Johann Ernst II Count Herberstein and the Commissions for the Parish Church of St Leonard in Slovenske gorice

Abstract

Based on archival data from parish ledgers and their enclosed documents, the paper analyses the hitherto un- known commissions and patronage of Johann Ernst II Count Herberstein (1709–1780) in the St Leonard parish in Slovenske gorice in the second half of the 18th century. New attributions made based on archival data provide context to his previously known commissions, enabling a comparison with commissions of residential furnishings and providing a departing point for their further analyses. Herberstein commissioned church furnishings from privileged artists from the Styrian capital of Graz: sculptor Johannes Piringer (1709–1788), and painters Johann Baptist Anton Raunacher (1729–1771) and Anton Jantl (1723–1805), all of whom had participated in the renovations of residences of his relative Carl Leopold Count Herberstein-Pusterwald (1712–1789) and his wife, Maria Eleonora, nee Princess of Eggenberg.