FUHRICH, JOSEPH VON (180o-1876), Austrian painter, was born at Kratzau in Bohemia on Feb. 9, 1800. He was cele brated as a composer of scriptural episodes, and his sacred sub jects were transferred in numberless repetitions to the roadside churches of the Austrian State. Fdhrich has been fairly described as a "Nazarene," a romantic religious artist whose pencil gave shape to countless incidents of the gospel and scriptural legends. He composed with great skill, especially in outline. His mastery of distribution, form, movement and expression was considerable. He had, however, no feeling for colour ; and when he produced monumental pictures he was not nearly so successful as when designing subjects for woodcuts. Fiihrich's illustrations to Tieck's Geno f eva, the Lord's Prayer, the Triumph of Christ, the Road to Bethlehem, the Succession of Christ according to Thomas a Kempis, the Prodigal Son, and the verses of the Psalter, became well known. In 1834 he was made custos and in 184o professor of composition in the academy of Vienna. After this he completed the monumental pictures of the Church of St. Nepomuk. In 1872 he was pensioned and made a knight of the order of Franz Joseph. He died on March 13, 1876.
See Mor. Dreger, Jos. Fiihrich (1912) ; H. V. Worndle, Jos. v. Fiihrichs Werke (1914) ; also his autobiography published in 1875 and a memoir by his son, Lucas (1886) .