Claudius Triumph, Alexander von Wagner (Hungarian, 1838-1919) Date unknown (Likely 1870s or later), Gift of Emile E. Watson, Florida Southern College Permanent collection.
For an artist whose signature work is so recognizable internationally as the emblematic illustration of the Roman chariot race, it is especially shocking that neither von Wagner nor his most famous painting has been the subject of any substantial research or solo exhibition. As a result, von Wagner is a bit of an art historical cipher. As the first deep foray into the legacy of his chariot race paintings, The Von Wagner Code is an important key to unlocking the mystery of not merely our own recovered masterwork but also of von Wagner himself.
We do know a few particulars about von Wagner. He created many closely-related variants of paintings on the theme of the chariot race as early as 1873 in Munich. The Roman Chariot Race, as the painting was originally known, was already extremely famous within years of its first two iterations in the 1870s (one is the so-called Vienna Exposition version; the other the Philadelphia version of the mid-1870s, definitive whereabouts of both unknown). It traveled the world and inspired the public with its Ancient Roman theme. Von Wagner’s finalized, enlarged, and only known extant version of the painting from around 1882 — projected on the rear wall of this gallery — carries the simplified title The Chariot Race.