Joseph Kellerhoven

He was the son of Moritz Kellerhoven, court painter for Charles Theodore, Elector of Bavaria and, in 1808, one of the first professors at the expanded Academy of Fine Arts, Munich. Joseph entered the Academy in 1809 and received practical training in the history painting department. His father was his primary teacher, but he also studied with Joseph Hauber, Andreas Seidl (painter) and Johann Georg von Dillis. He exhibited his works for the first time in 1814. In 1818, he married Friederike Feiler, the daughter of Friedrich Feiler, an official in the Prussian Ministry of War. Shortly after, he moved to Speyer, to accept a position as a drawing teacher at the Royal gymnasium. In 1825, the city opened a trade school, so he left the gymnasium to accept a similar position there, as the salary was higher. Friederike died two years later, aged only twenty-nine. Both of their sons died before reaching adulthood. After 1839, he worked as an art teacher at the newly-established Catholic school. In 1840, he remarried, to Elisabeth Werner, the daughter of a local landowner. The marriage remained childless. In 1842, he suffered what was most likely a brain hemorrhage, which left him partially paralyzed and unable to work. Elisabeth cared for him until his death, seven years later.