Double Portrait of the West Sisters

At the time Vogelstein executed this portrait of the sisters Mary Catherine and Elizabeth West, he was a professor at the Dresden Academy and an accomplished portraitist who specialized in incisive pencil studies. He had spent seven years in Rome with the Nazarenes, and his lucid, linear style reveals the influence of their portraits. This sheet is a rare portrayal by Vogelstein outside the Dresden Kupferstichkabinett, which holds the majority of his drawn oeuvre of over 700 portraits.