Heinrich Bürkel (1802-69) the son of an inn-keeper, showed an early aptitude for drawing and used the sights in and around the inn as subject matter. At fifteen he began training as a lawyer, but by the age of twenty he began to focus on painting, and learned the techniques of oil painting among friends in Munich, Schleissheim, and in the Netherlands. He studied at the Academy in Munich, travelled in Italy with Georg Köbell, and was made an honorary member of the Academies in Vienna, Dresden and Munich. He painted genre scenes, and landscapes with figures and animals. Bürkel dealt with a similar theme in his painting 'A Village Blacksmith' (1826; Hamburger Kunsthalle) 

The inscription over the rustic structure in this painting reads 'Bolciano Veterinaio' ('Bolzano Vet'); its title in the Osborne Inventory of 1876 is given simply as 'The Forge'. Travellers and their donkeys with loaded saddlebags rest in the shade in front of a blacksmith's forge, which has a vine-clad balcony on the upper floor; the blacksmith emerges from the entrance to meet two friars with mules; on the right, a rough village street bordered by houses and, in the distance, a hilltop town with mountains beyond.