The young boy with the stable-lantern / The Young Stableboy with a Stable Lamp

Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller (Austrian German: [ˈfɛrdinand ˈɡeːɔrɡ ˈvaldmʏlɐ] ; 15 January 1793 – 23 August 1865) was an Austrian painter. Waldmüller was one of the most important Austrian painters of the Biedermeier period.

In 1807, Waldmüller attended the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna. He lived in Pressburg, Hungary and, in 1811, he worked as a teacher of arts for the children of Count Gyulay in Croatia. He returned to the Academy of Vienna and studied portrait painting. In 1814 he married the singer Katharina Weidner, and subsequently went on tour with her, working as a set designer.

In 1817, Waldmüller returned to Vienna and spent much time copying the works of old masters and painting portraits, genre subjects, and still-life. In 1823 he made a portrait of Ludwig van Beethoven, now part of the musical collection of the Kunsthistorisches Museum (KHM) in Vienna. Waldmüller later became interested in nature and started painting landscapes, which in their loving attention to detail illustrate Waldmuller's belief that the close study of nature should be the basis of painting.