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History of Art Literature Anthologies
Click here to see all the anthologies reviewed in the series
[Letters of the Artists of the Nineteenth Century]
Künstlerbriefe aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert
[Edited by Else Cassirer]
Berlin, Bruno Cassirer Verlag, 1913 [on the cover page] / 1914 [in the frontispiece], 710 pages, with 150 illustrations.
Review by Francesco Mazzaferro
Part One
The editions in 1913/14, 1919 and 1923
End of Part One
Go to Part Two
[Edited by Else Cassirer]
Berlin, Bruno Cassirer Verlag, 1913 [on the cover page] / 1914 [in the frontispiece], 710 pages, with 150 illustrations.
Review by Francesco Mazzaferro
Part One
 |
| Fig. 1) The first edition of the anthology, dated 1913, but most probably published in 1914 |
The 1913-1914
Berlin anthology, devoted to the "Letters of the Artists of the Nineteenth Century" (Künstlerbriefe aus dem
neuenzehnten Jahrhundert) was published by Bruno Cassirer (1872-1941), one
of the most important publishers of those years: an innovator both in the field
of art and, more generally, in that of culture. We have already mentioned him in
this blog as editor of several writings by Lovis Corinth (1858 -1925) and Max
Liebermann (1847 -1935). It was mainly the merit of Bruno and his cousin Paul
Cassirer (1871 -1926), a great art dealer and collector, secretary of the
Berlin Secession and himself publisher of art, if the members of the Berlin
Secession, and in particular the masters of German Impressionism, conquered the
bourgeoisie of the country: in addition to the already cited Corinth and
Liebermann, also Max Slevogt (1868-1932).
 |
| Fig. 2) Franz Krüger, Parade on Opera Square in Berlin, 1824-1830 (detail). Among the public attending the parade of Prussian and Russian troops are portrayed, together with Krüger himself (the third rider on the right, with a brown suit), also the architect Karl Friedrich Schinkel, the sculptor Johann Gottfried Schadow, the painters Carl Joseph Begas, Karl Wilhelm Wach and Christian Daniel Rauch, as well as Nicolò Paganini (sitting in the carriage, top right) in the company of the famous opera singer Henriette Sontag. |
The anthology
is centred on the nineteenth century. The introduction explains why: "The editors have confined themselves to the
nineteenth century because the artists of this period are still close to us in
a very vivid way today and, at the same time, (...) they have already become
part of history in some way" [1].
I would add
three comments in this regard. First, an overall reassessment of German art
took place in those years: the three-volume work by Julius Meier-Graefe on the
"History of the development of modern art" (Entwicklungsgeschichte der modernen Kunst) were published in 1904.
The art historian did not hesitate to draw important lines of continuity
between the nineteenth century and contemporary art in Germany and Europe,
including the avant-garde [2]. Two years later, in 1906, the "Exhibition
of a century of German art" (Jahrhundertausstellung
deutscher Kunst) [3] presented a
rich retrospective of the nineteenth century to the Berlin public, with over
two thousand exhibits. It is an exhibition which is still being discussed today
as a seminal moment in the taste of the German public. It was curated by a team
of art historians (Alfred Lichtwark, Hugo von Tschudi, Woldemar von Seidlitz
and precisely Julius Meier-Graefe) who, despite having different preferences, were
all among the least related to the aesthetic conventions of the time. Their
goal was to propose a revision in a modern sense of romantic art, and in
particular of Caspar David Friedrich (1774 - 1840) and Philipp Otto Runge (1777
-1810). The exhibition also let the general public discover artists who were
then not yet universally known, as Hans von Marées (1837 -1887), Anselm
Feuerbach (1829-1880) and Wilhelm Leibl (1844 -1900). I believe that the
publication of the anthology of the Letters
of the artists of the nineteenth century in 1913/1914 was, in some ways,
the corresponding step of these developments in terms of art literature.
 |
| Fig. 3) Max Liebermann, Portrait of Bruno Cassirer, 1921 |
Secondly, the
nineteenth century has certainly been a crucial period of German history,
during which Germany did not only give birth to a global cultural movement
(like romanticism) but also achieved its national unification, and therefore aimed
at comparing itself, for the first time on equal terms, with the cultures of
the other great European powers. To reflect on the previous century German art
literature by comparing with that of France and Britain was therefore part
of an attempt to make an assessment on the culture of the young state.
