German architects of the Renaissance. School encyclopedia
Germany by the beginning of the 16th century. was fragmented into many dwarf states. It was a time of clashing interests of different classes and religious storms. The flowering of culture in Germany was not as organic as in Italy. There was no antique heritage of its own; antiquity became known only through processing by the Italians. Unlike becoming secular art In Italy and Germany, religiosity is not diminished; humanist theologians advocate the renewal of the Catholic Church.
The “Seasons” cycle included six paintings, each of which was dedicated to two months. Preserved: "Harvest", "Haymaking", "Dark Day", "Hunters in the Snow" and "Return of the Herd"
Germany, being in the center of Europe, was subjected to external influences. Developing in the general mainstream of the European Renaissance, German art advanced in many ways in my own way. In the art of Germany XV-XVI centuries. reminiscences of the Gothic appeared. Importance for development German art had local artistic traditions. Mystical writers of the XIII-XIV centuries. gave rich material to artists of the next two centuries.
The art of the German Renaissance took shape during one of the most dramatic periods in German history. In 1453, Byzantium fell. Heretical teachings spread. Many expected the end of the world in 1500.
Albrecht Durer (1471-1528). The Renaissance in Germany is called the era of Durer. Dürer is the first German artist whose popularity was pan-European during his lifetime.
Albrecht Dürer, like many creators of the Renaissance, was a universal personality. His talent equally developed in engraving, painting, and art theory. His creative credo is expressed in the treatise “Four Books on Proportions”, in which he wrote, addressing the artist: “do not shy away from nature in the hope that you could find the best yourself, for you will be deceived, for, truly, art lies in nature: whoever knows how to discover it owns it.”
Dürer was born in Nuremberg into the family of a jeweler in 1471. He was the third child in a large family. Albrecht received his first drawing skills in his father's workshop, then studied with Michael Wolgemut for three years in the largest workshop in the city. On December 1, 1489, Dürer completed his studies and, according to the guild rules, went to travel around the cities of Germany. The wanderings lasted 4 years. In 1493, Dürer painted his first self-portrait, appearing as a dreamy young man with a flower in his hand. In the spring of 1494, Dürer was summoned by his father to Nuremberg, where he married the daughter of an influential Nuremberg burgher, mechanic and musician Hans Frey, 15-year-old Agnes.
Soon after the wedding, the artist went to Italy. During his stay in Italy, Dürer paid a lot of attention to the depiction of the naked body. Returning from Venice to Nuremberg, Dürer captured the Alpine mountains and the cities lying on his way in numerous watercolors (“View of Innsbruck” 1495, “View of Trient”).
Woodcut (from the Greek Xylon - wood and grapho - I write) is a woodcut when a printing form is imprinted using letterpress printing - from the flat surface of a wooden board coated with paint.
1495-1500 - Start independent activity, when, having returned from Italy, the artist simultaneously began to try himself in painting, wood engraving and copper engraving. Dürer created engravings of mythological, everyday and literary subjects. He works on altar images, giving them realistic authenticity. Dürer's portraits marked the beginning of the flowering of this genre in German painting. By the end of the 90s. his name becomes famous not only in Germany, but also in Europe, mainly due to the popularity of engravings. The main thing for Dürer at this time was woodcuts. He turned to the common single-sheet woodcut, and eventually moved on to creating a series of engravings, bound in the form of bound books with accompanying text on the back of the sheets. In the second half of the 90s. Dürer goes to new technology: He introduces shading into the form with curving lines, applying intersecting strokes that give deep shadows. Among the best woodcuts of this period are “St. Catherine" 1498, series of engravings "Apocalypse". The descriptions of the disasters and destruction of mankind contained in the Apocalypse made a strong impression at that time. Dürer's illustrations reflect reformist sentiments. Babylon is papal Rome, and the characters are dressed in modern German and Venetian costumes. The series consists of 15 engravings, to which Dürer later added title page. Earlier sheets - “Opening of the Seventh Seal”, “Worship of the Father” are distinguished by the abundance of figures, in later ones - “Seven Lamps” - the figures are enlarged, the forms are interpreted more generally. The final page of "Heavenly Jerusalem" shows how an angel locks the defeated Satan in the underworld. Another angel shows John the Heavenly Jerusalem, which looks like medieval city with massive gates and numerous towers.
