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History of Art Literature Anthologies
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Ernst Karl Guhl
Künstler-Briefe [Artists' Letters]
Berlin, Part One, T. Trautwein’sche Büch und Musikalienhandlung, 1853
and Part Two, Guttenberg, 1856
Review by Francesco Mazzaferro
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| Fig. 1) The 1856 Edition of the Artists’ Letters by Ernst Karl Guhl, with the joint publication of the first (1853) and the second volume (1856) |
The "Artists' Letters" by Ernst Karl Guhl
A
German-Italian conference 1991 discussed the theme of "Kunstliteratur as experience of Italy" [1]. In other words, in Germany art literature (i.e. Kunstliteratur) was first of all the study of art
history sources of Italian art, in particular Italian Renaissance. The theme
fits perfectly with the work of Ernst Karl Guhl (1819-1862), one of the
pioneers of German art literature, author of two volumes of Artists’ Letters published in 1853 and
in 1856.
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| Fig. 2) Berlin, The Royal University of Berlin (now Humboldt University), taken from: A. Carse, Berlin and its treasures, 1850 |
We have in
front of us the first German-translated collection of artists’ letters, and at
the same time one of the first writings in Germany theorizing the importance, for
the understanding of artworks, of the study of the biographies of the artists, their
opinions and their personal projects, their way of understanding art, but also
their daily experiences. When the first volume was released, Guhl was just thirty-four
years: the text reflects the freshness of an author trying new avenues, for
example by applying the categories of the new-born economic science to grasp
the volatility of the emoluments paid to the artists: from very modest rewards
in the fifteenth century to the huge fees in the early sixteenth century to their
sudden final collapse in the middle of the century. The author was a great
admirer of the historian Leopold von Ranke (1795-1886); accordingly, he
rejected both positivism and Hegelianism, assigning the task of verifying the
history of art events to a fact-based historical method (and not to the
aesthetic theory).
The first
volume of the Artist’s letters of the
Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries [2], with its 470 pages, was devoted
entirely to Italian artists, from Ottaviano Nelli Martino and Jacopo della
Quercia up to Bartolomeo Ammannati and Andrea Palladio. It collected exactly
150 letters. The second tome, covering the seventeenth century [3] reached a
total of 380 pages: the first 120 were dedicated to Italians artists from
Barocci to Lanfranco, and the volume then continued with Flemish and French painters
of the sixteenth and seventeenth century and ended with the first Italian
Baroque. In total, it presented one hundred letters. The two volumes were also assembled
in a combined edition in one volume in 1856 - of which I possess a copy (see Fig. 1) - in
which the two tomes were simply bound together [4]. All volumes were published
by Meyer Guttentag, a Berlin publisher who until 1853 ran the business under
the name of T. Trautwein'sche Büch und
Musikalienhandlung and then became Guttentag
Verlag [5].
The
original plan included a third volume, whose preparation was announced as already
advanced in 1856, but was never concluded. It should have been a collection of
letters by German Renaissance artists (think for example of Dürer, who is not
present in the 1853-1856 collection). The German Renaissance was not included
in the first book (fully dedicated to Italians) but even not in the second (devoted
to the second part of the sixteenth and to the seventeenth century). There is a
need - explained the author of the second book [6] - to discuss separately the
Germans of the sixteenth century, for lack of homogeneity. The first book was
in fact all based on the study of the social aspects of art in the Italian
Lordships, while the second was focused on the impact on the Counter
Reformation on arts. The third book would therefore rely on the artists’ letters
to treat their relationship with the Lutheran reform (in part still not historically
explained, according to the author). It all came to nothing: in 1862, only
forty-three years, Guhl died after a short and sudden illness.
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| Fig. 3) Johann Heinrich Hintze, Altes Museum, 1832 |
For the
first time, the work made available a rich collection of letters of artists to
the German public, achieving a good success (it was rewarded with a gold medal
in 1856 [7]). To compile it, Guhl made mainly use of the Italian collections of
letters prepared by Bottari-Ticozzi [8], Gaye [9] and Gualandi [10]. Outside
Italy, the texts of these letters were not available except with great
difficulty, and it was perhaps for this reason that the Berlin publisher
(conscious of the novelty) introduced the following warning in the inside front cover
of the 1853 and the 1856 editions: "I reserve the right to publish the
work in English and French translation". Perhaps the sudden disappearance
of the author also prevented the materialization of that intention.