Finally, in
the years of the publication of the anthology Berlin had just experienced a
fierce debate on the direction of modern art, with very evident internal
splits. The artistic world of the city was in turmoil. The Cassirers were among
the protagonists of the controversy: they were the biggest supporters of
Impressionism and the staunchest opponents of the exciting new-born expressionist
groups (who considered impressionism an already aged movement), the
post-impressionist avant-garde movements, arriving simultaneously from Paris
(the Fauves, the Cubists) and the unquiet Scandinavian world (Munch). To retrieve
and present to the public the testimonies of the last century artists certainly
had a great value also for the current disputes about the art to come: the
writings of the artists would help explain the fundamental continuity between
the late nineteenth and the early twentieth century, bearing witness to the
modernity of Impressionism against previous art streams but also aligning
contemporary art against the most recent developments, which were bursting in
Berlin in 1910 with the opening of the gallery Der Sturm (The storm).
 |
| Fig. 4) Bruno and Else Cassirer, undated ©Regina.Pfennig |
Else Cassirer’s role
The curator
of the project of the Letters of artists
was Else Cassirer (1873-1942), the wife of Bruno (which was also her cousin)
and the sister of Paul. For reasons we do not know, her role as editor of the
anthology was made public only on the title page of the second edition,
published in 1919, but it is quite likely that she had already worked at it for
at least a decade. Else and Bruno were married in 1897. Very little information
is available about her, suggesting that she was a very reserved person. However,
in the publishing house of her husband, Else did not only take care of the
letters of the artists, but also of the illustration of children's books [4]. This
is far from implying a secondary role: the publisher Bruno Cassirer published in
German, in editions still remembered for their innovative taste from a typographic
point of view, the Thousand and One
Nights, Ali Baba and the Forty
Thieves (1903), Sinbad the sailor
(1907) and Till Ulenspiegel (1915).
It was Max Slevogt, one of the masters of German impressionists, to illustrate
the first two titles.
 |
| Fig. 5) Max Slevogt, Sinbad, 1907 |
Foretaste 1911
The first
materials of the anthology of letters of artists were released to the public in
Berlin as early as 1911. To them it was dedicated the entire July issue (pages
315-363) of the magazine "Art and Artists" (Kunst und Künstler), published by Bruno Cassirer. Also
that issue of the magazine was entitled "Letters of the artists of the
nineteenth century" (Künstlerbriefe
des neunzehntem Jahrhundert). The monthly magazine, which had been
published since 1902, was considered the best German art magazine never
published until then [5]. In the brief introduction to the Letters, the editorial said that the publisher Bruno Cassirer had
been collecting texts for several years, with the idea of a future publication.
The first core of that collection was covering three themes: that of the
nineteenth century German artists who looked at the classic Italian-Renaissance
or the medieval world as source of inspiration, that of the artists who had
instead enlivened the Berlin cultural life in search of a national style and
finally the letters of the French artists. The reading of the letters – it was
explained - gave directly the floor to extraordinary personalities and made
possible to learn the history of art directly from what they said. The same introductory
text announced the imminent publication of an extensive anthology and
explicitly urged readers to report any text which they hold privately, so that
it might be considered for the inclusion in the future publication.
After two
years since the first release of the letters in July 1911, Bruno Cassirer
published the first complete edition of the anthology of the artist's letters. It
made more than seven hundred pages altogether, of which 450 were dedicated to
the letters of German artists, 50 to the British artists (and Goya), and about 200
to the French ones. It was either 1913 (according to the cover page) or most
probably 1914 (according to the frontispiece), but most likely just before the
outbreak of the Great War. It is striking that some of the illustrations of the
anthology had already been shown in the art journal in 1911. Also the printing
layout was remarkably similar, as if a volume unit was ready two years before. It
was followed by a (slightly reduced) second and third version of the anthology
in 1919 [6], immediately after the end of the conflict, and in 1923 [7], to
show that the issue remained crucial to the Cassirer family despite the transition
from the Wilhelminian Empire to the Weimar Republic and all tremendous jolts to
which the German society was exposed. As already mentioned, in 1919 the name of
Else appeared on the frontispiece as curator, even if the same introduction was
maintained and signed again by the publishing house.
 |
| Fig. 6) The title page of the second edition of the anthology in 1919 |
How to
explain that the volume continued to be published in times of severe tensions in
Germany (in 1919 the country risked many times a coup from opposite directions)?
Perhaps it is a sign that art publications were successful in those years. The
art industry was one of the few sectors escaping the disasters of the early post-war
years, because paintings were becoming the favourite save financial heavens to
escape hyperinflation and to insure wealth against the continuous internal and
external geopolitical shocks. And yet, the more time was passing, the greater
became the public interest in that kind of expressionist and avant-garde art that
was so much disliked by the Cassirers: both German Impressionists as well as
the art of the nineteenth century were no longer the focus of the public
interest. This maybe explain why there was no further edition after 1923, i.e.
in the era marking the commercial successful of the expressionists (Nolde,
Kirchner), but also of abstract art (Kandinsky, Klee), the Cubists and the Futurists
in Germany.