The second series of woodcuts is called "Great Passions". It was completed only in 1510-1511. The first 7 leaves tell about the most tragic episodes of the life of Christ (“Prayer for the Cup”, “Flagellation”, “Behold the Man”, “Carrying the Cross”, “Mourning” and “Entombment”). One of the most popular sheets in the series was “Carrying the Cross,” in which Dürer presented Christ falling under the weight of the cross.
The subjects of copper engravings are varied. These are mythological, literary, and everyday stories. One of the most famous works - « Prodigal son" Among the genre images is “Three Peasants”.
The engraving "Melancholy" of 1514 is one of the most mysterious works Durer. It depicts a woman sitting alone in laurel wreath, personifying creative genius. She has a bunch of keys and a wallet on her side, a closed book on her lap, right hand compass is a symbol of geometry and construction art. There are scales hanging on the wall behind the woman, hourglass, bell and magic square. Main character Dürer is a person whom the artist places at the center of the universe. Dürer creates a generalizing type of Renaissance man in Self-Portrait.
Etching (French eai fort - letters, strong vodka, i.e. nitric acid) - a type of engraving on metal, where in-depth elements printed form created by etching metal with acids. The scratched recesses are filled with paint and the board is covered with moistened paper, receiving an imprint on a special machine.
1500, portrait of the Unknown 1504, portrait of Pirkheimer 1524. In the self-portrait of 1500, Dürer depicted himself in the image of Christ. Dürer placed his self-portraits in many paintings, he signed full name Almost all of his major works were monogrammed on engravings and even drawings. In portraits, the influence of the Dutch school is reflected in the careful finishing of details; portraits are characterized by extraordinary expressiveness.
Dürer anticipated the emergence of the mood landscape; he believed that everything in nature is worthy of being captured - a piece of turf, a rabbit.
In the painting “The Four Apostles” Dürer created monumental figures of people full of feeling self-esteem, confident in their strength.
In their theoretical works Dürer divided craft, which is based on skill, and art, which is based on theory. In 1525, Dürer published “Guide to Measuring with Compasses and Ruler”, a year later - “Instructions for Strengthening Cities, Castles and Fortresses”, after Dürer’s death, which followed in 1528, his work “Four Books on Human Proportions” was published. .
Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472-1553) was born into a family of artists in Upper Franconia, studied with his father, then settled in Thuringia, becoming the court painter of the Saxon Elector. Cranach was familiar
with Luther, illustrated his works. IN early works Cranach combines drama and lyricism. Everything in the landscapes is lovingly and carefully painted. In monumental altar compositions (“Altar of St. Catherine”, “Princely Altar”) the artist also uses genre motifs. His “Mary and Child” and “Venus” are close to Italian models, with which he was well acquainted. In portraits of his contemporaries, Cranach sought to convey in detail all the details of the external appearance.
IN last period The master's creativity is dominated by mythological and fairy tales, features of mannerism appear.
Albrecht Altdorfer (c. 1480-1538), head of the "Danube School". Worked in Southern Germany and Austria. The themes of his paintings are biblical and mythological.
Altdorfer's drawings are full-fledged works of art. In 1510, “Forest Landscape with the Battle of St. George", in which the desire for tonal painting most fully expressed. The beginning of the master's maturity was marked by the creation of the altar of the St. Florian monastery near the Austrian city of Linz in 1516-1518. The height of the altar is 2 m 70 cm, there are 16 paintings on it. When the doors are closed, 4 paintings with scenes from the legend of St. Sebastians. When the first pair of doors opened, the viewer saw eight paintings depicting the passion of Christ.
