Willroider was the son of the city architect Josef Willroider and his wife Josefa, née Kleinberger. His older brother was Ludwig Willroider. He first completed a craft training in his father's carpentry workshop before he received his first painting lessons from Jakob Canciani (1820-1891), who was also based in Villach. Willroider went to Munich in 1860 at the age of 22 to continue his self-study and to study at the Munich Academy there. Nevertheless, he is often referred to as an autodidact, which seems justified insofar as he did not permanently join a master in his academic years. In any case, an important influence during this period was his acquaintance with Eduard Schleich the Elder, who had already toured France with Carl Spitzweg in the early 1850s and thus became the earliest and most important mediator of the new landscape conception of the Barbizon and Fontainebleau painters within the Munich landscape painting was. In 1866 Willroider went to Düsseldorf for over two decades. He stayed there until 1889. [2] In Düsseldorf he made the acquaintance of the brothers Andreas Achenbach and Oswald Achenbach, of whom the former, with his fascination for the Dutch landscape, certainly exerted the most lasting influence on the artist. Oswald Achenbach was a professor there from 1863 to 1872. With colorful depictions of southern landscapes, he brought a new, fresh sound to the German scene, which was more influenced by the muted studio tone of Dutch landscape painting of the 17th century. Like his brother Andreas, who preferred Nordic landscapes and seascapes, he was decisive for the Düsseldorf school of painting at the time Willroider was living in Düsseldorf. In 1870, Willroider joined the famous Malkasten artists 'association, the artists' association in which the more progressive Düsseldorf landscape painters, who set themselves apart from academic traditionalism and rather pursued contemporary open-air painting based on the French model, gathered. During this time Willroider undertook several study trips, mainly to northern Germany, but more often also to Holland. In 1882 he was made an honorary member of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Munich, and his landscapes are regularly sold in the art association's exhibitions. In 1883 this honor was also given to his brother Ludwig, to whom the Prince Regent Luitpold also conferred the title of professor in 1886. In 1889 he returned to Munich, where he and his brother Ludwig, who was seven years younger than him, moved into a studio in Arkostraße. The 1870s and 1880s brought both brothers to the fore in the top ranks of German landscape painting. He found his motifs above all on Lake Starnberg and in the vicinity of Bernried, where he was staying with his brother. In Josef Willroider's work, the Carinthian landscapes take up a comparatively large area. His views from the Wörthersee with the characteristic view from Maria Wörth are worth mentioning here, but Villach and its surroundings also appear again and again in his pictures. The two brothers had not only received the official recognition they deserved with their painting, but with their artistic work they had established a firm place in the history of German landscape painting.

Literature: Thieme/Becker "Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart"; Prof.H.Fuchs "Austrian Painters ", Vienna, 1975.

Inscription: signed lower left, antique bronze plaque with the artist´s name mounted to the frame.

Technique: framed oil on canvas.

Measurements: unframed w 17 7/8 " x h 13 " (45,5 x 33 cm); framed w 25 2/3 " x h 20 2/3" (65 x 52,5 cm)

Condition: in very good condition..