Portrait of Maria Theresia, Queen of Saxony

This drawing by nineteenth-century German portraitist Carl Christian Vogel von Vogelstein portrays Maria Theresa (or Maria Theresia), Queen of Saxony (1767-1827), at the age of 60. Dated 1827, it is one of a group of portrait drawings the artist made at the Saxon court in Dresden that were subsequently reproduced in print by lithographer Ludwig Theodor Zöllner. It also relates directly to--and may well have served as a model for--the painted portrait Vogel made of Maria Theresa (the primary version of which is in the National Gallery Prague), together with a pendant of King Anthony (Anton), on the occasion of the couple's ascension in 1827, just six months before the queen's death.

The drawing, and the related oil and print, were produced in the wake of a turbulent period that witnessed the Napoleonic Wars, the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire, and, eventually, the establishment of the German Confederation. The Kingdom of Saxony, which had fallen under French control during the wars, emerged much diminished, with sixty percent of its territory ceded to Prussia at the Congress of Vienna. Against the backdrop of continued debate about the political and religious borders of the Saxon state, visual representations of Maria Theresa--daughter of former Holy Roman Emperor Leopold II--may have held special significance.