Caspar Wolf, 'The Geltenbach Falls with an Ice Bridge', about 1778

Geltenbach Falls (the Geltenschuss) lies in the Lauenen Valley, to the west of Ober Simmental in the Canton of Bern, and consists of two separate falls with a narrow ravine between. Wolf painted this view as a preparatory study for a picture (Oskar Reinhart Collection ‘Am Römerholz’, Winterthur), painted for Abraham Wagner’s engraving project, Remarkable Views of the Swiss Mountains, on which Wolf started work in 1773. The eroded rocks dominate the picture surface to such a degree that only a small amount of sky is glimpsed at the top. In the foreground a spring thaw has transformed the solid ice into a delicate ice bridge, whose elegant serpentine form contrasts with the formidable rock formations behind, out of which the waterfall surges.

Wagner’s project was indicative of the growing scientific and artistic interest in the Alps in the late eighteenth century. In Wolf’s many excursions into the mountains undertaken for the commission, he learned about glaciology and geology, and studied the rock and water formations in close detail. He was the first artist to penetrate so deeply into the mountains, and his views heralded the grand age of Alpine landscape painting of the nineteenth century.