Two Different Interpretations of Cennino Cennini
in Austria-Hungary of 1871 and 1914
Part two
The Second Series of Quellenschriften für Kunstgeschichte und Kunsttechnik des Mittealters und der Renaissance
Ilg did not decide for a university career, and devoted himself in full to, first, the writing of an immense literature (among monographs, survey and articles) on history of art; second, his profession in museums (he was the director of the Kunsthistorisches Hofmuseum, the later Kunsthistorisches Museum of Vienna, where he had been in charge of moving art collections from their previous locations into today’s building); and third, as his role as a publicist (between 1885 and his death, he published, together with a group of literates and art historians in Vienna, a group of pamphlets called 'Gegen den Strom – Flugschriften einer literarisch-künstlerischen Gesellschaft', i.e. ‘Against the stream – leaflets of a society on literature and art).
Seventeen years after having inaugurated the first series of the Quellenschriften with Cennino Cennini’s translation, Albert Ilg took over the task – in 1888 – to publish a new series of publications on history of art. The list of publications of the new series is to be found in Annex II below.
Julius von Schlosser
The role which the young Ilg had played himself in the 1870s as a disciple (translating five of the first seven publications) under the direction of Eitelberger, was now assigned to the young Julius von Schlosser in the 1890s. Von Schlosser published two out of the nine volumes under Ilg’s direction, in 1892 (aged 26) and in 1896 (aged 30).
Already before working at the new series of the Quellenschriften, Schlosser had published, only with 25, a philological research entitled “Beiträge zur Kunstgeschichte aus den Schriftquellen des frühen Mittelalters" (Contributions to history of art from written sources of the early Middle Age), in a series published by the academy of science of Vienna [13]. The study had been reviewed in “Neues Archiv” [14], where it had received many compliments. The work “follows above all the transition of architecture and painting from antiquity to the Carolingian times.”
Von Schlosser had graduated in philosophy and classical philology and history of art in 1887, had worked at the Austrian Institute for research in history between 1887 and 1889 and was working at the Kunsthistorisches Hofmuseum since 1889 (where he became curator in 1893).
In line with his general attitude towards art – focused on baroque studies - Ilg decided to extend the coverage of the new series of the Quellenschriften to the ‘Neuzeit’, modern times. However, of the nine volumes published until his premature death, four still concerned Middle Age. They were one publication by Ilg himself on “Contributions to the History of Art and Art Techniques from Middle High German poetry” [15]; two by Julius von Schlosser, on Carolingian art [16] and on the Middle Age in Western Countries [17] respectively; and one on Jean Paul Richter on Byzantine art.
The introduction to the 1892 work by Ilg on Middle High German poetry clarifies that this text belonged originally to the first series of the Quelleschriften in the early 1870s. The volume was ready, but had to be reviewed by a German philologist, Wilhelm Scherer. His sudden passing away and the accumulation of other tasks impeded the publication.
Ilg writes in the introduction that he has been pushed by many colleagues to ultimate the work: “I confess that I would have not finalised this task anymore, because the transitions in spiritual orientations (which happen to all of us) have brought me since those days to completely different actions and goals. When I started this work in my young years, the research of the ‘old-German’ art seemed to me (as to many people of my age) as the supreme ideal. Multiple events and influences led me in the course of the years to a real different area, on which it is not needed to speak here.”(p.vi)
Indeed, as from 1880 onwards, Ilg devotes himself to what he will consider the real project of his life: to study the development of an autonomous Baroque style in all countries under the Habsburg dynasty in the XVII-XVIII century and to establish ‘Neo-Baroque’ as the future national style of Austria-Hungary. This activity starts with an anonymous pamphlet he signs with the pseudonymous of ‘Bernini the younger’ [18]. It continues with numerous monographs and essays [19]. It develops in nasty polemic arguments, characterised by violent verbal attacks, which will also mark the growing isolation of Ilg from his colleagues.
Julius von Schlosser: The first references to Cennino Cennini
If von Schlosser starts his career in 1891 with numerous essays and translations on art literature from Middle Age, it is only in 1914 that he shows to have developed a complete view of the work of Cennino Cennini.
