Trip to Germany: Hildesheim (Day 8)

Once we got settled in Berlin, I decided that I wanted to go to Hildesheim and see the famous bronze doors that I discuss with my student at length. Rachel understandably didn't want to do the 2.5-3 hour train ride both ways (and I don't blame her), so we split up and I took this trip on my own. This was a really special day trip for me to see these doors that I know so well, and perhaps going alone made it feel even more like a pilgrimage.

I was a little nervous about navigating through the transit system by myself since I don't speak German, but I was just fine. I did end up sitting in first class on accident, though, and I had to change seats about halfway through the ride there!

As I wandered through the streets of Hildesheim, I tried to find the cathedral by looking for tall church towers. The first building I came across was the church St. Andreas (which incidentally has the tallest church tower in Lower Saxony). The outside of the church depicts this monument in honor of the Reformer Johannes Bugenhagen (1485-1558).

I was struck by how the figures on the fountain seemed similar to the proportions and Ottoman style of the bronze doors, and I wondered if there was an intentional choice to have a cohesive aesthetic between churches in the city.

The Hildesheim Cathedral!

This is the place where the doors originally would have been placed on the west side of the cathedral. They now are located inside the doors in a little faux narthex meant just to showcase the doors. I know that these doors were able to escape damage when Hildehseim was bombed in an air raid in 1945 - the doors were removed to the Kehrwieder in the southeast of the old city in 1942. The doors weigh several tons, and had to be carefully transported on a stable scaffold by two teams of horses. Since the doors spend their time underground during they war, they were not damaged! My assumption is that the doors were placed inside the cathedral after the war ended.

Interior of the cathedral

The doors! I probably spent about hour looking at these doors and photographing small details that I had never noticed before.

I never noticed that Joseph is holding a little dove (as an offering) in this panel

It was neat to see how far the images protrude from the surface of the door into the space of the viewer.

 I was also surprised to see how thin these doors are! What an amazing technical achievement to cast something so tall and so thin, especially since each of these doors was cast as a single unit!

Inside the cathedral is Bernward's Column (also called "Christ's Column"), which was made about the same time as the doors. The scenes on the doors depict events surrounding the life of John the Baptist and the ministry of Christ. These events chronologically "fill in" the New Testament scenes that are not shown on the bronze doors themselves.

I did notice, however, that the craftsmanship of the bronze column is not as refined as that on the doors.

Salome dancing so she can ask for the head of John the Baptist

After visiting the cathedral and the cathedral museum, I walked over to St. Michael's Monastery, which possibly is the place that originally housed the bronze doors starting in 1015. It is presumed that the doors would have been in place when Bernward commissioned the crypt in 1015 (see Cohen and Derbes, "Bernward and Eve at Hildesheim," GESTA, 2001, p. 19).  Bernward is buried here, so I felt like it was appropriate to go and pay homage to the bishop who commissioned the bronze doors. The Bronze doors may have been moved to the cathedral by Bernward's successor Gotthard in either 1022 or 1035 (the latter date was first argued by Franz Dibelius in "Die Bernwardstür zu Hildesheim, Strassburg: Heitz," 1907, p. 78-80).

This was a special and unforgettable day. I'm so glad that I got to visit these doors and spend some time in this smaller German city.

Trip to Germany: Meissen (Day 7)

After leaving the Gemaldegalerie in Dresden, Rachel and I checked out of our hotel and headed in the car to visit the Meissen porcelain factory. Rachel was so nice in accompanying me here and said, "I'll go where you want to go - I want you to have a good trip." She is such a sweetheart.

I was really curious about going to this place because I've studied Meissen porcelain. This is the first porcelain factory that was established in Europe under the endorsement of the ruler August the Strong (see timeline). In fact, August the Strong essentially held the alchemist Böttger and his comrades in captivity until they were able to figure out how to produce porcelain! Meissen continues to produce porcelain today and the museum displays both contemporary and traditional porcelain. Here were some of my favorites:

Jörg Danielcyzk's "Saxonia" (2014) is a life-sized female figure whose skirt is decorated with 8,000 handmade porcelain blossoms. Danielcyzk has been working at the factory for over 45 years and understandably considers this work of art (as the largest free-standing porcelain sculpture the world) as a highlight of his career!

