The pediment of a Doric building amid dense vegetation; and A study for the same

Professor Dr. Helmut Börsch-Supan has kindly confirmed the attribution of the present lot to Schinkel. The scenes on the pediment show a mother in labour to the left, with an infant being laid in a crib to the right, and with a central group with the Virgin and Child attended by saints and dignitaries. Professor Dr. Börsch-Supan notes that this subject, combined with a rose tree symbolising love, ivy symbolising eternity, and a winged figure holding sheaves of plenty, may indicate that the drawing was commissioned to celebrate the birth of an heir. In 1836, the year of the finished watercolour, Schinkel visited the Bohemian spas, and given the mountain landscape visible in the distance, Professor Dr. Börsch-Supan suggests that the watercolor may have been worked up from the initial sketch for an international, possibly Russian, patron.