The 1892 publication on the Schriftquellen zur Geschichte der Karolinigischer Kunst (Written Sources of Carolingian Art) covers a period chronologically far from Cennino Cennini’s Book of the Art. To the contrary, the Quellenbuch zur Kunstgeschichte des Abendländischen Mittelalters (Book of the sources for the History of Art of the Western Middle Age) is an anthology of literature texts in original language, which also includes, among others, the Italian Trecento, including Petrarca, Boccaccio and Filippo Villani. There is however no reference to Cennino.
The introduction of the Quellenbuch helps perhaps explain why the Book of the Art has not been included. Von Schlosser refers in it (p. viii) to three different categories of old literature on art: the theoretical (theoretische), the historical (historische) and aesthetical (ästhetische) genres. At page ix, he explains that these three categories do not include the exclusively technical treatises, like the “Schedula” of Theophilus, as they cannot be considered as part of history of art.
The first reference we find to Cennino is in a long essay about “Giusto's Fresken in Padua und die Vorläufer der Stanza della Segnatura”, published in 1896 [20]. Most probably, von Schlosser included a couple of peripheral references to him because Cennino had been active in Padua as an artist.
In 1902, Julius von Schlosser published an article in the yearbook of the imperial art collections, entitled Zur Kenntnis der künstlerischen Überlieferung im späten Mittelalter [21] (on the knowledge of the artistic tradition in the late Middle Ages). Cennino was sparely quoted a couple of times only.
Julius von Schlosser and Cennino Cennini: between the Middle Age and the Renaissance
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| J. von Schlosser’s ‘Materialien
zur Quellenkunde der Kustgeschichte ‘, containing the chapter on Cennino Cennini (1914) |
Cennino Cennini entered therefore in von Schlosser’s universe step by step, and perhaps not from the main entrance. It is however in 1914 (in the Mid of the First World War) that von Schlosser proposes his own reading of the work of Cennino, dedicating to him the last chapter of the first volume of the one-hundred page “Materialien zur Quellenkunde der Kunstgeschichte”, on the Middle Age. These are materials for the study of the sources of history of art, which he used for his courses at the university, where he has become ordinary professor of History of Art at the Vienna University in 1913.
The 1914 interpretation of Cennino by von Schlosser is essentially different from the one of Ilg in 1871 (but also from his own of 1896). The focus in not any more on shortcomings. Differently from Ilg, von Schlosser considers now the Book of the Art as containing innovative elements, and stresses all of them which will have an impact on arts in the following centuries. Differently from the Quellenbuch of 1896 – which ignored Cennino – the Materialien include Cennino among the main authors of history of art sources.
Cennino continues to be seen as a figure full of contradictions, remaining in between two worlds, but also as the inventor of a new language. While Ilg saw in him a testimony of the sunset and degeneration of Gothic art, for von Schlosser – at least since 1914 – he is integral part of a period (the Trecento) which has still strong cultural connections with antiquity and can at the same time reason in new terms. Let us speak the author for us.
„Cenninis Einleitung zu
seiner Schrift ist dadurch merkwürdig, daß sie einen engen Zusammenhang mit
Gedanken der scholastischen Enzyklopädie verrät. Wie Theophilus beginnt er ab
ove, mit dem Sündenfall und der Arbeit der ersten Menschen, aus der sich alle
Künste entwickeln, natürlich die Künste im Sinne des Mittelalters, die die necessitas hervorruft. (…) Zu jenen
Künsten, die der Not der ersten Menschen ihren Ursprung danken, rechnet
Cennini auch seine eigene, die Malerei. Klingt hier deutlich der Begriff der
alten ars mechanica an, so führt
Cennini sehr merkwürdigerweise einen Faktor ein, der seine Auffassung der
Kunst schon der unsrigen nähert, freilich schon in der Spekulation des späten
Altertums seine Rolle spielt: die künstlerische Phantasie, die zur
Handgeschicklichkeit hinzutreten muß, um als wirklich darzustellen, was real nicht
vorhanden ist; wir haben sie schon bei Dante angetroffen. Deshalb verdient
die Malerei im zweiten Range unter der Wissenschaft (scienza) zu sitzen und von der Poesie den Kranz zu erhalten.
Unwillkürlich erinnert man sich der trecentistischen Darstellungen der
Künste, in der Spanischen Kapelle, in Giustos Eremitanifresken in Padua
u.s.w. Denn gleich dem Dichter hat auch der Maler Freiheit zu bilden, wie es
ihm die Phantasie erlaubt, sitzende oder aufrechte Figuren, halb Mensch, halb
Roß.