Ernst August Leuteritz's ornamental vase "Flora," 1877

Johann Theodor Paul Helmig's clock "The Future" (Die Zukunft, 1904) reminds me a little of Guiseppe Sanmartino's "The Veiled Christ." I love the little figures of Day and Night too.

This figurine was based of the Liotard's "The Chocolate Girl" pastel that we saw in Dresden that very morning. This model was formed in 1843, but the specific object on display dated from 1920.

Johann Gottlieb Kirchner's porcelain rhinoceros (2010) pays homage to Albrect Dürer's woodcut print from 1515

At the end of our visit through the museum, we attended a demonstration of how porcelain is made. It was a little bit too contrived and formal as a presentation (it felt like it was really just geared toward getting tourists to spend money in the gift shop), but it was memorable nonetheless. I couldn't really afford anything in the gift shop, but I did buy a little putti head that had been used as a demonstration example.

We spend the afternoon driving through the German countryside until we reached Berlin. We stayed at the NH Collection hotel on Friedrichstraße and ate dinner at a grill called Peter Pane (Peter Pan). The interior of the restaurant was created in a way to evoke Neverland and the forest where the Lost Boys live.

Trip to Germany: Dresden (Days 6 and 7)

Dresden is also a place that I didn't really think to consider visiting, but I'm glad that Rachel recommended it. This is such a great city for art and Baroque architecture! Before going to Dresden, my main association with the city was that it was heavily bombed during WWII, which is the reason why Courbet's The Stone Breakers was destroyed and no longer exists (such a shame!). Upon arriving in Dresden I learned that the architecture underwent extensive restoration or was completely rebuilt after the bombing. So the city is a very unique combination of the old and the new: many things have an old appearance in style but they are relatively new. Rachel had been to Dresden before, and she recommended that we stay in a hotel that was located right in the heart of the old part of the city (the Altstadt).

This image was taken from the cupola of the Frauenkirche church in the old part of the city.

Our hotel is just at the lower right hand portion of this photograph

This is the Katholische Hofkirke, which was just a block away from our hotel. It is a really lovely structure and its too bad that it is covered with so much soot.

The Frauenkirche building was really interesting to me, because was completely rebuilt to be a copy of the original that stood before WWII. The structure has some of the old stones that were from the original church. I wrote more about this building on my art history blog.

The morning after we arrived in Dresden, Rachel and I went to go and visit the Grünes Gewölde (Green Vault) and the Neues Grünes Gewölde (New Green Vault) at the Reisdenzschloss. The Green Vault was the first public museum in Europe and today it houses one of the biggest collections of treasury in Europe (see this news article). Room after room is filled with luxurious decorative arts and jewels, largely from the time of August the Strong and his son August III. There were thousands of objects on display, and I liked seeing all of the lathe ivories, nautilus cups, mounted ostrich eggs, and mounted coconut cups. Visitors weren't allowed to take pictures in the Green Vault, but they were allowed to take pictures in the New Green Vault area.

This is the doorway to the Residenzschloss, which is the building that houses the Green Vault and the New Green Vault

It was fun for me to see this coconut goblet with depictions of Amerindians, since I have read about this goblet in articles but I hadn't seen a reproduction before - and I got to see the real thing! The label specifies "North American Indians," which is curious to me because other images like the Humboldt Cup are inspired by Eckhout's images in Dutch Brazil (i.e. South America). I'd love to do more research on this cup in the New Green Vault. It was made in Nuremberg shortly before 1656.

These delicate, intricately-detailed polyhedrons are made out of ivory! The two court turners, Wecker and Lobenigk, made these between 1581 and 1584.

I really adore the floral decoration on his perpetual calendar for Elector Johann Georg II of Saxony (presumably made in South Germany, dated 1657)

Owl with a matching case by Gottfried Döring, Dresden, shortly before 1713

The piece I loved the most in the New Green Vault was this marquetry panel, "Still Life with Flowers" (1654) by Dirck van Rijswijck. The panel is made of iridescent mother-of-pearl from different kinds of shells, which results in the subtle color variation between flowers. Apart from the beautiful colors, I love the little details like the parrot and the dragonfly.

In the afternoon, Rachel went to the hotel to rest and I went back to the the Residenzschloss to see the Historical Museum and the armory (Rüstkammer). I spent a lot of time looking at the historical clothing. One really curious piece of clothing was the "Landscape Garment of Elector Johann Georg I of Saxony" from 1611. The garment is filled with little circles that contain landscape scenes (see here and here).