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| Fig. 4) The second edition, revised and enriched by Adolf Rosenberg in 1880 |
In 1880, a second
posthumous edition was published [11]; it was revised and enriched by the
Berlin art historian Adolf Rosenberg (1850-1906). Although twenty-five years
and more had passed, Guhl’s language remained clearly understandable and
therefore there was no need for a new translation. The two volumes were assembled
typographically, but the structure, with separate numbering of the letters and
two different introductory essays for the first and the second part, remained
intact. In the former first tome the number of letters was augmented from 150
to 160 letters. As to the former second tome, the leap was even greater (from
100 to 150 letters), with the revision of the section on Rubens and the
addition of a whole new 'second part' dedicated to the German artists of the
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, originally intended for the third volume.
Dürer's letters, which existed in the 1872 version of Thausing, were translated
anew in modern German. Rosenberg wrote that he had also taken into account, for
his review, the availability of new sources, including works by Milanesi [12]
and Crowe-Cavalcaselle [13]. In the introduction he also specified that the new
collection of original artistic letters, edited by Campori [14], had instead not
been a great help to him.
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| Fig. 5) Friedrich August Stüler, Neues Museum in Berlin, printing around 1850 |
In 1913,
sixty years after the first publication, a compendium of Guhl’s letters was
released, entitled Letters of Renaissance
Artists, curated by Wilhelm Miessner (1876 to 1915), a novelist and literary scholar who died in
war only two years after [15]. This issue was far removed from the original, as
it was only limited to Renaissance and focused on the letters of only 12
artists [16].
After World
War I, the art critic Hermann Uhde-Bernays, a follower of Grimm and Tschudi, originally
intended to prepare a further new version of Guhl’s collection. The differences
of their approaches, however, were too large to prepare a simple revision.
Under the influence of Ranke, Guhl had focused on the relationship between
artists as individuals and the historic elements around them; for him, every
artist was first and foremost a child of his time; to him the letters were
important to understand biographies and events. Uhde-Bernays was instead the son
of Hegelian theories, according to which history is marked by the continuity of great heroic
spirits; the only element of continuity that artist’s letters can score over
time is the primacy of the subjective aspect on any other element, or - as he
wrote - the truth of artistic creation. These were two different stages of the Berlin
School of art history. Uhde-Bernays then published, in 1926, a collection selected according to very different criteria from those of Guhl [17], replacing five
sixths of Renaissance literature and expanding the collection of letters to Van
Gogh: this way, a new classic of German art literature was born, and the time
of the anthology of Guhl was indeed over. Not by chance there were no other
updated versions any more. However, facsimile editions of the Letters of Guhl
artists became recently available between 2012 and 2014 [18]. As indicated in
the footnotes, all original editions are now available for free on the
internet.
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| Fig. 6) A table from "The monuments of ancient art" of Ernst Guhl and Joseph Caspar, 1851 |
Ernst Karl Guhl
Today, the
memory of Ernst Guhl has, in fact, almost disappeared. A simple review of the
list of his publications reveals that all his work always had the goal of
making extensive and systematic publications available to the readers. Together
with Wilhelm Lübke, he commented a collection of illustrated tables of Joseph
Caspar on The Art of Monuments [19], published
between 1845 and 1856. The collection summed up, in four volumes, the entire
history of world architecture, from prehistory to the present; the work was the
subject of new editions until 1893. Together with Wilhelm Koner, he published
in 1860 a Life of Greek and Romans,
derived from the ancient monuments [20], in
two volumes, rich in illustrations: it was perhaps his most successful work,
with translations in English, French, Spanish and Italian [21] and with new
editions and updates until the present days. But his interests were very broad:
they included publications that today could be classified as close to studies on
archaeology ("An attempt on the
Ionic Capital"), but also very innovative themes for its time ("Women in the History of Art").
Perhaps, exactly the dispersion of interests (in addition to his death at a
young age) may explain the reasons why Guhl has not gone down in history as a
reference art critic.
