facts regarding Grassi have been published 50 years ago by Heinz Schöny, art historians seem to have completely ignored this study. This resulted in a painter named Josef "Maria" Grassi entering the world of Wikiality.

Joseph Mathias Grassi: self portrait (private property)

On 11 June 1754, the goldsmith Ottilio Grassi ("Gebürtig zu Utini in Welschland aus den[!] Venitianischen Gebieth") married Antonia Winterhalter (1737–1817), daughter of the goldsmith Mathias Winterhalter:

The entry concerning the wedding of Joseph Grassi's parents on 11 June 1754, at the Schottenkirche (A-Ws, Tom. 30, fol. 58r)

The entry concerning the baptism of Joseph Grassi's mother Antonia Winterhalter on 18 January 1737, at St. Stephen's Cathedral (A-Wd, Tom. 70, fol. 83v)

Ottilio Valentino Grassi had been born on 10 May 1723, in Udine, son of Valentino Grassi (1680–1762) and his wife Livia. In 1742, Ottilio Grassi began his six-year apprenticeship in Vienna. In 1760, he was appointed master goldsmith and in 1761, he took the oath as "Wiener Bürger" (Viennese Citizen). Schöny gives Ottilio Grassi's date of death as "after 1782". Grassi's appearance in the Steuerfassion (the municipal tax register) shows that he was still alive in 1788.

Ottilio Grassi, listed as tenant of a small apartment on the sixth floor of the house Stadt 1356 (today Himmelpfortgasse 7) (A-Wsa, Steueramt B 34/5, fol. 400)

Ottilio Grassi's first son Anton Mathias was born on 26 June 1755, in the "Blumenthalisches Haus" am Hof (Stadt No. 310, today Am Hof 6a), and baptized in the Schottenkirche with his maternal grandparents officiating as godparents.

The baptismal entry of the sculptor Anton Mathias Grassi (1755–1807)
(A-Ws, Tom. 34, fol. 247v)

Auf dem Hof in 1778 with Anton and Joseph Grassi's birthplace ("Zur kleinen Weintraube" No. 310) on the right (W-Waw, Sammlung Woldan)

Ottilio Grassi's next child, Joseph Mathias, was born on 22 April 1757 and like his older brother he got his middle name from his grandfather (and godfather), the goldsmith Mathias Winterhalter (1696–1763).

The 1757 baptismal entry of the painter Joseph Mathias Grassi (with his godfather misnamed "Winterhauer"). Note the f in "auf dem Hof" which looks like a double f, but is not (A-Ws, Tom. 34, fol. 334v).

Consequently, Ottilio Grassi's two daughters got their middle name from their maternal grandmother Margaretha Winterhalter, née Poser (1715–1775): Elisabetha Margaretha Grassi was born on 29 October 1759 (A-Ws, Tom. 35, fol. 125r), and Eleonora Margaretha on 24 September 1761 (A-Ws, Tom. 35, fol. 240r). The next child of the Grassi family was Johann Gottfried Grassi, born on 12 January 1766 (A-Ws, Tom. 36, fol. 156r), who was named after his godfather, the K.K. Hof Cammer Registraturs Adjunct Johann Gottfried Anhalt (who in 1754 had been Ottilio Grassi's best man). The last child of the Grassi family was born on 7 April 1769 (A-Wd, Tom. 88, fol. 73v), and christened Johann Christoph after his godfather, the K.K. Hofkammer Concipist Christoph von Keßler. Keßler was a legendary freemason who in 1782 seems to have been responsible for Joseph and Anton Grassi joining the Viennese Masonic lodge "Zur Beständigkeit". Ottilio Grassi died on 1 April 1791, in Vienna, and on 3 April was buried in the St. Marx cemetery (A-Wd, Bahrleibuch 1791, fol. 104r).

The seal of the Masonic lodge "Zur Beständigkeit" (which was disbanded in 1785) with its motto "STAT TIRMITER"

Joseph Mathias Grassi left Vienna after he was denied a travel grant which was given to Heinrich Füger. But since Füger already went to Rome in 1776, while Grassi still remained in Vienna, something seems to be amiss in this chronology of events. Either Grassi went to Poland much earlier, or his departure had nothing to do with Füger. Grassi did not leave Vienna in 1790 – as is stated in the literature – but already in 1785. The earliest source for Grassi's stay abroad is a letter he wrote on 3 January 1786, from Annopol to his close friend and fellow mason Franz Xaver Brabbée (1758–1831). From this letter (Wienbibliothek, I.N. 68608) we not only learn that Grassi had just fallen in love with a blue-eyed girl, but also that at that time he had already been in Poland for at least four months. Being a fervent freemason, Grassi in his letters to a fellow mason used the masonic date "ab anno lucis":