Dreierlei ist an dieser Stelle bemerkenswert. Einmal die uralte, bis in
die altgriechische Zeit zurückreichende Vergleichung des Malers mit dem
Dichter, das berühmte ut pictura poesis,
ein geflügelter Concetto des Alterturms, der bis auf Lessings Laokoon sein
Wesen in der Kunsttheorie getrieben hat. Er stammt in dieser Fassung
bekanntlich aus der Poetik des Horaz (v. 361) und hat dort allerdings einen
wesentlich andern Sinn. Daß Cennini, sei es unmittelbar, sei es auf einem
Umwege, seinen Vergleich aus dem viel gelesenen, auch in Dantes Convito benützen Schulbuch bezogen
hat, lehrt das weiterfolgende Beispiel des Kentauren, mit dem die Epistola ad Pisones beginnt:
Humani capiti cervicem pictor equinam
Jungere si velit …..
Und Horaz (der sich gegen diese Auffassung übrigens polemisch verhält)
faßt die Meinung der Gegenpartei in den Satz:
Pictoribus atque poetis
Quidlibet audendi sempre fuit aequa potestas.
Das ist wohl die ältere Spur dieses einflußreichen Werkes in der
Kunsttheorie, die im weiteren Verlauf einen solchen Schatz an flügelten
Worten und Gemeinplätzen daher übernommen hat.
Ferner meldet sich zum ersten Male, wenn auch nur flüchtig und, wie man
sieht, aus antiker Grundlage erwachsend, das später endlos ausgesponnene
Thema vom Rangstreit der Küste, der Paragone.
Zuletzt, und das ist das Wichtigste für uns, wird hier zuerst, am
Vorabend der Renaissance, aus der Künstlerpraxis heraus ein Vorstoß
unternommen, die bildende Kunst aus den Banden des Handwerks, der ars mechanica zu lösen, und zwar mit
einem Elemente, das wieder antikem Denken angehört. Der Malerei gebührt die
zweite Stelle nach der Wissenschaft, neben und vor der Poesie. Es ist der
Weg, den die Theoretiker der Folgezeit weiter gewandelt sind und der
schließlich zu dem Concetto der selbstherrlichen „schönen Kunst“ führte.“
[…]
„Nicht umsonst steht
Cenninis Buch auf der Scheide zweier Perioden. Es enthält
antik-mittelalterliche und moderne Elemente; er selbst betont ausdrücklich
das „Moderne“ an Giottos Styl. Zum ersten Male erscheint dieser wichtige,
schon früher gebrauchte Terminus in der italienischen Kunsttheorie. Wohl wird
schon die Natur als sicherste Führerin gebannt (c.28), begreiflich genug in
einer Zeit und Umgebung, die, wie besonders die Fresken der
veronesisch-paduanischen Schule zeigen, ein unmittelbares und ziemlich
ausgiebiges Modellstudium pflegte, aber für den nach dem Norden verschlagenen
Giottisten hat das Wort kaum viel mehr Bedeutung als für seine Landsleute aus
del Laienstande, Boccaccio und Villani, und er bleibt den Traditionen seiner
Schule im allem Wesentlichen zugetan. Die
Typik und die Vorherrschaft des mittelalterlichen exemplum tritt uns fast in allen seinen Vorschriften und
Ratschlägen entgegen. Führt die Regel, im Freien zu zeichnen und dann die
Sonne stets zur Linken zu haben (c.18), gleich auf antik-südlichen Boden, so
sind die weitern Einzelheiten doch wieder ganz mittelalterlich formelhaft,
wie denn in Cenninos Werkstatt genau so mit Bausen nach ältern Vorbildern
gearbeitet wird als etwa in den Ateliers der Athosklöster (c.28). Die Stellen
des Gesichtes werden genau bezeichnet, wo der Schatten zu sitzen hat: Nase,
Lippen, Mundrand, Kinn u.s.w. Ebenso wird die Weise, in der Agnolo Gaddi das
Wangenrot anlegte, genau geschildert und zur Nachahmung empfohlen, da sie dem
Gesicht mehr „rilievo“ gebe. Dieser wichtige Kunstausdruck tritt uns hier
ebenfalls zum ersten Male entgegen. Ebenso formelhaft sind die
perspektivischen Vorschriften (c.87). Die obern Gesimse der Architekturen
sollen fallend, die untern steigend gebildet werden; das ist noch nicht
einmal die rein empirische Manier, die in Flandern geübt wurde, als die
toskanischen Maler bereits die mathematische Konstruktion begründet hatten.