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| Fig. 7) Ernst Guhl, Ernst Guhl, An Attempt on the Ionic Capital, 1845 |
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| Fig. 8) Ernst Guhl, Women in Art History, 1845 |
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| Fig. 9) A modern English edition of The life of the Greeks and Roman Lives, published by Bracken Books in 1989 |
Combining
the Artist’s letters, the Art of the monuments and the Life of Greeks and Romans, one gets the
picture of his endless curiosity as a scholar, which could range from art history
to archaeology, from ancient Greece to the Renaissance. Guhl was perhaps more an
encyclopaedic populariser than a deep scholar, and was certainly the result of
his age and of the erudite world of Berlin. Examples were the very old
Alexander von Humboldt, who died in Berlin only three years before Guhl, and
Heinrich Schliemann, who was his contemporary. Crossing between modern and
ancient was common at that time: even in 1838 the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Universität had only one chair, called "Archaeology and History of Art"; therefore,
art history was - at the time - an appendage of archaeology. Just to understand
how things were in Berlin in those years, to pass the examination of
qualification to teach at the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Universität
Guhl had to complement his thesis (on the Ionic capital) with a lesson in Latin
entitled " Succinta architecturae
gothicae apud Italos historiae expositio", i.e. a brief exposition on
the history of Gothic architecture in Italy: he did it on October 27, 1848 [22]. Passing the exam gave
him the opportunity to teach as a Privatdozent
at twenty-nine, the lowest (and worse paid) title in the academic career. In
March 1854, shortly after he had published the first volume of the Artists’ Letters, he achieved the second
step of the academic ladder, with a permanent chair at the Academy of Fine
Arts, which still did not allow him financial security [23]. The appointment as
extraordinary professor at the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Universität was instead
achieved only in 1861, shortly before his death.
Though
working from junior academic positions, Guhl entered the Berlin academia (University and College) and thus joined
the heart of the Berlin school of history of art, founded by Carl Friedrich von Rumohr (1785-1843) and continued by Gustav Friedrich Waagen (1794-1868), Karl
Schnaase (1798-1875) and Franz Kugler (1808-1858). And it was Waagen to write two rich book reviews, in 1854 and in 1857, on the Artists' letters, published in the Deutsches Kunstblatt, the magazine that in its editorial board
gathered the crème de la crème of the
German-speaking art criticism: Eggers, Kugler, Schnaase and Waagen in Berlin,
Passavant in Frankfurt, Eitelberger von Edelberg in Vienna and other scholars
in Dresden, Dusseldorf and Munich. On the two texts by Waagen, we are writing a
different post to be published in the coming weeks. They were important texts,
because they showed that the history of German-speaking art literature was not
only a Viennese phenomenon. If the Vienna School inaugurated the first collection of texts of art history sources with Eitelberger von Edelberg, under
the aegis of a positivistic influence that will eventually lead to Julius von Schlosser’s decision to write a scientific manual an art literature, the Berlin
School started an idealism-inspired stream, strongly linked to the idea of the
primacy of individuals over groups, which will result in the production of
anthological texts, composed of letters and other writings, which was very
popular until the first half of the twentieth century.
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| Fig. 10) The 1834 edition of the Deutsches Kunstblatt |
Art history as a history of biographies
"The work I am herewith presenting to the
public has been inspired by a personal necessity. In the course of the art
history lessons that I have to give at the University and the Academy of Arts,
and for which I have the task of marking more than anywhere else a certain
individual setting to the ideal content of historical developments, I noticed a
certain lack, more or less common to all major history of art monographs. They
provide information about the succession of styles and artworks, as well as on
the position of individual artists involved in this succession and evolution of
their creations. What is lacking in most cases is any understanding about their
personality, character, on the personal opinions of the artists, their position
in real life and finally on the way in which they have contributed, from the
point of view of their inner convictions, to culture and the spiritual
movements of their time." [24] Thus, the Artists’ letters were born from the desire to conceive history of
art not only as a history of styles, but as the history of the biographies of
the artists, and the letters became the main tool for capturing new information
to that end.
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| Fig. 11) Carl Rohrich, The National Gallery in Berlin, 1878 |
From a
methodological point of view – as Guhl wrote in the introduction to the first
volume - there were two possible paths: the first one was to select the letters
of the most famous artists only and use them to create 'biographical medallions’
on the main personalities; the second was to analyse the entire material and
use it to compose a sort of epistolary-based history of modern art (here
understood as the art of 1400-1600), founded on "well defined criteria, and ordered in a coherent way." [25] Although
the first criterion was simpler, Guhl decided to follow the second one, in the
desire to show that "the whole
history of modern art can be concretely illustrated with the ideas which were
practiced on art, ethics and religion by certain persons and in certain situations"
[26]. The Italian
Renaissance, as Guhl wrote in the introduction to the first volume, was the
period that best lent itself to this effort, thanks to the documentary wealth
of available letters.