The date "30 April 1787" written by Grassi in masonic code (Wienbibliothek, I.N. 51693)

It seems that by leaving Vienna, Grassi fared much better than most Austrian painters of his time. In addition to his income as a freelance portraitist, by 1805 he already drew an annual income of 2,400 Thaler (which the Neuer Nekrolog der Deutschen in 1840 was to call "Westengeld") from Augustus, Duke of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg whose poetry Grassi also used as subjects for a number of paintings. The villa in the Plauenscher Grund in Dresden that Grassi bought at that time was unfortunately destroyed in 1857.

 

The "Villa Grassi" near Dresden (which had to make way for the now defunct Felsenkeller Brauerei)

The "Gothaischer Geheimer Legations-Rath" Joseph Grassi, who after he had been awarded the title "Ritter des Königlich Sächsischen Civil-Verdienst-Ordens", always called himself "von Grassi", died a wealthy man on 7 January 1838, at his home at Moritzstraße 752 in Dresden. His grave on the Old Catholic Cemetery is not preserved. Since his work mostly consisted of miniature portraits of members of the nobility and other wealthy citizens, most of his paintings are in private ownership today and can rarely be seen at exhibitions. This public underrepresentation of his artistic oeuvre seems to be the main reason that weak and technically flawed pieces of work, such as the *not really new* supposed Mozart portrait are being attributed to this great artist.

 

© Dr. Michael Lorenz 2013

Updated: 13 May 2025

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"The Newly Discovered Mozart Portrait": Back to Reality

On 11 January 2013 the Mozarteum in Salzburg published a press release that contained the following page:

The gist of this announcement is as follows:

The Mozart Discovery. Hitherto the small portrait on a tobacco box came with a huge question mark. Now it is certain: it shows a portrait if the composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart! In the course of a thorough study of all the documents and sources this portrait could definitely be identified as a Mozart portrait from 1783. The miniature shows a striking resemblance to the 1829 engraving by the Dresden engraver Gottschick, wh with this engraving refers to a miniature by Grassi. The portrait on the box could well be a work by Grassi, because Mozart and the painter met each other in Vienna.

Here is the page in the book about the exhibition that deals with the supposed Mozart miniature: 

What we read here, quickly takes us down from the spheres of "sensationally new discoveries" to the low grounds of only too well-known dull speculation. The "certainty" that the press release has been bragging about is gone and the shadow of "we don't really know anything for sure" is lying heavily on the the portrait's supposed authenticity:

Joseph Maria[sic!] Grassi (1757-1838)?[sic!] [...] The miniature shows a striking resemblance to the 1829 engraving by the Dresden engraver Gottschick who refers to a 1785 miniature by Grassi. The portrait on the box could[sic!] well be a 1783 work by Grassi or done from a 1783 model, when Mozart and the painter met each other in Vienna. Possibly[sic!] the object is identical with the "box lid that was done not long after his death, probably based on speculation" as the widow [Constanze Mozart] put it in 1800. It is conceivable[sic] that there were several Grassi miniatures of this portrait which looks unfamiliar to us today.

Thus, the whole "sensation" simply boils down to the following points:

• There is no proof that this miniature was intended to show Mozart.
• There is no proof that it was done from life.
• The miniature is being attributed to Joseph Grassi in the book based only on a handwritten[!] note on a copy of Gottschick's 1829 engraving. This note has no provable connection to Gottschick who (for reasons not difficult to imagine) did not put this attribution on his engraving, but only wrote "Nach einem Miniaturgemälde 1785, gestochen von Gottschick 1829".

• From a purely technical point of view this portrait is starkly at odds with Grassi's work and does not fit into the corpus of his oeuvre. Dr. Großpietsch seems to have delved very lightly into Grassi's life, since he does not even know the painter's correct forenames and erroneously calls him "Joseph Maria" (while his name was Joseph Mathias).
• The dating of the portrait with the appearance of Grassi's name in a Mozart letter is totally arbitrary. There is no provable connection between Mozart and Grassi, apart from the fact that at a ball in 1783 both of them took part in a pantomime.
• None of the information presented by the Mozarteum on p. 96 of the book about the exhibition is new. The information simply copies research that has already been published in 2008 by Dr. Richard Bauer in his book Das rekonstruierte Antlitz (Neustadt an der Aisch: 2008). Bauer is not being given credit by the Mozarteum in connection with the miniature portrait in question.