Cranach and Luther knew each other; in 1522, Cranach used his own money to publish Luther’s work “The September Gospel”, providing it with engravings. The scenes “Entombment” and “Resurrection” were written on the outside of the doors. Top row consisted of night scenes and “The Flagellation of Christ.” The lower one included scenes in bright daylight. In all compositions the horizon line was at the same level. All scenes are permeated with a seething passion, sometimes hidden, sometimes bursting out. The dramatic intensity is especially evident in the almost Boschian grotesqueness. In all scenes, Christ is the sacrifice intended by God for slaughter. Color is the most remarkable feature of altar painting. In “The Prayer of the Cup,” red reflections are painted on a background of pure gold. The most amazing work Altdorfer's "Battle of Alexander and Darius" 1529; in it the action takes place against the backdrop of a grandiose landscape shown from above.
In the work of the artists of the “Danube School”, but not only theirs, there is a unity of man with nature. Reliance on antiquity was worn in German Renaissance dual character. Artists willingly took subjects from ancient history and mythology. But the ancient Greek and Roman plots are far from being solved in the ancient spirit.
Grunewald, this has been wrong since the 17th century. began to be called the largest German painter, architect Matthias Niethardt (c. 1470-1528). Niethardt worked in Frankfurt am Main, Mainz, was a court painter of the Mainz
archbishops and electors. The artist’s work most fully expressed the national spirit, his worldview is close to the people’s, religious images interpreted in the spirit of mystical heresies. In a creative manner Grunewald is characterized by drama and expression, a special relationship between color and light. The most famous work Grunewald - “Izengei Altar” was a monumental nine-part composition, complemented by painted wood sculpture. In the center of the composition is the scene of the crucifixion of Christ, filled with deep tragedy, conveying torment and pain.
Silver lead produces colorless, indelible lines
on primed or tinted paper. The drawing with a silver lead does not allow blots.
Lucarne (fr. lucarne) - window opening various shapes in a roof slope or dome.
Hotel (French hotel) - in French architecture- a city mansion, usually located on a relatively cramped area, set back deep into the territory and fenced off from the street and neighboring areas by closed buildings of service wings and high stone fences, forming a closed courtyard with a main entrance from the street. The garden is located behind the main building.
Hans Holbein the Younger (c. 1497-1543), a quarter of a century younger than Dürer, developed as an artist during the maturity of the Renaissance, becoming its most prominent figure. Holbein of all German artists was closest to Italian Renaissance. The life of the artist is known only in the most general outline. In the house of Hans Holbein the Elder's father, famous painter, he comprehends the basics of painting. Wanders as an apprentice, in mature age works in France, the Netherlands, since 1532 he remains living in England, where he is patronized by Thomas More and Henry VIII. The most strengths Holbein's talents were drawing and portraiture. Holbein's early portraits were created using the silver pencil technique; after 1522, the master more often resorted to more soft materials- black and colored chalk pencils. The artist paints his later portraits on pink paper, which gives warmth to the human face.
1 - German Renaissance
From the beginning of the century until the end of the Thirty Years' War, the German Renaissance style dominated the architecture of German cities, with frequent Gothic elements and a strong Italian influence. The most outstanding German architects of this era are considered to be Paul Franke, Heinrich Schickhardt and Elias Goll
Among the horrors of the Thirty Years' War, economic, spiritual and artistic life German Empire. Change trade routes, which now, after the great discoveries on the other side of the ocean, bypassed their former hubs, the art-rich Upper German cities, and directed towards the coastal cities of northwestern Europe, contributed to the economic and artistic impoverishment of the German states. In the middle of the 17th century, Germany in all areas higher culture was likened to a desert, in the sands of which only isolated springs, fed from afar, made their way. The few skilled artists whom Germany produced at this time became foreigners in the foreign lands whither their earnings attracted them. But even before the end of the Thirty Years' War, crowds of foreigners were summoned to Germany by spiritual and secular princes, who only partially took the interests of art to heart; in the Catholic south it was mainly Italians, in the Protestant north the Dutch, and in the end both there and here mainly French. With the help of these foreign masters, their artists again rose to creative power and independent results only on the transition to XVIII century. If German art of the first decades of the 17th century still belongs German Renaissance, grasping at its shoots, then the history of German art at the end of the 17th century cannot be separated from its history in the 18th century, since both constitute one historical whole. To trace the artistic successes of our fatherland throughout the seventeenth century is not so gratifying as it is instructive, although there will still be no shortage of comforting old memories or hope for the future.