As for the
German translation, the author specified that he did not try to improve the
style of the letters, to which he did not attribute aesthetic properties (therefore,
differently from the French concept of artistes-écrivains, which was developing in parallel
in the XIX century in Paris, they were not seen as part of literature): "They are not beautiful nor must necessarily
be beautiful." [27] The texts belong to artists who sometimes
had evident difficulty in expressing themselves in writing. In line with Ranke,
the priority of the curator was instead given to historical accuracy, which explains
the vast critical apparatus in the form of the notes preceding the letters to present
the author, and those following each of them, to explain the context in which every
single letter should be read.
The introductory essay to the first volume:
"On the Art of the 15th and 16th Century"
The
introductory essay to the first volume sought to provide a common reading of
the phenomena during the hundred-fifty years covered by the anthology. The
letters must be seen as a testimony of the art of those times, allowing to
enrich their understanding, as a support to the documents already available. In
particular, Guhl assigned the letters with the task of witnessing the artists "as human beings" [28]. Here his
words were again in tune with Ranke’s criticism of Hegelian idealism: "The work of art is not just one or the other
representation of this or that idea in a painting or a statue: a true work of
art is born when the artist moves his innermost essence in his art production."
[29] One cannot separate the man and the artist, writes Guhl. "In other words, the history of art has to be
individualized" [30]. Therefore,
if art critics - under the combined effect of positivism and idealism – had tried
to draw general rules, now the time was come to move to a later stage: "If until now the task was to idealize
people, or to raise them in the fields of general historical ideas, today the
mission is instead to embody these ideas, or in other words to prove their actual
existence in individuals" [31].
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| Fig. 12) Maximilian Rich, The long bridge and the castle on the side of the Spree, 1830 |
It was also
wrong to conceive the history of art as a result of brilliant events
attributable to the heroes of history, because its course does not depend on
great personalities only. Citing the French-Belgian scholar Rogier de Beauvoir
(1806-1866), Guhl explained that "the
hidden features of the artists often make the history of art itself" [32]. He added that, to study the minor
artists or even interpret the statements of the main artists which would remain
otherwise inexplicable, the artists' letters are key: referring to those of
Filippo Lippi, Benozzo Gozzoli, Andrea Mantegna and Lorenzo di Credi, he explained
for example that they were written in a particularly authentic style [33].
The letters
were also fundamental to understand the artists' interaction with his time: and
here we found some aspects of modernity in Guhl’s thinking that cannot be denied
and that recall, albeit from distance, the parallel development in those years
of social and economic sciences. The artists’ letters in fact provide some basic
information on a few "social
elements of art history", and in particular on four issues: (i) the relation
of the artists between themselves; (ii) the relation of the artists with those
in power; (iii) their contractual relationship with the clients and finally
(iv) their relation with the representatives of the world of culture.
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| Fig. 13) Joseph Maximilian Kolb, The Gendarmenmarkt in Berlin, 1850 |
This was
not mere curiosity. In Guhl’s view, the letters would allow to fill the gaps
that the reading of Vasari did not solve satisfactorily, and would moreover allow
to study how the friendships between artists - sometimes due to fortuitous
circumstances - allowed them to mature their style. Guhl made explicit
reference to the alleged exchange of letters between Francesco Francia and Raphael
(perhaps a false letter produced by Malvasia, just at odds with the
Tuscan-centric Vasari and his story according to which the Bolognese Francia
died of a heart attack after seeing the Santa Cecilia of Raphael sent to
Bologna) and between Raphael and Michelangelo, Michelangelo and Sebastiano del
Piombo, Bartolomeo Ammannati and Giorgio Vasari, Giulio Romano and
Parmigianino. "In some cases the
clarification of such personal relationships may contribute to the solution of
specific issues on the history of art. An example is the relationship between
Raphael and Michelangelo, who often is judged so wrongly and is even
misinterpreted and that will be the subject of detailed analysis below”
[34]. In fact, on the basis of the combined reading of the letters, and of
Vasari’s texts Guhl concluded that Michelangelo did not have at all a negative
attitude vis-à-vis his younger colleague and that the animosity was the result
of the clash of the respective groups of disciples. It should immediately be
anticipated that Waagen, in the review of the text of Guhl published in the spring
of 1854 in Deutsches Kunstblatt,
which we will examine separately, would instead take the opposite view, using
the same pieces of evidence shown by Guhl, and confirm the animosity between
the two great artists.