The rise to
power of Hitler in 1933 created a dramatic situation: not only the Cassirers were
Jews, but much of the art they dealt with - while not representing at all the
most advanced forms of avant-garde of the time - was still considered
degenerate by regime [8]. The magazine Art
and Artists was immediately seized in 1933. In December 1938 Bruno Cassirer
and Else fled to Britain to escape racial persecution by the Nazis and founded the
Bruno Cassirer Publishers Ltd. in Oxford, which was active there until 1990,
and thus long after they passed away. Bruno died in fact in Oxford in 1941 and
Else followed him immediately afterwards in 1942 [9]
The rationale for art literature
The
anthology of the Letters of artists of
the nineteenth-century was released at a time when similar initiatives in
the field of art literature were still very rare. After the anthology by Ernst Karl Guhl (1853-1856) mid of the nineteenth-century, the collection by Else
Cassirer is (to our knowledge) the oldest compilation of artists' letters in
the German world. The only other previous anthological work in the field of art
literature (but not an anthology of letters) was the "Repertory of thesources of the art of the Western Middle Ages" (Quellenbuch zur Kunstgeschichte des abendländischen Mittelalters) by
Julius von Schlosser (we are in 1896), aimed at a specialized group of
medievalist scholars.
How to
explain the rationale of the innovative work to the large public? The study of
the writings of the artists, it may be read in the introduction, is very useful
as the original testimony of their will, and it is even essential if we take
into account the structural gap between what artists think and the theories of
art critics. The contrast is inevitable: the artists think of their own art works
as real and unique products, which are made on the basis of a subjective
process that they control. To the contrary, the judgment made on the works
themselves by art critics (who in the introduction of the anthology are still called
'writers', i.e. Schriftsteller, according to the prevailing terminology
before the birth of art history as an autonomous discipline), is always
formulated starting from general theoretical judgments. Although the
introduction did not go so far, one could think that the interest in art
literature was a direct consequence of, and almost a needed counterpart to, the
birth of art criticism as a discipline: to collect the artists’ writings meant
to provide the reader with those materials that were necessary to check the
proliferation of differing orientations of art history.
 |
| Fig. 7) Max Slevogt, Bruno Cassirer, 1911 |
The same concept
is at the centre of a 1880 letter by Hans Thoma (1889-1924), addressed to
his colleague Emil Lugo (1840-1902), in which he spoke of the pain that are
caused by "explanations that are
taken from principled arguments and prejudices. Nowadays, these resonant words
have a preponderant role in art, although they are never truthful. The
aestheticians and critics (...) will continue to churn out their proclamations,
giving new life to old phrases and adorning with beautiful thoughts expressions
which are devoid of clarity. I do not want to have anything to do with them; if
I ever need a few good words about art, I will use one of those from whom I am
sure they understand what they were saying, and whose words bear witness that
have not thrown words to the wind. These are simpler, more genuine, more
understandable words than those used by our quirky moderns. They clarify
everything which can be explained on art by making use of language. These are
the words used by Dürer, Leonardo, Alberti and others” [10]
 |
| Fig. 8) Hans Thoma, The Source, 1895 |
 |
| Fig. 9) Emile Logo, Nymphs Bathing, 1894 |
Here is
what we can read on the subject at the beginning of the introduction of the
anthology (the text of the 1913-1914 remained the same in subsequent editions):
"Between what the artists think
about their art and what writers write on it, acting as mediators for the
general public, there has always been some opposition. And it should be like
this, because the two groups start from different points of view: the artists
move from themselves, from traditional crafts, their will, their talent, their
works of art and the work of those with whom they are associated; the writers
instead leverage on art as a category in its own right, on the general view of
things [allgemeine Weltanschauung] and on the comparison between contradictory elements. The artist starts
from the individual case and try to build up a general rule; the writer usually
makes the first reference to a law and then searches for the particular case;
but in most cases the two approaches will never meet, because a gap remains between
them. In these cases, it is always better to move closer to the artist than to
the writer, because his way is safer and a source of further clarification. It
is more reasonable to advance from a solid base to the top, instead of
proceeding from an uncertain top downwards. (...) Actually, all the artists taking the word here (...) always talk about themselves; even when they
assert in general terms, their feelings and their thoughts are always personal" [11].
 |
| Fig. 10) Autograph letter from Caspar David Friedrich (1820), preserved at the Pommersche Landesmuseum in Greifswald. Source: http://www.kulturstiftung.de/pressemittelung-0715/ |
Although
the testimonies of the artists are completely personal, putting them together
(and thus filling an anthology) is far from lacking a more general interest. In
fact, it creates a kind of alternative art history, which - despite its
shortcomings - must be considered very carefully, because it may be closer to
reality than a lot of abstract constructions may be: "The complex of these statements gives shape, however, to a new type of
art history, almost emanating from the letters of the artists. Of course, we
must consider all precautions, first of all because this can simply mean an
alignment of personal testimonies, and not the representation of a clear line
of historical development. But this publisher believes that such an art
history, although incomplete, is in many respects more effective of the
diligent and 'objective' histories of art written by art historians. True, this
book assumes that the readers have a certain creative imagination and are able
to create links; and yet this stimulus to draw independent conclusions is in
turn a particular source of delight" [12].
So,
following this invitation to the reader, we too have been searching in the
anthology for some red lines to decipher the German art of the nineteenth
century.