Genau so formelhaft sind die Vorschriften für die Landschaftsmalerei; hier
finden wir den oft zitierten Rat, große unbehauene Steine als exempla
im Atelier zu halten. Es handelt sich um die merkwürdig schematische, aus der
Antike vererbte Darstellung des Terrains mit abgetreppten Felsen, die sich in
den Bildwerken des Trecento mit ungemeiner Zähigkeit erhält und auch in die
französische Miniaturmalerei übergangen ist. (…)
Wichtig und merkwürdig ist
Cenninis Kapitel über die Proportionen des Menschen (c.70); es ist wieder das
erste Mal, daß sie
in einem Kunsttraktat zur Sprache kommen. In der Theorie behaupten sie von da
an ihre feste Stelle bis auf unsere Zeit herab. Empirischer Formeln solcher
Art hat eben keine Werkstattpraxis seit altägyptischer Zeit entraten können,
selbst im Malerbuche des Athos fehlt das Kapitel nicht, hier freilich wohl
(seiner ganz späten Redaktion entsprechend) auf abendländisch-italienischer
Grundlage. Cenninis Angaben, die Einschreibung des Körpers, die Dreiteilung
des Gesichtes nach Nasenlängen verraten deutlich die antike Quelle. Es ist
der berühmte Passus in Vitruvs Architekturbuch (III, i), der die antike, für
uns mit Polyklets Kanon beginnende Praxis kompendiert. (…)
Echt mittelalterlich,
obgleich auch hier (freilich dieser Zeit nicht mehr verständlicher) Nachklang
von der Antike her nachzittern könnte, ist die Ausscheidung der Frau aus der
Proportionslehre, weil sie kein „Ebenmaß“ besitze (…). Daß
Cennini ein Mensch des Mittelalters ist, zeigt seine völlige Unkenntnis der
Anatomie, er ist fest im Bibelglauben, daß der Mann eine
Rippe weniger als die Frau habe. Dergleichen hat nun freilich wenig praktische
Bedeutung; dafür ist die Forderung der geziemenden Farbe, braun für den Mann,
weiß für die Frau, im rhetorischen Concetto des Decorum sowohl als in der
Praxis selbst ein Nacklang antiker Ateliergewohnheiten, der sich übrigens
selbst noch im 17. Jahrhundert mitunter recht auffällig bemerklich macht. Die
Antike selbst, als Form, spielt bei Cennini aber noch nicht die mindeste
Rolle; das könnte für seine Zeit und seine Umgebung recht verwunderlich
scheinen, denn Padua war damals schon eine echte Humanistenstadt, in der der
Preis des Altertums laut verkündet wurde, und die merkwürdigen Denkmünzen der
Carraresen, die Cennini wohl selbst noch gesehen hat, gehören zu den ältesten
und merkwürdigsten Zeugnissen des italienischen Klassizismus. Aber Cennini
ist viel zu fest mit der Praxis der heimatlichen Giotteske verwaschen; wie
fremd er im Grunde antikem Wesen gegenübersteht, zeigt seine ganz
mittelalterlich fabulose Vorstellung von der Art, wie die nackten Statuen des
Altertums entstanden seien, nämlich als Nachahmungen von Naturabgüssen über
der ganzen Figur, über die er sich ausführlich verbreitet (c.182); das
Akademisch-Formelhafte ist übrigen auch hier leicht zu erkennen. (…)
Im übrigen ist das Atelier des Cennini noch ganz zünftig und
handwerksmäßig eingerichtet; es übernimmt alle Arten gewerblicher Arbeiten,
das Bemalen von Fahnen, Schildern, Truhen, Vorzeichnungen für Stricker und
Zeugdrücker, selbst das kunstgerechte Schminken der Damen. Alles das geht ja
noch ins 15. Jahrhundert fort, wohl auch darüber hinaus; Handwerk und Kunst, ars mechanica und liberalis sing noch
einträchtig beisammen. Die Trennung der hohen ‚schönen‘ Kunst vom offiziell
verachteten ‚Kunstgewerbe‘, des ‚Kunstmalers‘ vom ‚Flachmaler‘ hat sich dann
seit der Virtuosenzeit der Spätrenaissance vollzogen, und erst die modernste
Entwicklung hat sie wieder fallen lassen, in Theorie wie in Praxis.