The articles in the book published by the Mozarteum are classic examples of the deep lack of logical thinking among scholars, who seem to be dazed by the "Salzburg Mozart Bubble" when it comes to logic and a clear methodology in defining *authenticity* in historical portraiture. I will deal with fundamental issues regarding the authenticity of Mozart portraits in an upcoming review of the exhibition book on this blog. 

In the course of a desperate publicity campaign, the Mozarteum took advantage of a journalist's naivete and launched an article in today's New York Times, titled "Wolfgang, Is That You?". In this strangely superficial piece of "popular science" we are being confronted again with the usual mixture of factoids and unsubstantiated conclusions. According to the article in the NYT, "a rummage through the archives found a document showing the object’s provenance". Quote:

The document said Mozart had owned the snuffbox for 10 years and gave it as a gift to Anton Grassi, a sculptor friend in Vienna. Letters from Mozart indicate that Grassi’s brother Joseph, also an artist, painted a miniature of Mozart. Joseph acquired the snuffbox from his brother and attached the miniature, Ms. Ramsauer said.

This mysterious "document" (which could not be located by the Mozarteum experts in the course of the yearslong preparation of their current exhibition) is still unpublished. Since (as stated by Dr. Großpietsch) "Mozart owned several tobacco boxes", its provable[!] connection to the box in question remains doubtful. There is no proof at all that Anton Mathias Grassi (b. 26 June 1755, Vienna, d. 31 December 1807, Vienna) was a "sculptor friend" of Mozart's (as a matter of fact he was a model sculptor at the Imperial Vienna Porcelain Manufactory). To establish a close connection between Anton Grassi and Mozart is an even bigger stretch than the inflation of Joseph Grassi's dancing activities in 1783 into an intimate friendship with the composer. The claim that "Letters[!] from Mozart indicate that Grassi’s brother Joseph, also an artist, painted a miniature of Mozart" is a false and ruthlessly dishonest statement. Grassi does not appear in "letters", but only in one of Mozart's letters to his father on 12 March 1783, where Mozart only reports that "a[sic!] painter (graßi)" appeared as Dottore in a pantomime at a masquerade ball. Any similarity to scholarship is purely coincidental. There is no proof that Grassi ever painted a portrait of Mozart. There is no proof that "Joseph acquired the snuffbox from his brother" or that "he attached the miniature". These claims are all based on reckless speculation. To quote from the NY Times:

One of the most famous portraits — and the one Mozart’s wife, Constanze, considered the most true to life — has long been considered unfinished. It is by Joseph Lange, Mozart’s brother-in-law, and shows him in profile, looking down, his face emerging from a dark background, with a triangle of torso surrounded by scratched white space. The painting, dating from 1789, without doubt looks unfinished, like a classical symphony of two movements.

Fact of the matter is that there is no proof at all that this painting dates from 1789 (contrary to Großpietsch's claim, Franz Segl's 1856 photograph proves absolutely nothing). This dating is based on a mere assumption. No research on Lange's oeuvre and the development of his artistic style has ever been undertaken by the Mozarteum. Quote:

X-ray and infrared analysis performed at the Doerner Institute in Munich, an art research institution, last December, showed that a small completed painting of Mozart’s head and shoulder had been trimmed and mounted at some point on a larger canvas, with paint added around the edges to smooth out the surface. The enlargement was unfinished, not the original.

This paragraph offers no new information at all. It just repeats my 2009 discovery which I published on 19 September 2012, under the title "Joseph Lange's Mozart Portrait" on this blog. When I told Ms. Ramsauer about my discovery in June 2010, I learnt with astonishment that the thought of submitting the painting to X-ray and infrared analysis had never occurred to the Mozarteum curators. Only after my suggestion, did they undertake said analysis which led to the "sensational" results about which the Mozarteum is now bragging. In February 2013, the Mozarteum had the audacity to send me the following statement: "Unfortunately at the time of our press release, we were unaware of the results regarding the Lange portrait that you had published on your blog, because contrary to practice in the scientific community you failed to inform us of a publication about objects from our collection that we had allowed you to consult." The Mozarteum, who employs a librarian for keeping their database of publications up to date, now tries to accuse me of not having properly reported my research. The claim that I "consulted" objects is plain nonsense. I only took a look at the Lange painting which I also could have done by simply visiting the museum, had they not removed the painting from the exhibition. Of course, I do not quarrel with the fact that with this media announcement regarding the Lange portrait the staff of the Mozarteum is now claiming a priority that is not really theirs. There are so many colleagues who witnessed my discovery back in 2009, that today I can actually lean back and watch the ongoing (and partly embarrassing) events with great amusement. I am proud of my pioneering vision that needed no X-ray analysis to discover the truth about Lange's Mozart portrait already four years ago.