Looking for red lines to understand the German
art literature of the 'Long Century'
Notoriously,
the British historian Eric Hobsbawm has called the nineteenth century 'the long
century', because it was born with the French Revolution and finished with the
First World War. And this is exactly the picture of the Letters of artist of the nineteenth century. The anthology opens
with the letters by the illustrator Daniel Chodowiecki (1726-1801), a Huguenot
engraver from Gdansk intertwined with the court of Prussia, but selling his etchings
also to aristocrats, military officers and other officials. And it closes with
a letter of 1911, sent by the impressionist Max Liebermann (1847 -1935) to
Alfred Lichtwark, the art critic and long-time director of the Kunsthalle in
Hamburg, one of the four directors already mentioned as one of the curators of
the 1906 Berlin retrospective exhibition on German art in the nineteenth century.
 |
| Fig. 11) Daniel Chodowiecki, The Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, 1764 |
Not
surprisingly, there was a succession of very different experiences in terms of
artistic taste between two so different worlds, in most cases one after the
other but sometimes side by side: neo-classicism, the Nazarenes, early romanticism,
the Biedermeier style, genre painting (with the strong contrast between
landscape painters and history painters), realism and naturalism, idealism,
symbolism and pointillism, impressionism, and, last but not least, various avant-garde
schools (which are however not included in the book). And above all there was a
modernization of society (industrialization, the input of technology in
everyday life, the increasingly evident success of the industrial bourgeoisie,
the formation of rival political forces representing conflicting interests with
each other) that marked profound changes in the world around the artists.
 |
| Fig. 12) Max Liebermann, The Noordwijk beach, 1908 |
There is no
doubt that, in the face of a so extensive literature and in such a mixed
picture, Else Cassirer was forced to implement draconian choices on the letters
to include or exclude in the anthology. The volume presents letters of forty
German-speaking artists, including Austrian and Swiss German; as we shall see, it
also includes, among the German artists, two subjects of the Empire Habsburg of
Italian language, i.e. Antonio Canova (1757 -1822) and Giuseppe Segantini (1858
-1899). As it is often the case, the analysis of the absences is equally (if
not, even more) interesting than that of the presences. Certainly many of the
artists are missing because their letters were not available, or were
considered uninteresting by the curator; however in some cases it seems very
strange. In fact, there is no trace of some very successful painters in the
second half of the century, in particular the official history painters at
their respective courts, like Carl Theodor von Piloty (1826-1886) in Munich,
Hans Makart (1840 -1884) in Vienna and Anton von Werner (1843-1915) in Berlin.
In their time, they had conquered so central positions in the German-speaking academic
world that they must have entertained a rich correspondence with powerful officials
and with many artists. The only reference to von Werner is a poisoned dart from
Anselm Feuerbach, in a letter to his mother from Rome (written in 1866): "In Berlin the horrible Werner drawing is
being transformed into a mosaic at the base of the Victory Column (Siegesäule)
and he himself was appointed director of the Academy. You yourself can finally
realize... Those who have the power to award such a lack of talent can also
damage the real talent" [13]. It
was against this emphatically styled historical painting, clearly subservient
to dynastic power goals, that at the end of the century were born those secessionist
movements, which the Cassirers had so strongly supported. It is therefore
possible that there has been here an attempt to erase them from the memory of
the 1913 reader, considering them definitely aged.
 |
| Fig. 13) Carl Theodor von Piloty, Thusnelda during the triumph of Germanicus, 1873 |
 |
| Fig. 14) Hans Makart, The Entrance of Charles V in Antwerp, 1878 |
 |
| Fig. 15) Anton von Werner, The Proclamation of the German Empire, 1885 |
More
difficult to interpret are other important absences, such as those of Henry
Fuseli (1741 -1825, Swiss painter, one of the predecessors of Romanticism),
Gottfried Semper (1803-1879, one of the most famous architects of the century,
active in Dresden and Vienna), Wilhelm von Kaulbach (1805-1874, Munich history painter),
Franz von Lenbach (1836 -1904, portrait painter, active in Monaco), Adolf von
Hildebrand (1847 -1921, sculptor and theorist of the form), Wilhelm Trübner
(1851-1917, naturalist painter active in southern Germany) and Franz von Stuck
(1863-1928, symbolist painter and the most famous representative of the Munich
secession during the years when the anthology was published). Some of these
artists had great reputation in the nineteenth century, and they were so
successful to achieve very wealthy economic conditions. Many were active in Munich,
one of the leading art centres in Germany and Europe (which was second only to
Paris). The artistic weight of the Bavarian capital is clearly underestimated
in the anthology. Finally, are also missing the letters from Max Klinger (1857
-1920, painter and sculptor, at that time hailed as the most important German
artist of all time), Max Slevogt (1868 - 1932, impressionist) and Lovis Corinth
(1858 -1925, also Impressionist). These last three artists, in particular, were
authors who had a stable and structural relationship with the publisher
Cassirer and were certainly not considered as 'undesirable'. Perhaps, they were
considered as already representatives of the twentieth century, although an
important part of their activities was yet organised in the nineteenth century.