Endlich ist Cenninis Traktat ein erster und merkwürdiger Zeuge für die
aus der Atelierpraxis heraus entwickelte, bei ihm schon ziemlich gefestigte
Terminologie der Kunstausdrücke.
Einige dieser Termini, denen ein langes Leben beschieden war, haben wir schon
erwähnt; Milanesis treffliches Glossar zu seiner Ausgabe gibt übersichtliche
Auskunft. Ich will hier nicht auf die besonderen technischen Ausdrücke
eingehen, sondern nur kurz einige Begriffe allgemein theoretischen Gehalts
herausheben: ‚Disegno‘ der bei Cennini schon den Sinn angenommen hat, in dem
ihn die spätern Theoretiker gebrauchen; er ist das fondamento dell’arte zusammen mit dem Kolorit (il colorire c.4) und bedeutet über die
bloße ‚Zeichnung‘ hinaus die innere, durch die Theorie gefestigte Form: [il
disegnare di gesso] … ti farà sperto pratico, e capace di molto disegno entro
la testa tua (c.13), und besonders das abschätzige Urteil c.171 über die
Miniatoren, die mehr pratica als disegno haben. Während der Ausdruck esempio (c.8 u. ö) der
mittelaterlichen Kunstterminologie
angehört, sind das schon erwähnte rilievo
(c.28) für Modellierung, das (auch in das Malerbuch von Athos
hinübergewanderte) naturale (c.28),
ignudo (c.71), sfumare (c.31. 71), maniera (c.27) Ausdrücke, die aus der
Kunstsprache von da ab nicht mehr verschwunden sind. „
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“Cennini’s introduction to his writing strangely
reveals a close connection with the thoughts of scholastic encyclopaedia. As
Theophilus, he starts from the origin of the human kind, with the original
sin and the work of the first man. From that work all arts developed: of
course, art in the concept of the Middle Ages, which is caused by the necessitas (...) To those arts which originated
thank to the plight of the first humans, Cennini also assigns his own art,
i.e. painting. Here sounds very clear the ancient concept of ars mechanica. However, Cennini introduces
- very strangely indeed - a factor which already approaches his conception of
art to ours (even if it had played a role – to be sure – already in the theory
of the late antiquity): the phantasy of the artist, which must be added to
the manual dexterity, in order to represent as real, what is actually not present.
We have already encountered it in Dante. Therefore, painting earned to sit
with the second rank behind science ( scienza
) and to get the wreath from poetry. Involuntarily one remembers the Trecento’s
representations of the Arts, in the Spanish Chapel, in Giusto’s frescos at
the Eremitani chapel in Padua, etc. For like the poet the painter has also
the freedom, as phantasy allows him, to create sitting or upright figures,
half human, half horses.
Three aspects are to be noted at this point. First, the
really ancient comparison between the painter and the poet, dating back to
the ancient Greek time, with the famous ut pictura
poesis, a winged concept of the antiquity, which up
to Lessing's Laocoon has played a role in art theory. It is well known in this
version from the poetics of Horace (v. 361), where it has, however, a much
different meaning. The continuing example of the Centaurs, with which begins
the Epistola ad Pisones, teaches us that Cennini, whether directly or
indirectly, has drawn his comparison from this widely read, textbook, (even
quoted in Dante Convito):
If the painter
wants to combine
a Human head
and a horse’s neck
.....
And Horace (who by the way behaves polemically against this view) summarizes the opinion of
the other party in the sentence:
Painters and poets always
Had the same
power to dare everything.
This is probably the older trace of this influential
work in the theory of art. In the further course, the theory of art has
adopted from here a wealth of outstripped words and platitudes.
Furthermore, it appears for the first time, even if
only fleetingly and (as you can see) originating from ancient basis, the
theme of the dispute of the rank between arts, the Paragone, which will be spun endlessly after that.
Last, and most importantly for us, an attempt is
here made for the first time, on the eve of the Renaissance, and originated from
art practice, to release the visual arts from the bonds of the craft, the ars mechanica, with an element, which
again belongs to antique thinking. Painting merits the second place after science,
side by side and ahead of poetry. It is the path that the theorists of the
aftermath period have further followed and which eventually led to the Concetto of the autonomous "fine
art".