On the
relationship between artists, commissioners and patrons, Guhl identified a
major discontinuity. In the fifteenth century and until the early decades of
the sixteenth century the relationship between artists, nobles and political
authorities was the one between peers: "There were not yet those numerous barriers that people would have
created between themselves later on, in order to make relations and personal
contacts more difficult. There was still a sense of a certain equality between
those who held the power and those who had the talent; a parity that resulted
in a frank, open (I would say exclusively personal) way to relate to each other" [35]. Cosimo de' Medici and Donatello were
friends; Mantegna and Francesco Gonzaga had a cordial relationship despite their
age difference; and, in the sixteenth century, the relations between Federigo
Gonzaga, Titian or Giulio Romano were still entirely free from all formalities.
It is with the mid-sixteenth century, and paradoxically with the sunset of the
financial fortunes of the Italian Lordships, that the artists were forced to innumerable
subterfuges, flattery and real humiliation for having access to the declining
commissions of the powerful. For instance, Bronzino wrote on purpose that he
was kissing Cosimo’s 'most holy hand' in 1548. This new formalism of relations
between artists and people in power also reflected, in the opinion of Guhl, the
decadence in the art during mannerism, in a remarkable parallel between style
of letters and art [36].
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| Fig. 14) K. Loillot de Mars, View of the Brandenburg Gate from East, about 1850 |
When however
the great artists of the Renaissance imposed themselves on the stage, the
relations were reversed; people in power were ready and willing to acquire whatever
work from these creators, with no discrimination on the subject, because they saw
in art purchase a proof of the affirmation of their power. The Gonzaga contacted
Michelangelo for this purpose, to order him a work, whether sculpture or
painting, to be chosen at his will. Federigo Gonzaga set to Sebastiano del
Piombo the only condition for the purchase of his work that it would be a
beautiful and graceful painting [37].
If we
examine the contractual dynamics between artists and clients, the documentation
shows that in a first phase the requests to the artist were extremely detailed.
At times, there was no lack of disputes between them on the actual compliance
with agreed conditions (Benozzo Gozzoli and Pietro de’ Medici, Pietro Perugino
and the monks of San Pietro in Perugia, Correggio and the religious of the
Cathedral of Parma). The actual prices were in line with those of the most
skilled craftsmen, and the income allowed painters, in the best cases, to have a
decent life, but not to be well-off. Even the contractual forms were similar to
those of the artisans: painters were paid, we would say today, a fixed piece
rate, i.e. on the basis of the number and size of painted figures, or portrayed
heads, etc...
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| Fig. 15) K. Loillot de Mars, A View of Berlin Seen from the West, 1846 |
Instead, in
the age of Michelangelo, Leonardo and especially Titian, and thus in the first
decades of the 1500s, the economic value of the fees soared. It was a period
where all social groups were especially interested in soliciting the production
of artworks, as never (perhaps) occurred except the times of ancient Greece.
The artist's life was characterized not only by a high social position, but
also by "waste, luxury and splendor" [38]. After the highs of those years, and in
a situation of substantial over-supply of artistic goods compared to a stalling
demand [39], prices however collapsed [40] (though with some exceptions) and
the artists had to face a destiny marked by "privation, poverty and hardship"
[41].
To conclude
on the introductory essay to the first volume, a few words remain to be said about
what the letters tell us about the relationship between art and the world of
culture. At the height of the Renaissance, art was no longer the result of a
naive and instinctive creation within the workshops, but now the conscious
result of an artistic education, which was fully integrated with the other
branches of culture. Artists are characterized by "the respect for science, their
participation in the general culture and an intense relationship with their
representatives" [42]. The proof was the correspondence of Leon Battista Alberti and Leonardo. Circles of intellectuals formed themselves, where
artists fully participated together with writers, philosophers, scientists
(Bembo, Giovio, Varchi, Borghini and many others). These were the circles gathering,
for example, at Lorenzo the Magnificent or the court of Urbino.
The introductory essay to the second volume: “On Art in the Seventeenth Century”
Compared to
the overall picture of the fifteenth and sixteenth century, conditions changed
in the seventeenth century: first of all, there was more information to
reconstruct the biography of artists regardless of their letters; the number of
available drive letters also increased; and yet - Guhl wrote - they proved to be
much less varied and fresh in content and writing [43]. These elements justify
the claim that the selection of the letters (only one hundred in the second
volume in 1856, compared to one hundred-fifty in 1853) cost the curator greater
effort. Since the letters, so to speak, told us fewer things concerning their
authors, it became necessary to further increase the space dedicated to the critical
apparatus.