A conservative but moderate reading of national
art
We know
that the anthology was published in a world which was increasingly
characterized by an explosive nationalist charge. A few months later only,
Germany was at war. I would have expected, therefore, an ideological and nationalist
reading of the writings of the German artists. I thought, for example, that such a vast collection would carve out a large space to the attempts to create a
national artistic culture in Germany, in the years following the 1871 unification,
also in order to contrast it frontally to the French culture. I thought I would
run into extensive evidence of the rancorous substrate of German nationalism,
which was so widespread in particular in the second half of the nineteenth
century, especially because of the established belief of many German
intellectuals that the alleged primacy of French art and culture was the
residue of a centuries-old plot to check the German language world. Indeed,
there is a passage from a letter by Adolf von Menzel, still young, who in 1836
criticized the French art as materialistic and exalted the German spiritualism
[14]. And yet, with the exception of a joke of the old Viennese Moritz von Schwind,
for decades living in Munich, there is no reference to German unification
in the entire volume. And he even wrote, in 1871, to the Frankfurt music composer
Schädl, that "the famous German Empire
is just not my thing" [15] revealing that he opposed the Prussian
expansion. And on the competition between Germany and France over the best art,
there were also those who argued that the French art was more advanced, such as
the Swiss painter Karl Stauffer-Bern did, when he wrote from Berlin to
colleague Peter Halm in 1882 explaining that Germany had indeed the same wealth
of paintings and architecture as France, but not the contemporary art of
Delacroix [16].
The profile
which Else Cassirer selected for the Letters
of artists, although revealing a general conservative tone, did not seem
oriented towards hegemonic designs. There are signs hinting that the book was
addressed primarily to a certainly traditionalist, but also liberal middle class,
and certainly not to the extreme wings of the society, which already existed in
the world of the Wilhelmine empire of those years: neither to communists or revolutionary
socialists nor to the militarist and pro-nationalist groups.
There is no
doubt that, on the basis of selected texts, the artists appear well aware of
the power relations prevailing in their time (and none of these texts aimed,
even implicitly, to overthrow them). The anthology is therefore neither
ahistorical nor intimate. The texts certainly witness a culturally very
conservative attitude of the artists, and in many cases their real
subordination to the established power.
 |
| Fig. 16) Theodor Hosemann, The barricades in Berlin, 1848 |
The only
case in the anthology which is comparable to the sympathies that the revolutionary
attempts by Mazzini and Garibaldi gathered among contemporary Italian artists
is the one of Theodor Hosemann (1807-1875). In a letter of November 1848 he
narrated about a meeting of the Revolutionary Assembly (Nationalversammlung)
which was interrupted and dispersed by the troops. Hosemann was attending a
boring lecture on landscape painting in ancient times, which was being held at
the Berlin Kunst-Verein (the art association) in the central Unter den Linden avenue, when troops broke
by error into the room with weapons in fist, believing it was a new, non-authorised
subversive meeting. But the revolutionaries were not far away: they were
downstairs, and it did not take long to the soldiers to discover them. Here is
how the artist described the scene: "I
could see the floodlighted room, and the mass of the people attached to each
other. The President [Victor Hans von] Unruh was talking, but I did not
understand what he was saying, even for the noise caused by the eruption of the
soldiers. I was not even able to enter the hall, so I was told the content of
the discussions only after their interruption. After about fifteen minutes or
maybe a few minutes more, I suddenly felt an indescribable applause and shouts
of hurray hurray. The doors opened and people went out with faces full of joy. They
hugged, persons I did not know gave me energetic hands shakes and told me: we
will succeed. And at that time I was told that the tax strike had been
proclaimed unanimously" [17].
In all
other cases, history is always read in the artists’ letters through the lens of
power.
 |
| Fig. 17) Daniel Chodowiecki, Frederick II, King of Prussia, 1777 |
The
illustrator Daniel Chodowiecki attended the enlightened circles surrounding the
Berlin court (where, decades before, Frederick the Great had hosted Voltaire). He
was especially close to Friedrich Nicolai, the enlightened editor and novelist,
who asked him to illustrate his new novel entitled “The Life and Opinions of Monsieur
Sebaldus Nothanker” (Das Leben und die
Meinungen des Herrn Magister Sebaldus Nothanker). In the rejection letter
of February 25, 1775 Chodowiecki, who was Huguenot on the mother's side, said
he could never join a literary project that had strong anti-clerical
tendencies. The letter was a celebration of the role of the sacred books and
the respect that should always be due to them [18].
 |
| Fig. 18) Joseph Anton Koch, The Argonauts are celebrating the return of Jason, the Dioscuri and Medea with the Golden Fleece, in 1799 (designed by Asmus Jakob Carstens) |
The
Tyrolean painter Joseph Anton Koch (1768-1839) made the youthful mistake of
siding with the Jacobins in the years of the French Revolution, when he was in
Strasbourg. Pursued by that subversive fame, he first fled to Switzerland and
then to Italy, where he arrived in Rome in 1795. Here he witnessed the birth
and death of the first Roman Republic between 1798 and 1799. His words to a
friend, written a few years later (1805), pointed out that he wanted to remain
aloof from any revolutionary movement in Italy. "And now, here too, the storm of the revolution unleashed: a small group
of so-called patriots made nonsense and asked me to arm myself with a dagger,
but I did not want to make mine an alien cause in a foreign country. The verses of the Marseillaise still
resounded in my ears, but the spirit of this Propaganda of freedom [Propaganda
della libertà - in Italian] had altered.