[…]
Not for nothing, Cennini’s book is in between two
periods. It contains antique - medieval and modern elements; he himself
explicitly emphasises the "modernity" of Giotto's style. For the
first time this important (earlier already used term elsewhere) term (modern) appears in
Italian art theory. Well, nature is indeed proclaimed as the safest guide
(C.28), understandably enough in a time and environment which (as
particularly shown by the frescoes of the Veronese - Paduan school) made a
direct and fairly extensive use of model studies. But for the scholar of
Giotto, who moved north, the word nature hardly has much more importance than
for his compatriots from the non-painting laity, Boccaccio and Villani, and
he remains in all essentials within the traditions of his school. The
typology and the supremacy of the medieval exemplum appear to us almost in all its rules and advice. If the rule
leads to outdoors drawing and to keeping the sun always on the left (c.18),
equal to the antique southern soil, so the farther details are yet again very
much based on medieval formulas, just as in Cennino’s workshop where work
with casts is made along the older models used in the studios of the Athos
monasteries (c. 28). The locations of the face continue to be indicated
precisely where the shadow has to sit: nose, lips, mouth rim, chin, etc.
Likewise, the manner in which Agnolo Gaddi painted cheeks in red, is
described in detail and recommended, as it gives the face more "rilievo". This important expression
of art also meets us here for the first time. Likewise, the instructions on
perspective are formulaic (c.87). The upper cornices of the architectures should
be formed as falling, while those which are below should be formed as ascending.
This is even not the purely empirical maniera, which was practiced in
Flanders, as the Tuscan painters had already established the mathematical
construction. Equally rigid are the requirements for landscape painting,
where we find the oft-quoted advice to hold large unhewn stones as exempla in the studio. It is the
strange schematic view, inherited from the ancient representation of the
terrain with stepped rocks, which maintains itself with uncommon strength in
the pictures of the Trecento and has
been also extended to the French miniature painting. (...)
Important and strange is Cennini’s chapter on the
proportions of the man (c.70), as it is again the first time that they come to
word in an art treatise. In theory, they confirm themselves from then on into
a permanent position up to our time. Empirical formulas of this kind have not
been used anymore in a workshop’s practical activity since ancient Egyptian
times, and even in the painter's book of Athos the chapter is not missing.
Here of course it is based on an occidental Italian foundation, in line with
its quite late drafting. Cennini’s instructions, the enrolment of the body in
a circle, the threefold division of the face according to the nose lengths,
clearly reveal the ancient source. It is the famous passage in Vitruvius'
book on architecture (III, i) which offers a compendium of the antique, which
for us started with Polykleitos’ canon. (...)
The exclusion of the woman from the theory of
proportion, because they do not have "any symmetry" really resounds
medieval, and is indeed not anymore understandable in this time, although it
also reflects an old echo from antiquity. ... That Cennini is a medieval man
is also shown by his complete ignorance of anatomy, as he firmly believes in
the Bible that men have a rib less than women. This has of course little practical
significance. However, the advice to follow a rule of decency on colour
(brown for men, white for women) is – both in the rhetorical concept of
decorum as well as in practice - nothing else but the echo of old workshop
practices, which made themselves quite striking noticeable, even in the 17th
Century. The antiquity itself, as a form, does not play any role with Cennini.
This could seem quite surprising for his time and his surroundings, because
Padua was already a real humanist city, in which the praise of antiquity was
loudly proclaimed. The peculiar medals from Carrara, that Cennini had most probably
even not seen, are among the oldest and most remarkable testimonies of
Italian classicism. But Cennini is much too tightly faded with the practice
of his home-based Giotto style. How strangely he faces everything antique is
basically shown by his very medieval fabulose idea of the way the nude
statues of antiquity had arisen, namely as imitations of nature casts over
the whole figure, a theory which he extensively propagated (c.182); the
Academic - formulaic is by the way easy to see here. (...)
Moreover, the studio of Cennini is still entirely furnished
and organised in the sense of traditional handcraft; it takes care of all
types of artisanal work, the painting of banners, signs, chests, preliminary
drawings for knitters and textile printing, even the skillful makeup of the
ladies. All this is still on in the 15th Century, and probably even beyond; crafts
and art, ars mechanica and liberalis are still singing peacefully
together. The separation of high , beautiful art from the officially despised,
arts and crafts, of the painter 'from flat painter' has then taken place only
from the late period of virtuoso Renaissance, and only the most modern
development has let it drop again, in theory and in practice.