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| Fig. 16) F.A. Borchel, The Schöneberger meadows and the Tiergarten, 1850 |
In Guhl’s
view, the second half of the sixteenth century was a period of acute spiritual
decadence, which was reflected in his extremely negative judgment on mannerism,
characterised by the conservation of the forms of the great masters, but the
loss of their balance. To the fall of any authenticity in the artworks
corresponded the loss of any natural element in the letters (starting from
those of Zuccari and Paggi), linked to the attempt to elaborate, in his view, empty
systematic theories on art creation (his critical comments to the "Idea of Painters, Sculptors and Architects"
by Federico Zuccari occupies three pages of the introduction to the second
volume [44]). Theorists and their "empty and false idealism" [45] were
given the responsibility for the decline of art: this reasoning indicated once
again his distancing from the Hegelian world.
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| Fig. 17) Ludwig E. Lütke, The Royal Palace in Berlin, 1850 |
The
reaction only came at the end of the sixteenth century, with the two opposing
schools of academic and naturalist painters. The former were represented in the
collection by the letters of the Carracci and their followers (Domenichino,
Guido Reni, Albani, Lanfranco and Guercino), for a total of over one hundred
pages, undeniable sign of sympathy; the second by Salvator Rosa’s letters.
Obviously, Guhl dedicated to Caravaggio – the founder of the naturalists - some
passionate pages in the introduction. The sometimes sour clash between
mannerists, academics and naturalists was reflected in the excerpts of artists
and critics of the time, in the Rome of Pope Sixtus V. Guhl cited quotations
from texts by Giovan Battista Passeri and Francesco Albani against Caravaggio.
But he did not omit some negative judgments on this master from himself, revealing
his personal views: replying to the observation of his contemporaries Philippe
de Chennevières Pointel (1820-1899), Eduard Kolloff (1811-1879) and Friedrich
Theodor Vischer (1807-1887) who celebrated Caravaggio as 'revolutionary' and even 'democratic',
because naturalism had made it possible for the 'mass of people' to understand
art, he noted that "these views can
only be recognized as valid on condition of a very narrow interpretation"
[46]. Evidently, to talk about democracy in the Kingdom of Prussia in 1856 was still
an embarrassing topic, which reminded the French Revolution and the 1848
uprising and certainly did not raise unanimous consent.
The
developments in paintings of the seventeenth century were characterized by the
Counter-Reformation, to which Guhl attributed the ability to strengthen the awareness
of Italian artists on the need to overcome the supreme evil of mannerism and to
anchor themselves to "more solid and
positive values in art" [47] taking iconographic forms which express
devotion [48]. Domenichino wrote that "the
artist must feel within himself what is displaying" as a painter [49].
The letters by Barocci, Guercino, Maderno and Crespi testified that art was now
consciously serving the Church. In turn, the Church had the power to determine
the fortune of the artists (that is what happened to the academics of the
Bologna school under Paul V and Gregory XV) or decree their eclipse (under Urban
VIII). With Urban VIII, a strategic shift of the papacy occurred from Spain to
France, a freer and more modern state, which corresponded to a change of taste
in Rome: Domenichino and Lanfranco followed the Spanish viceroy in Naples,
Guido Reni and Guercino went back to Emilia, while a new generation of Italian
artists achieved popularity in Rome (the reference here is to Bernini, whose
role was however underestimated by Guhl); then the French artists and
personalities like Poussin (represented with twenty pages of letters) got power.
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| Fig. 18) The Altes Museum in Berlin in a postcard of 1858 |
However, the
ripple effects of developments in Rome opened new spaces for local artists,
right in Spain and in the other provinces of the Habsburg Empire. Ample space (twenty-two
letters and sixty pages in all) was devoted to Rubens by Guhl, who was
obviously in love with him; he saw in him (although solidly anchored to the
Habsburg power system) a different spirit from that of the Counter-Reformation,
as proven by the freedom of judgment that he showed in his letters, speaking for
instance of Tilly and Wallenstein, the heroes of the Catholic camp in the
Thirty Years War, as barbarians and mocking the announcement of alleged
miracles in areas of war. In the United Provinces, and therefore in that part
of Flanders embracing Protestantism, there was instead a blossoming of poetry,
prose and philosophy, but of course also of painting with Rembrandt.