The faces of the leaders promised crimes,
fraud and robbery; instead of Spartan simplicity, the looting led to Asian
glamour conditions. I began to be
ashamed of republicanism, and the fact that freedom had become a venal whore.
Everything could be seen but real Republicans. People that before the arrival
of the French still had to scrape the bottom of the cup with me, now owned in
the space of just a few weeks their own equipment for painters and enjoyed life
in a Sardanapalus-like style. (...) One day I saw a girl in Trastevere who
repaired the poorly maintained dress of her boyfriend. When I laughed, they
cried together: now we are all equal [adesso siamo tutti uguali - in Italian],
that is we are all beggars! On the one hand you could see people gnawing
chicken legs although they had been thrown away and eating the salad gone bad,
on the other hand so-called freedom parties were held in full luxury. Dudes
pretending to be Republicans, especially those who had beautiful girls, in most
cases real villains, obtained the best seats. For mocking, the inscription The
Roman Republic [La repubblica romana - in Italian] was set to a hungry and pale beggar in a piece of paper, while he was
wandering. You will understand that I
had no desire to be a citizen of such a republic" [19].
 |
| Fig. 19) Franz Krüger, Parade on Opera Square in Berlin, 1824-1830 |
The
painting by Franz Krüger (1797-1857) of 1824-1830, of which a detail was
already shown where one can see many Berlin artists gathering in front of a
parade, celebrated the Prussian and Russian troops, united in the Holy
Alliance. The Berlin art world bowed to Frederick William III.
 |
| Fig. 20) Adolf von Menzel, engraving for the Life of Frederick the Great, 1839 |
Adolf von
Menzel (1815-1905) showed an extraordinary devotion to the Hohenzollern in the correspondence
with Heinrich Arnold (a renown industrialist and his lifelong friend, whom he
nevertheless wrote in very formal terms, according to the habits of that time).
First he showed himself honoured and proud, in a series of letters to him, of
the series of illustrations which he had completed for the book by Franz Kugler
on the life of Frederick the Great (it was in 1839) [20]; then he described
with great wealth of detail the clashes between revolutionaries and Prussian
troops in Berlin in March 1848 and explained that King Frederick William IV,
while repressing the rebellion, had withdrawn the troops who had gone beyond
his orders and had made concessions to the rebels, even celebrating their
funeral with state ritual [21]. Von Menzel came to the surprising conclusion
that, thanks to the courage and the spirit of sacrifice of both parties, "Berlin has, albeit in terror, saved its
honor" [22]. It would seem to mean that Berlin has saved its honour
by fighting for freedom, but in reality he cared mostly on geopolitical
hierarchies. He enjoyed that the Berlin events had in fact exceeded in severity
what had happened in any other German cities, and were even more serious than
those in Paris, and comparable only to those in Palermo. In short, he felt
necessary to stress the importance of what was happening in Berlin to reaffirm the
town’s weight in the framework of balance of power in Europe, as if his
paramount concern was to affirm the central role of Prussia in the German and
European concert. That same year, he painted the official funeral that the King
payed to the two hundred fallen, even if they had been shot down by his troops.
In the letters, he said his friend that he had witnessed that ceremony: "It was a day of official ceremonies, but full
of sadness, as one would never have imagined it could happen in Berlin. In the
morning, the coffins were placed on a large memorial stage placed on the stairs
of the New Church on the Gendarmenmarkt, on the side of the Taubenstrasse. You will have the possibility to read about
the grand procession in the newspapers. For my part, I can only say that the
slow processions of all professional groups and all corporations, accompanied
by their choirs (playing partly funeral marches and partly singing sacred songs),
carried their banners, signs and coffins, supported on the shoulders of the
members. The serious and silent attitude of the masses aroused a terrible and
majestic impression. (...) Each time
a new body was passing, the king took off his hat and stood still, until the
coffin was not passed. His head was shining from a distance like a white stain.