In all areas of church and secular architecture in early XVII centuries, only a few buildings arose that represented the brilliant successes of the “German Renaissance”. They constantly mix together Gothic experiences with individual motifs Italian Renaissance, even Italian Baroque, independently reworked in northern taste. Nordic scrollwork and wrought iron still occupy a significant place in the decoration of the building, if they are not outweighed by the Italian sense of form. In the second decade, these forms of jewelry, based on the shapes of volutes in the form of the auricle, used in different positions, begin to turn into fleshy, as if muscular, somewhat shapeless formations, called “cartilage.” They are most clearly shown in the book of samples by Rutger Kassmann (1659). Posterity reacted, perhaps, too negatively to the aesthetic dignity of these “cartilages”, which took over the frames and narrow fields of the walls and turned inclined forms into outgrowths in the grotesque style. Yet they dominated as German uniform decorations for about a generation, only to disappear again after the Thirty Years' War.
Rice. 181 - Cartilaginous ornament from the "Book of Designs" by Rutger Kassmann
The works of three skilled German architects, who stood at the height of their creative power around 1600, best introduce us to the German late Renaissance. The oldest of them, Paul Franke (circa 1538-1615), a gifted architect for Duke Henry Julius of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, still essentially belongs to the 16th century; Even in this century, his university building (Uleum) in Helmstedt (1592-1597) arose - a tall building, decorated in both main floors only on the portals and windows, the three-story roof pediment of which is all the more richly decorated with pilasters, niches and statues on the narrow and long sides His second main building, the Church of Mary in Wolfenbüttel (from 1608), was built in the 17th century and is essentially a three-nave Gothic hall church, some of whose forms are borrowed from the Renaissance and Baroque. How unique are the capitals of the octagonal pillars! How free and luxurious the openwork of the windows is! How tense are the “cartilages” of the frames of the longitudinal sides of the pediment, completed, however, after the death of the master.
Second famous architect of this era, Heinrich Schickhardt (1558-1634), architect to Duke Frederick of Württemberg, with whom he visited in 1599-1600. Italy, in his diaries and projects stored in the Stuttgart library, is more vital than in the surviving buildings; but we know that he, a student of Georg Behr, built many useful and art buildings, churches, castles and simple houses. Upon his return from Italy, he developed to artistic independence. Unfortunately, his main work - "New Building" ("Neue Bau"; 1600-1609) of the Stuttgart castle - has survived only in images. The high basement floor of this building carried three more floors under a steep roof. Only the four corner towers and the middle risalit (ledge) with a high pediment were decorated with pilasters. But all the windows and doors are topped with baroque flat pediments with volutes. In general, it gives almost the same impression as a modern city house with apartments.
Another main job Schickhardt founded the “City of Friendship” (“Freudenstadt”) at the height of the Black Forest, intended to shelter Protestant fugitives from Austria. The houses of the large market square (1602), facing the street with a pediment, rest on Doric colonnades. Four corner buildings cut off at right angles - the town hall, Gostiny Dvor, hospital and church - rest on arcades with Ionic columns. Opposite the narrow side of both wings of this peculiar church is a bell tower with a raised dome and a narrowed lantern. Emporas rest on arcades visible from the outside; the mesh vault and the openwork decorations of the balustrades also give a Gothic impression.