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| Fig. 19) The Altes Museum in Berlin today |
Conclusions
Guhl accomplished
an attempt to narrate the history of art during three centuries, from the early
fifteenth century to the end of the seventeenth century; he did it, using
modern historiographic standards, inspired to Ranke, and thus anchored to the
idea of a solid evidence base. The artists’ letters provided a sufficiently
broad support to attempt a more individual approach to the history of art,
placing individuals, their thoughts and their experiences at the centre of art
history. It was an attempt to streamline the path of works and styles according
to different criteria from those of positivism and idealism, the concurrent and
alternative cultural references then present in the German world. The author drew
two frescoes, the one focusing on the social aspects of art and the other on
the influence of the Counter-Reformation. In the background, German readers were
offered for the first time a methodical collection of writings, which were
hitherto inaccessible. That way, a strand of German art literature was born that
would be successful for over a century.
[1] Pfotenhauer,
Helmut - Kunstliteratur als
Italienerfahrung, Series of Villa Vigoni N.5, Tübingen, Niemeyer, 1991, 327
pages.
[2] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. Übersetzt und
erläutert, Berlin, Trautwein'sche Buch u. Musikalienhandl., 1853. The
original text is available at: https://archive.org/details/kunstlerbriefe01guhl
[3] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler-Briefe. Band 2, Kunst
und Künstler des siebzehnten Jahrhunderts, Berlin, Guttentag, 1856. The
original text is available at: https://archive.org/details/kunstlerbriefe02guhl
[4] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler-Briefe. Übersetzt und
erläutert von E. Guhl. 2 Bände in einem, Berlin, Trautwein, Guttentag,
1853/56.
[5] See:
Ziesak, Anne-Katrin - Der Verlag Walter
de Gruyter: 1749-1999, Berlin, De Gruyter, 1999
[6] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler-Briefe. Band 2, (quoted)
… 1956, p. VIII
[7] Garberson
Eric - Art History in the University II: Ernst Guhl, in: Journal of Art
Historiography, Number 7 December 2012. The original text is available at: https://arthistoriography.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/garberson-article.pdf
[8] Bottari, Giovanni Gaetano - Raccolta di lettere sulla pittura, scultura ed architettura scritte da'
più celebri personaggi dei secoli XV, XVI e XVII, pubblicata da M. Gio. Bottari e continuata fino ai nostri giorni da Stefano Ticozzi (Collection of letters on painting,
sculpture and architecture, written by most famous figures of the XV, XVI and
XVII, published by Mr Giovanni Bottari and continued to this day by Stefano
Ticozzi), Milan 1822-1825, eight volumes.
[9] Carteggio
inedito d’artisti dei secoli XIV. XV. XVI. Pubblicato ed illustrato con
documenti pure inediti dal Dott. Giovanni Gaye (Unpublished correspondence
of artists of the XIV, XV, XVI centuries. Published and illustrated with previously unpublished documents by Dr.
John Gaye), Florence, 1840, three volumes.
[10] Memorie
originali italiane riguardanti le belle arti di Michel Angelo Gualandi, Serie
I-VI, Bologna, 1840-1845. Nuova Raccolta di lettere sulla pittura, scultura ed
architettura scritte da’ più celebri personaggi dei secoli XV a XIX, con note
ed illustrazioni (Italian original memoirs concerning the fine arts by
Michel Angelo Gualandi, Series I-VI, Bologna, 1840-1845. New Collection of letters on painting,
sculpture and architecture written by most famous characters of the fifteenth
to the nineteenth centuries, with notes and illustrations), volumes I and II,
Bologna 1844, 1845.
[11] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstlerbriefe. 2 Teile in 1 Band. 2., 2.
umgearbeitete und sehr vermehrte Aufllage von Adolf Rosenberg. (Artist letters. 2 parts in 1
volume. 2. Second revised and much amplified version by Adolf Rosenberg), 2 halves
in one volume, Berlin, Guttentag (D. Collin) 1880. The original text is available
at: https://archive.org/details/kunstlerbriefe00guhl_0
[12] Milanesi, Gaetano, Documenti per la storia dell’arte senese (Documents for the history
of Sienese art) 1854. The
original text is available
at:https://archive.org/details/documentiperlas00milagoog. Moreover: Milanesi Gaetano,
Le lettere di Michelangelo Buonarroti
(The letters by Michelangelo Buonarroti), 1876. The original text is available at: https://archive.org/details/laletteredimich00buongoog.
