Michael Wutky was an Austrian rococo landscape painter specialized in Italian scenes, famous for his paintings of the eruptions of Vesuvius. In 1759 he began studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna with Martin van Meytens. Initially a history painter, he was not very successful in this field. In 1770, he became a member of the Academy. When he did not receive a scholarship to travel to Italy, he began his artistic training on his own. Once there, he devoted himself to landscape painting, which turned out to be his true forte. He is best known for the pictures he painted during a stay in Naples. Vesuvius was particularly active at the time, and he took the opportunity to capture close-up scenes of eruptions and lava flows. Accompan...