Bartsch joined the staff of the Royal Court Library in Vienna in 1777, after studying engraving at the Vienna Kupferstecheracademie, and became Head curator of the print collection in 1791. He was also an advisor to Duke Albert of Saxe-Teschen, who founded the collection of the Albertina, Vienna, then as now the world's finest collection of old master prints. In the twentieth century the two collections were merged in the Albertina.
Between 1803 and his death in 1821 Bartsch published in French in 21 volumes Le Peintre Graveur, a pioneering catalogue of old master prints by Dutch, Flemish, German, and Italian painter-engravers from the 15th to the 17th century. References to "Bartsch" normally mean this work. It has been reprinted five times, most recently in 1982.
Bartsch established what has become the definitive numbering system, bearing his name (eg "Bartsch 17" or "B17"), for Rembrandt etchings and the prints of many other artists, which is still used or at least referred to most subsequent and standard works in this field. In his lifetime, Bartsch executed over 500 plates from his own designs and from those of other masters.