It must have been the most terrible day of his life" [23]. It is
understood that, in the painter’s view, the old king, who had protected his
dynasty with weapons, but also withdrawn the troops and paid tribute to the
dead, was the only true hero of those days, the true representative of the
nation.
 |
| Fig. 21) Adolph von Menzel, Official funeral in honour of the victims of the March revolution, 1848 |
Finally,
the drawings by Alfred Rhethel of the following year (see for example the
allegory of Death on the barricades) displayed
with great dramatic effect the bloodshed caused by the uprisings in Dresden in
May of 1849, but one of his letters to his brother - although full of
compassion for the young students who came from all over Germany to defend the
new-born republic and were slaughtered by the military force - contained clear-cut
judgments against the attempt to subvert the established economic order, attributing
all responsibility for losses to the rebels: "A few hours ago the tremendous catastrophe has turned in this city in
favour of the military, and therefore of the king - a great and wonderful
mission to the honour of Germany failed, a victim of the cold military force of
the sabers. I have seen the birth of this movement with a lot of distrust and I
expected the red republic and communism with all its consequences"
[24].
 |
| Fig. 22) Alfred Rethel, Death on the barricades, 1849 |
And yet, if
the tone is that of political conservatism, the Letters of artists from the nineteenth century did not only lack
any rhetorical celebration of the 1871 unification, but also of the victory
over France and the expansion of the area of German influence in Europe. The leading
themes of the anthology were not the issues that are ubiquitous elsewhere in
German historiography of those years: the constant reference to the world of
Wagner and the Nordic mythology as founding myths of the profound difference
between the German world and the Latin people, the idea that Germany cultivated
a deeper, and therefore greater culture than the French and the proclamation of
the mission of German artists as architects of a national art that should
exceed that of France. Of course, nationalism was a widespread cultural
background also in the art world in Germany those days, even among the closest artists to Cassirer
(think of the writings of Lovis Corinth). Indeed, nationalism was fed by
founding myths and also sought its legitimacy in fine arts. It would therefore
have been easy, in my opinion, to fill the anthology with these references, if
Else Cassirer had wanted. She did not.
 |
| Fig. 23) Gottlieb Schick, Heinrike Dannecker, 1802 |
 |
| Fig. 24) Hans von Marées, The Rape of Helen, 1881-1883 |
To the
contrary, Else Cassirer seems to have drawn the scheme of the anthology so that
these issues did not appear as prominent, even in those decades (1870-1910) in
which they were so. Indeed, the Letters
of the artists from the nineteenth-century explain to the German bourgeoisie,
which was (unwarily) about to go to war, that the artistic culture of their
world would not be such if it had no fostered, for the last century, the myth
of Raphael and Correggio; that the reconstruction of national symbols (such as
the completion of the Cologne Cathedral during the nineteenth century) was
possible thanks to the alignment between the Francophile Rhineland and the
world of the Nazarenes spread between Rome and Düsseldorf (even more than because
of the Prussian attempt to create a new national monument), and that the German
taste was not only formed in Düsseldorf, Dresden, Munich, Frankfurt and Berlin,
but also in Rome and Paris. There was a clear desire to write about the
relationships between cultures in ways that are not antithetical: the letters
of Wilhelm Leibl tell of his personal success and of the one of German Art in
Paris in 1878 [25], to the point of receiving medals and French commission a
few years after the battle of Sedan: these were the years in which the
anti-German resentment in France was overwhelming. Instead, the memoirs of the German
painters learning craft in Paris often told of the harassment they were
subjected as a form of revenge for the military defeat).
 |
| Fig. 25) William Leibl, Rosine Fischler Countess of Treuberg, 1877 |
Is this
perhaps a too watered down interpretation of reality? It is clear that Else Cassirer
was culturally light years away from the fields of the Marne, where only a few
months later the first major battle of the First World War would be fought. Perhaps
she represented a minority position in Germany (at least in those years, when
the reasons of nationalism prevailed), even if the husband republished the
volume, largely intact, at the end of the conflict. There is, however, from the
point of view of cultural preferences, a remarkable continuity with the
aforementioned previous anthology of Ernst Guhl (1819-1862), the Berlin scholar
who presented the letters of the Italian and French artists to the German world
mid of the Nineteenth century, but also with the following anthologies, in the
twenties, by Hermann Uhde-Bernays (1873-1965) and Paul Westheim (1886-1963), all
oriented to stress the aspects of continuity between past and present. Those
studying art literature in the Berlin world, between the second half of the
nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century, continued to believe
in the triumph of the idea of an at the same time classic and cosmopolitan culture
that was typical of the Germany of Goethe and Kant.