My favorite dress was the parade dress (c. 1650) of Electress Magdalena Sibylla of Saxony

The next morning, before we checked out of our hotel, Rachel kindly agreed to go with me to the Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister before we left Dresden. The Gemäldegalerie is located in the Zwinger palace, and we took some time to look at the grounds before we went into the museum.

Baroque parterres at the Zwinger Palace! The parterres were filled with grass

Rachel and I at the Zwinger palace

When we got into the museum, I was disappointed that Vermeer's "Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window" was not on display (for conservation purposes), but there was still a lot to see. 

I don't remember seeing or studying Jan Van Eyck's "Winged Altar" (1437) in school, so it was fun to see this new painting (for me) by a beloved artist

Titian's "Portrait of a Lady in White" (c. 1561) has some really striking details in the fabrics - one can get a good sense of the different textures

Detail of Giorgione and Titan's "Sleeping Venus" (c. 1510). I thought of my blogger friend Frank when I saw this painting, since he loves Giorgione and Titian

This is Vermeer's "The Procuress" (1656). I have seen his painting before, but in person I was struck by how much I did not like it, because I usually love paintings by Vermeer. Sometimes I question the attribution of certain paintings to Vermeer (and rightly so, I think, since Vermeer's really gained his reputation posthumously and attributions have been shaky at times). The details seemed so muddied in contrast to other Vermeer paintings and some of the features (like the man's left hand in front of the woman) are very awkwardly rendered.

A group of students were learning about Raphael's Sistine Madonna (1512), so we weren't able to get too close or spend too much time in this gallery. This painting is probably best well known for the two little angels that are on the bottom of the picture plane.

Étienne Liotard's pastel "The Chocolate Girl" (c. 1744/45) - this is one of the popular images that appear in the Dresden tourist shops. It is really impressive to me that the transparent glass of water is made with pastels!

Trip to Germany: Nuremberg (Day 5)

We left Rothenberg ob der Tauber and headed to Nuremberg. We said goodbye to Meka and June. Rachael wasn't interested in visiting Albrecht Dürer's house, so I went over there by myself. This was a really special trip for me, because Dürer is such a fascinating artist who was able to achieve international fame through his prints (the printing press was invented a few decades before Dürer's career). It was also special to be in Nuremberg and think about how the city climate fostered Dürer's career, since artists were not required to work within a guild system in this city. Dürer lived in the right place at the right time. Today this is the only surviving home of a 15th century artist from Northern Europe, and it is especially lucky that this building exists since 90% of Nuremberg was bombed during WWII.

The painting on the left is a copy of the original self-portrait by Dürer (which I saw in the Alte Pinakothek). The copy was purchased by the Nuremberg City Council in 1786 and for a time was even thought to be the original painting, until the Swedish poet Atterbom corrected the error in 1817.

There is a modern section added onto the original house which has gallery spaces. A docent dressed up as Agnes was giving a tour to visitors, but I wasn't able to follow along since the tour was in German!

Dürer and his wife Agnes had a very large house, especially since they didn't have any children.

I was really struck by all of the circular window panes in the upper story of the original house. Dürer depicts similar circular window panes in his print "Saint Jerome in His Study" (1514).

One room had a copy of a matrix for the Emperor Maximilian I engraving (1519). It was neat to see all of the intricate lines and the depth of the engraving, since I'm only familiar with the print itself.

After leaving the house, I met up with Rachel and we visited the Dokumentationszentrum, where Nazi Party rallies used to be held. The National Socialists first began to hold Party Rallies in Nuremberg from 1927-1929. The grounds were bombed heavily during WWII, but this site remains probably the best example of Nazi-era architecture that exists today  I was struck by how the architect Albert Speer intentionally designed the space so that the visitor's eye would be drawn to where the Führer was located during rally events. It was also interesting to learn that the participants of these rallies did not go with the intent of learning something new, but to have the experience of participating. In a way, these rallies remind me a little of performance art.

Part of the remaining architecture that gives a sense of the original intended appearance of the Nazi Party rally grounds. However, construction work for the site as a whole (which would have covered 11 square kilometers) was abandoned to a large degree with the beginning of WWII on September 1, 1939.