Only the third of these architects, Elias Goll of Augsburg (1573-1646), completely abandoned the Gothic language of forms. His autobiography, published by Christian Meier, already ensured his fame in posterity. His art was critically illuminated by Julius Baum. Gaul returned from Italy to Augsburg in 1601, a year later than Schickhardt, and built here in strict style semi-baroque Italian late Renaissance, without abandoning its basic Germanic mood. In the art of dismembering and reviving the general masses, he surpassed all his German contemporaries. Gaulle's buildings gave Augsburg a new imprint, which it still retains to this day. His "Beckenhaus" (1602) carries, like a corner building, above classical facades with pilasters, and on both the narrow and long sides, Germanic high pediments. The magnificent armory (1602-1607) rises to the flat arch of its broken crowning pediment in five richly dissected floors. Strong impression produces Doric, columned, with rustic finishing, portal. Fantastic are the broken pediment frames, in a Baroque style, connecting the round windows on the first upper floor with the square ones placed below them. The butcher shop building (Fleischhaus; 1609), which is only vertically dissected, looks massive and solid, a strong building characteristic of Gaulle’s style, which rejects any borrowing from foreign models. The elongated living room at the wine market (1611) even refuses any added pediments and, dissected only by windows like dormer windows, is concentrated, complete and complete in itself. But my full force Elias Gaulle deployed the town hall (1614-1620). The completed project has the advantage over the earlier, abundant Upper Italian colonnades that it is a true work of the Germanized late Renaissance. With a width of fourteen windows, it has seven rows of windows one above the other in the middle risalit, topped with a half-barred triangular pediment. Pilasters adorn only the two octagonal towers on either side of this pedimented superstructure. Apart from the latter, the massive building is divided in powerful proportions into three parts, both vertically and horizontally.
The architecture of the "German Renaissance", the significance of which we owe to the extensive research of Lübcke, Dohme, Bezold and Hoffmann, then to the photographs and publications of Orthwein and Schaeffer, Fritsch and others, cannot be equal to its Italian sister neither greatness nor logic and clarity. In the layout and body of the building, it retained the established forms. The Gothic cross vault with ribs and Gothic through carving dominated most of the few newly built churches that were now emerging in Germany. The extreme corner towers, during the transition from medieval castles to modern palaces, also often denoted the outer frame of magnificent princely residential buildings equipped with extensive courtyards, the staircases of which inside the outer towers, not to mention exceptions, were still spiral throughout the century. The houses of the townspeople retained their gables on the outside, and in northern Germany inside they had a vestibule, indicating their origin from a Lower Saxon peasant house, while in upper Germany, with richer buildings, they retained a courtyard, through which there is at least one arched gallery connecting the front part of the house with the back. All these buildings become works of the German Renaissance mainly thanks to decorations imitating antique ones, thanks to pilasters and friezes decorated with symmetrical floral curls, vases, cupids and fabulous animals in the spirit of Upper Italian early renaissance and thanks to arbitrarily reworked Greco-Roman capitals, the carriers of which are often “baluster” or “candelabra” columns swollen at the bottom. These new forms of decoration appear primarily on portals, lanterns, stair towers, and pediments. In the German Renaissance, however, from the very beginning there was no shortage of complex multi-story facades with pilasters and half-columns; unfortunately, from the very beginning he lacks only a sense of pure proportions and organic divisions, which manifests itself only in the second half of the century.
They imitate most strictly and organically ancient art, of course, those German architects who themselves visited Italy. Actually, the buildings erected in Germany by the Italians do not belong to the German Renaissance, such as, for example, the beautiful Belvedere pleasure palace in Prague (1536), surrounded by a gallery with semi-circular arcades, then the courtyard of the palace in Landsgut (1536-1547) in the classical style high renaissance, as well as the then pure palace portal (1555) on the Judenhof in Dresden, the buildings of Giovanni Maria Nosseni, described by Makovsky, especially his magnificent princely chapel (1585) in the cathedral in Freiberg and the magnificent Piast palace in Breg (1547), Upper Italian the builders of which, however, with the assistance, of course, of German workers, made so many concessions to German taste that we can classify it as a German Renaissance.
Truly german architecture Renaissance, whose acquaintance with Italian forms is based on the ornaments of engravings and art manuals, comes from the Italianized German ornamentation of the 16th century, first thoroughly illuminated by Lichtwark, and in Lately Dery. Its sources at that time include woodcuts by Peter Flöttner (Flöttner, d. 1546), who was brought to the fore by Haupt, not without exaggeration general development, after Reimers made a summary of his woodcuts and drawings, Domanig of the medals, and Konrad Lange of all his works in general. Printed works that had greatest influence, were: a small book on art by Vogtherr (1537), “Moorish Ornament” by Flettner (1549), illustrations by the same Flettner to the German Vitruvius (1548) by Rivius and, finally, a book of brilliant talent about architecture by Wendel Ditterlin (1598), in full sail floating in wonderful country Baroque style.