 |
| Fig. 26) Friedrich Overbeck, Triumph of Religion in the Arts, 1829-1840 |
With
hindsight, those years were certainly marked by great ingenuity. The letters of
Max Liebermann to the art historian Wilhelm Bode reported the echo of a
controversy that raged in 1905. That year, France and Germany clashed on the
issue of commercial access in Morocco, and the tones of the controversy between
the two countries became rough. The art historian Henry Thode took the
opportunity to unleash an attack against Liebermann, denouncing the anti-German
character of impressionist art. Thode theorised a national art founded on the primacy
of drawing against the primacy of colour, and linked it to the art of the late
Gothic painter Grünewald; furthermore, he proclaimed the founding role of the
Nazarenes and celebrated Hans Thoma (who actively took part in the controversy
against Impressionism, supporting a mystical painting with symbolist
orientation) as their epigone. Liebermann responded with a vitriolic article in
the Frankfurter Zeitung against any vision of a 'mystical' art, and on the need
to interpret nature, and not to invent it. In his letters to Bode [26], who by
the way defended him, Liebermann explained these events as the ultimate
consequence of a radically different aesthetic vision on the relationship
between art and nature; he also referred in his own defence to Lessing and noted
with despair that his rivals had even manifested doubts about Velázquez and
Rembrandt. Most exchanges with Bode are on the greatness of Rembrandt and
Velázquez and the hatred towards them by the German Symbolists (such as
Böcklin, who spoke of Velázquez as a 'pig'). But there are also points where
Liebermann raised questions on more prosaic issues: "What does it ever mean national art? Since Dürer (with Hungarian
father) came to the world in Nuremberg, must make of him the German artist
κατ'εξοχήν (par excellence)? On the contrary. Since Dürer was a genius and he
came by chance in the world to Nuremberg, we call German the way he worked.
(...) On the basis of their work, may it perhaps not be possible that Millet
would be a German and Menzel a Frenchman?" [27].
 |
| Fig. 27) Max Liebermann, The 12-year Jesus in the Temple, 1878-1879. |
Today
instead, that event is interpreted as an occurrence with a clear anti-Semitic
profile: it wasn’t perhaps the aim to insinuate that a Jewish painter could
only produce anti-German art? There is evidence to believe that this was the
fundamental reason. Thode was married to the daughter of Cosima Wagner, and was
therefore in contact with anti-Semitic circles, while Thoma would be proclaimed
years later on, during the Nazi era, as 'the
favourite painter of the Germans'. What did Liebermann think of the
relationship between the Jewish and the Catholic world? The last letter of the
anthology, directed to Alfred Lichtwark, the director of the Kunsthalle in
Hamburg, is on his "The 12-year Jesus
in the Temple." It was dated June 1911 [28]. Liebermann says that he had
studied the subject in 1876 in the synagogue of Amsterdam, and that the stairs in the painting represented an exact reproduction of it. The models, however,
were from Munich and were not Jewish (and, to be precise, had been recruited in
the Catholic hospitals in the city, although he confesses that he had tried to
emphasize those physical aspects that would suggest they would be Orthodox
Jews). Christ instead was inspired by the Italian Renaissance models.
Therefore, this was a multicultural world, one would say today. Liebermann told
Lichtwark that the picture, just exhibited in Munich, had sparked an uproar
among those who considered it the absolute masterpiece produced in town during
the last fifty years and those who considered it rather an affront to religion
(both from Catholic and Jewish side). After that Liebermann decided not to
produce any religious subjects for the rest of his life.
Go to Part Two
NOTES
[1] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, Berlin, Bruno Cassirer, 1919, 712 pages.
Quotation at page 2.
[3] The
catalogue in two volumes is available at the addresses https://archive.org/stream/ausstellungdeuts01berl#page/n23/mode/2up and
https://archive.org/stream/ausstellungdeuts02deut#page/n9/mode/2up
[4] Bauschinger,
Sigrid - Die Cassirers: Unternehmer, Kunsthändler, Philosophen.
[6] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, edited by Else Cassirer, Berlino, Bruno
Cassirer, 1919, 669 pages. See:
[7] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, edited by Else Cassirer, Berlino, Bruno
Cassirer, 1923, 669 pages.
[8] Paradoxically
a copy of the Letters (in the version
of 1919) was included in the library of Adolf Hitler. He got it as a birthday
gift by Gerdi Troost, wife of one of the regime architects, in 1942. See https://books.google.de/books?id=fch_CwAAQBAJ&pg=PA11&lpg=PA11&dq=k%C3%BCnstlerbriefe+aus+dem+neunzehnten+Jahrhundert+hitler&source=bl&ots=5ykg9YzoMO&sig=H6n_L93u7Fy3-m80HzGqcGv-sUg&hl=it&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjupdS5wpDOAhUkCsAKHbgsD-8Q6AEIITAA#v=onepage&q=k%C3%BCnstlerbriefe%20&f=false. The copy is retained at the
Washington Library of the Congress: http://www.worldcat.org/title/kunstlerbriefe-aus-dem-19-jahrhundert/oclc/21659535.
[10] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 396.
[11] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 1.
[12] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 1.
[13] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 324.
[14] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, pp. 359-360.
[15] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 196.
[16] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 336.
[17] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 222.
[18] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 10.
[19] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 116.
[20] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, pp. 360-362.
[21] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, pp. 363-367.
[22] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 364.
[23] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 366.
[24] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 253.
[25] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 390.
[26] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, pp. 431-433.
[27] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, p. 435.
[28] Künstlerbriefe
aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert, (quoted), 1919, pp. 436-438.
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