The subject of this mythological painting is the German legend about Parsifal, the  work depicts the knight Parsifal on horseback, moving through fairy forest.

The legend of Parzival (or Parsifal) tells the story of a young, naive knight who grows up unaware of his origins. After many trials and tribulations through knightly adventures and encounters, particularly with the mysterious Grail and its guardians in the castle of Montsalvat, through suffering (especially at the hands of the Grail King Amfortas) and through his own failings, he attains enlightenment and redemption, ultimately becoming a pure fool who gains wisdom through compassion and redeems the Grail. The best-known versions are Wolfram von Eschenbach's Middle High German verse romance (c. 1200) and Richard Wagner's opera "Parsifal" (1882), which explores the theme of religious redemption.

The story is a profound exploration of themes such as guilt, redemption, compassion, temptation, and the search for one's own path and place in the world, interwoven with religious and philosophical elements.

This mystical painting was executed around 1900 by Austrian portrait, genre, landscape and military painter Franz Horst ( 1862 Vienna - 1950 Klosterneuburg).

He attended the Department of Ornamental Painting at the Vienna School of Applied Arts, where his teachers were Friedrich Sturm and Michael Rieser. Later, he studied at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts under Christian Griepenkerl, Carl Wurzinger, and August Eisenmenger. From 1887, Horst worked in Vienna-Döbling, and from 1896 primarily in Klosterneuburg, exhibiting at the local art association for decades. He was represented at the Vienna Künstlerhaus's anniversary exhibition in 1908 with the oil painting "Klosterneuburg Abbey in the Snow. In 1932, he was awarded the Silver State Medal.

In 1899, he was commissioned by the Austro-Hungarian Army to paint scenes from a military maneuver. These paintings are now located, among other places, in the... in the Vienna Museum of Military History.

Literature: Prof.H.Fuchs, Lexicon of Austrian artists, Vienna, 1975; in on-line: Wikipedia.

Inscription: signed  lower right; on the back of the stretcher - the label of previous painting's owner.

Technique: oil on canvas. Original period frame.

Measurements: unframed w 39 1/3" x h 25" (100 x 63,5 cm), framed w 46" x h 31 7/8" (117 x 81 cm).

Condition: in  good condition.