Eine Auftragsarbeit Paul Trogers für Trebitsch (Třebíč) : zur Identifikation eines ursprünglichen Bildes vom Hauptaltar der Pfarrkirche St. Martin

The last ten years of his life belong to the little-considered sections of the life and work of the Vienna-based painter Paul Troger (1698–1762). The start of the 1750s had already brought significant changes into his personal and professional life; these also significantly subdued his creative activity, which was further limited by health problems from the mid-1750s onwards. In practice these prevented him from personal involvement in work on frescos. Although Troger continued to accept commissions, he entrusted their implementation to a large extent to his collaborators and former students of the Vienna Academy (Josef Hauzinger, Franz Zoller). A certain space for him to work alone was offered by the painting of hanging and altar pictures, which did not require such physical effort. An interesting individual contribution to our knowledge of this final period of Troger's work is offered by a previously unnoticed and unassigned picture St Martin sharing his cloak with a beggar from the collections of the Moravian Gallery in Brno. With the help of reports on sources, this painting can be clearly identified with an original image painted around 1758 for the main altar of the parish church of St Martin in Třebíč. Troger was probably contacted by his friend, sculptor Josef Winterhalder the Elder (1702–1769), approached after 1755 regarding the construction of a new main altar. Troger accepted the commission, but the painting itself was then painted by one of his collaborators.