Swiss poet and artist, born at Zurich; served an apprenticeship to a bookseller in Berlin, and after a sojourn in Hamburg returned to Zurich, where the rest of his life was spent; he published several volumes of poetry, chiefly pastoral and of no great value; his "Death of Abel" is his most notable performance; his paintings are mainly landscapes of a conventional type, several of which he engraved, revealing better abilities as an engraver than as an artist (1730-1788).