Finally Cennini’s treatise is a first and remarkable
testimony for the development – first within the studio practice and later
quite firmly in the language of Cennino’s treatise – of a pretty
well-established terminology on art expressions. Some of these terms, which were
granted a long life, have already been mentioned. The admirable glossary which
the Milanesi brothers prepared for their edition gives clear information. I
will not go into the specific technical terms , but only briefly lift out
some terms with a general theoretical content: the term disegno has been already adopted by Cennini in the sense it will
be used by later theorists: it is the fondamento dell'arte (foundation of
art) together with the colouring (il colorire
c.4 ), meaning - beyond the mere 'drawing' - the inner form, consolidated by
the theory: “Do you realize what will happen to you if you practice drawing
with a pen? -That it will make you expert, skilful, and capable of much
drawing out of our own head.” ( c .13, translation D. Thompson).And see especially
the disparaging judgment (c.171) on the miniaturists who have more pratica than disegno . While the term esempio
( c.8 ö u ) belongs to the terminology of art of Middle Age, the already
mentioned terms rilievo ( C.28 )
for modeling, the term naturale (also
migrated over through the book by painter of Athos) ( C.28 ), ignudo (c.71) , sfumare ( C.31 . 71), maniera
( C.27 ), all expressions that have no longer disappeared from the language
of art from then on . "
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Cennino Cennini and the School of Wien: an Appraisal
Between the first translation of Cennino Cennini by Albert Ilg of 1871 and the essay by Julius von Schlosser of 1914 more than forty years have passed, during which three (and more) generations of art historians have been active at the Vienna School of History of Art. We considered three of the most important representatives: Rudolf Eitelberger von Edelberg, Albert Ilg and Julius von Schlosser.
All of them contributed to shape the views of art scholars on Cennino Cennini. For Eitelberger, the interest for the technique issues and craft in art justified translating Cennino as the first inaugural volume of the Quellenschriften, the most important cultural initiative launched in Europe on history of art sources. Ilg translated the text from Italian into German, but did not really show great sympathy for its author, if not to thank him for having preserved testimony of a world which did not have any more reasons to exist: Cennino had compiled nothing else but the necrology of gothic. With Schlosser the technical and material issues – so dear to Eitelberger - became irrelevant, while Cennino was seen as an intellectual bridge between antiquity, Middle Age and future Renaissance, and the inventor of a new technical language on art which would survive until our days.
In those forty years, Austria-Hungary (and Vienna in particular) had been the extraordinary laboratory for a discussion on style and language in any sort of art discipline. The new discipline of history of art sources was therefore an integral part of the Viennese search for aesthetic roots and identity of a society in a continuous mutation.
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ANNEX I: THE SECOND SERIES OF THE QUELLENSCHRIFTEN (1888-1908)
Under the
direction of Albert Ilg
1 – Der Anonimo Morelliano, Theodor
Frimmel, 1888
2 – Luca Pacioli, Compendio della
divina proporzione, Constantin Winterberg, 1889
3 – Filarets Tractat über
die Baukunst, von Oettinger, 1890
4 – Schriften zur
Geschichte der Karolinischen Kunst, von Schlosser, 1892
5 – Beiträge zur
Geschichte der Kunst und Kunsttechnik aus mittelhochdeutschen Dichtungen,
Albert Ilg, 1892
6 – Des Augsburger
Patriciers Philipp Hainhofer Beziehungen zu Herzog Philipp II. von
Pommern-Stettin. Correspondencen aus den Jahren 1610-1619, Oscar Doering,
1896
7 – Quellenbuch zur
Kunstgeschichte des abendländischen Mittelalters. Ausgewählte Texte des vierten
bis fünfzehnten Jahrhunderts, Julius von Schlosser, 1896
8 – Quellen der
byzantinischen Kunstgeschichte. Ausgewählte Texte über die Kirchen, Klöster