Joseph Grassi's signature (which appears on none of his supposed "Mozart portraits")

© Dr. Michael Lorenz 2013

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Postscript (January 2014)

The document that according to the 2013 article in the New York Times, "said Mozart had owned the snuffbox for ten years and gave it as a gift to Anton Grassi, a sculptor friend in Vienna" has still not been published by the Mozarteum. 

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Postscript (January 2015)

The document that according to the 2013 article in the New York Times, "said Mozart had owned the snuffbox for ten years and gave it as a gift to Anton Grassi, a sculptor friend in Vienna" has still not been published by the Mozarteum.

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Postscript (May 2025)

In an essay entitled "Grassis Mozart Porträt. Die Revision einer Miniatur" (Mozart-Jahrbuch 2014, 257-93), in which all kinds of heavy props of scholarship were dragged onto the stage, Christoph Großpietsch presented the miniature in question as an "authentic Mozart portrait" by Grassi. To make matters worse, in this essay, the collector Aloys Fuchs was presented as the main witness to the authenticity of the miniature and was even referred to as a "manuscript expert." Fuchs was anything but an expert, and his many erroneous "expert opinions" demonstrably prove this. The most notorious example of Fuchs's incompetence is his erroneous opinion about the forged 1790 Schikaneder billet to Mozart "Lieber Wolffgang derweilen schicke ich dir dein Pa Pa Pa zurückh" (Wienbibliothek, H.I.N. 8355). Furthermore, Fuchs misidentified Freystädtler's counterpoint studies (A-Sm, Autogr Var 2) as "Mozarts eigenhändig geschriebene Uibungen"; and (to name only one of countless other examples) he "guaranteed the authenticity of the above musical notation of the great W. A. Mozart" of a fragment of the Church Sonata K. Anh. C 16.01 (US-NYpm, M9397.C559), which is actually a copy written by Leopold Mozart. However, even with the greatest effort, the two main obstacles to authenticating the miniature cannot be argued away: 1) The person depicted on the miniature bears no resemblance to Mozart, and 2) the painting technique and style of the miniature do not fit into Grassi’s oeuvre at all.

The "Newly Identified" Mozart Portrait

The Mozarteum recently issued a press release regarding "sensational discoveries" in Mozart portraiture which contains statements that are likely to mislead the public. 1) The "Boy with the Bird's Nest" (attributed to Zoffany) "does not show Mozart and is a fake". As a matter of fact that this painting does not show Mozart had been known to art historians for ages. The painting is not a fake, but a misattribution by greedy sellers and/or wishful "experts" who already existed at the Mozarteum back in 1925. 2) "The Unfinished Lange portrait had been already finished before it was enlarged which has been proven by X-ray analysis". This fact was already uncovered by me back in March 2009 without any X-ray and the recent analysis was only carried out after I had suggested this procedure to Dr. Ramsauer in June 2010. 3) "The miniature on ivory on a tobacco box definitely shows Mozart" (quote: "Nun ist es sicher"). As a matter of fact this miniature (Mozart-Museum Salzburg, Inv. Nr. 90/47) has already been identified as genuine Mozart portrait five years ago by the historian (and retired head of the Munich City Archive) Dr. Richard Bauer in his excellent book "Das rekonstruierte Antlitz" (Neustadt an der Aisch: 2008, pp. 6-11). Revaluating the sources (among others Constanze Mozart's letter to Breitkopf & Härtel from 21 July 1800 and the 1829 engraving by Christian Benjamin Gottschick) Bauer came to the conclusion that the portrait "is an en-face-portrait of Mozart dating from the mid 1780s". However (and in my opinion quite correctly) Bauer doubts the attribution to Joseph Mathias Grassi (hilariously misnamed "Joseph Maria Grassi" by the Mozarteum staffer Dr. Christoph Großpietsch), because Grassi, who was personally acquainted with Mozart, would not have written "Joh: Mozart" on the back of the painting and the execution of the portrait is starkly at odds with Grassi's elegant style. Furthermore the attribution to Grassi is only based on a very dubious 1792 engraving, listed among Mozart portraits by Constant von Wurzbach in 1868 (32. "J. v. Grassi p. 1785, Gottschick sc. 1792") that has never been verified. (Gottschick would have been 16 years of age in 1792). It is to be hoped that Bauer's 2008 identification and my 2009 discovery will be referred to by the Mozarteum in the catalogue of its upcoming exhibition.