[13] Cavalcaselle, Giovan Battista e Crowe, Joseph
Archen; Tiziano, la sua vita e i suoi
tempi: con alcune notizie della sua famiglia. Opera fondata
principalmente su documenti inediti (Titian, his life and his times: with some
information on his family. Work mainly based on unpublished documents),
Firenze, Le Monnier,1877.
[14] Campori, Giuseppe - Lettere artistiche inedite (Artistic Unpublished Letters), Modena, Erede
Soliani, 1866.
[15] Guhl,
Ernst Karl e Miessner, Wilhelm - Künstlerbriefe
der Renaissance, Berlin, Meyer & Jessen, 1913, 349 pages. The original
text is available at: https://books.google.it/books?id=AlrpQStyivkC&pg=PR3&lpg=PR3&dq=Wilhelm+Miessner+k%C3%BCnstlerbriefe&source=bl&ots=uno4twQVB8&sig=4yyMwCwu1xgrlxcVXwmux4CBS-Q&hl=it&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjz_KD2_-DLAhUFZ3IKHeCxC24Q6AEIXjAJ#v=onepage&q=Wilhelm%20Miessner%20k%C3%BCnstlerbriefe&f=false
[16] Domenico Veneziano, Fra Filippo Lippi, Bertoldo,
Andrea Mantegna, Leonardo da Vinci, Raffaello Sanzio, Lorenzo di Credi,
Michelangelo, Titian, Sebastiano del Piombo, Benvenuto Cellini, Dürer and Rubens.
[17] Uhde-Bernays,
Hermann - Künstlerbriefe über Kunst.
Bekenntnisse von Malern, Architekten und Bildhauern aus fünf Jahrhunderten,
Dresden, Jess Verlag, 1926
[18] Guhl,
Ernst Karl - Künstler-Briefe. Erster
Band, Brema, Dogma Verlag, 2014; Guhl, Ernst Karl - Künstler-Briefe. Zweiter Band, Bremen, Dogma Verlag, 2014; Guhl, Ernst
Karl - Künstlerbriefe der Renaissance,
KlassikArt Verlag, 2012.
[19] Guhl,
Ernst and Joseph Caspar (Volumi I-III), Wilhelm Lübke and Josph Caspar (Volume
IV) - Denkmäler der Kunst zur Übersicht
ihres Entwicklungs-Ganges von den ersten künstlerischen Versuchen bis zu den
Standpunkten der Gegenwart, Stuttgart, Ebner & Seubert, 1851
[20] Guhl,
Ernst Karl and Koner,Wilhelm - Das Leben
der Griechen und Römer: nach antiken Bildwerken, Berlin, Weidmann, 1860.
Volume I – Die Griechen, 324 pages with
317 etchings; Volume II - Die Römer,
407 pages with 211 etchings.
[21] Guhl, Ernst Karl and Koner, Wilhelm - La vita dei
greci e dei romani: ricavata dagli antichi monumenti, Milan, Loescher, 1875.
[22] Garberson
Eric - Art History in the University, quoted.
[23] Garberson
Eric - Art History in the University, quoted.
[24] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. V.
[25] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. VII.
[26] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. VIII.
[27] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. IX.
[28] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXI.
[29] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, pp. XXI-XXII.
[30] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXII.
[31] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXIII.
[32] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXIII.
[33] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXIII.
[34] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXV.
[35] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXVII.
[36] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXX.
[37] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXXII.
[38] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXXVI.
[39] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXXVII.
[40] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXXVII.
[41] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXXVII.
[42] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler - Briefe. … 1953, quoted, p. XXXIX.
[43] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler-Briefe. Band 2, … 1956, quoted, p. VII.
[44] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler-Briefe. Band 2, … 1956, quoted, p. XV-XVII.
[45] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler-Briefe. Band 2, … 1956, quoted, p. XIX.
[46] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler-Briefe. Band 2, … 1956, quoted, p. XXV.
[47] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler-Briefe. Band 2, … 1956, quoted, p. XXVIII.
[48] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler-Briefe. Band 2, … 1956, quoted, p. XXVIII.
[49] Guhl,
Ernst - Künstler-Briefe. Band 2, … 1956, quoted, p. XXXI.
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