Paläste Staatsgebäude und andere Bauten von Konstantinopel, Jean Paul
Richter, 1897
9 – Francisco de Hollanda,
Vier Gespräche über die Malerei geführt zu Rom 1538, Joaquim de Vasconcellos,
1899
[DEATH OF ALBERT ILG]
Under the
direction of Camillo List (the son in law of Albert Ilg) – published in
Wien-Leipzig
10 – Des Ausburger Patriciers
Philipp Hainhofer Reisen nach Innsbruck und Dresden, Oscar Doering, 1901
11-13 Nürnberger Ratsverlässe
über Kunst und Künstler im Zeitalter der Spätgotik und Renaissance (1449)
1474-1618 (1633) Theodor Hampe, Bd 1: (1449) 1474-1570, Bd. 2.: 1572-1618
(1663), Bd. 3: Personen-, Orts- und Sachregister, 1904
14 – Des Bildhauergesellen
Franz Ferdinand Ertinger Reisebeschreibungen durch Österreich und
Deutschland. Nach der Handschrift LGM 3312 der Kgl. Hof- und Staatsbibliothek
München, Erika Tietze-Conrad, 1907
15 – Vasaristudien von
Wolfgang Kallab, Julius von Schlosser, 1908
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Under the
direction of Albert Ilg
1 - The Anonimo Morelliano,
Theodor Frimmel , 1888
2 - Luca Pacioli, Compendium of divine proportions,
Constantin Winterberg , 1889
3 – Filaret, Treatise on Architecture , Oettinger ,
1890
4 - Writings on the history of Carolingian Arts, von
Schlosser , 1892
5 - Contributions to the history of art and
technology from Middle High German poetries, Albert Ilg , 1892
6 – The relations of the Augsburg patrician Philipp
Hainhofer with Duke Philip II of Pomerania -Stettin. Correspondence from the
years 1610-1619, Oscar Doering , 1896
7 - Sourcebook for the art history of medieval
Europe. Selected texts from the fourth to the fifteenth century, Julius von
Schlosser, 1896
8 - Sources of Byzantine art history. Selected texts
on the churches , monasteries, palaces, State Building and other buildings of
Constantinople, Jean Paul Richter, 1897
9 - Francisco de Hollanda, Four talks about the
painting, conducted in Rome in 1538 , Joaquim de Vasconcellos, 1899
[DEATH OF ALBERT ILG]
Under the direction of Camillo List ( the son in law
of Albert Ilg ) - published in Vienna-Leipzig
10 – Journey of the Ausburg patrician Philip
Hainhofer to Innsbruck and Dresden, Oscar Doering , 1901
11-13 Nuremberg Edicts about art and artists in the
age of late Gothic and Renaissance ( 1449 ) 1474-1618 ( 1633) Theodor Hampe ,
Vol 1: ( 1449 ) 1474-1570 , Volume 2 : 1572-1618 ( 1663 ) , Bd . 3: persons,
places and subjects , 1904
14 – Travels of the sculptor Franz Ferdinand
Ertinger through Austria and Germany . After the manuscript LGM 3312 of the the
Royal and Imperial State Library, Munich , Erika Tietze-Conrad , 1907
15 – Sutdies on Vasari by
Wolfgang Kallab , Julius von Schlosser, 1908
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NOTES
[14] Neues Archiv' Bd. 17 'Nachrichten' Nr. 68, S. 238, http://www.digizeitschriften.de/dms/img/?PPN=PPN345858530_0017&DMDID=dmdlog22&PHYSID=phys249
[15] Ilg, Albert - Beiträge zur Geschichte der Kunst und Kunsttechnik aus mittelhochdeutschen Dichtungen, Wien, 1892. This library hosts an original second edition of 1896.
[16] Von Schlosser, Julius – Schriftquellen zur Geschichte der Karolingischen Kunst, Wien, Carl Graeser Verlag, 1892. Available in this library in the reprinted version by George Olms Verlag, 1988.
[17] Von Schlosser, Julius –Quellenbuch zur Kunstgeschichte des Abendländischen Mittelalters, Wien, Carl Graeser Verlag, 1896. Available in this library in the reprinted version by George Olms Verlag, 1986.
[18] Bernini, (Der) jüngere [Albert Ilg] - Die Zukunft des Barockstils: eine Kunstepistel, 1880
[19] Among them, this library holds the original of: Ilg, Albert – Die Fischer von Erlach, Wien, Verlag von Carl Konegen, 1895.
[20] http://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/jbksak1896/0017
[21] Von Schlosser, Julius – Zur Kenntnis der Künstlichen Überlieferungen im späten Mittelalter, in: Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen Sammlungen des Allerhöchsten Kaiserhauses, 1902, pp 279-338.
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ALL THE POSTS IN THE CENNINI'S SERIES
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