REQUIEM beim RSA in Montreal
Das REQUIEM-Projekt war mit drei Panels auf der 57. Jahrestagung der Renaissance Society of America (RSA) in Montreal, Kanada vertreten.
Link zum Veranstalter: www.rsa.org
REQUIEM I: Tombs between Spain and Italy in the 15th Century
Organizer: Judith Ostermann, Co organizer: Anett Ladegast
Chair: Benjamin Paul (Rutgers University)
Anett Ladegast (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin)
Three Faces of One Bishop: the Roman Chapel of Juan de Coca
The burial chapel of the Spanish bishop Juan de Coca (d. 1479) in the Roman church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva is today almost forgotten. Yet, it provides a programmatic reflection on the roles of portraits as well as on the concept of identity in an Early Modern sepulchral context. Coca who commissioned the building well before his death appears in three different representations on the – no less than two – personal tombs of the chapel. In my talk I will explore this rather remarkable phenomenon and investigate why Coca cared in such a precise fashion for his Roman afterlife, even though, in the end, he never intended to be buried in the city. According to his testament, his remains were transferred to his Spanish family chapel in Burgos where a third tomb already waited for him.
Grit Heidemann (Universität der Künste Berlin)
New in town: Spanish Tombs and Family Chapels in Naples of the late 15th Century
After the Aragonese had displaced the Anjou-Durazzo in Naples in 1442, Spanish nobleman arrived in the new residence of the Catalan dynasty. There they were facing a powerful, closely linked local nobility. Through its division into local centres of power, the Seggi, the Neapolitan nobility consisted of closed circles, which remained nearly inaccessible to foreign noblemen. With the support of the Aragonese crown, however, certain Spanish families managed to establish themselves and in order to underline their new status built tombs and family chapels. This paper will discuss some of these late 15th century monuments, situated in Santa Maria di Monteoliveto, the church of the Aragonese in Naples, focusing in particular on the interaction between the new patrons and the local artistic language in order to investigate whether the Spaniards attempted to assimilate themselves in Naples.
Judith Ostermann (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin)
A Fallen Favorite’s Triumph: Alvaro de Luna’s Toledo Tomb
The astonishing history of Alvaro de Luna (c: 1390-1453) has long raised questions. The closest confidant of the young king John II. of Castile (1405-1454) not only dominated the politics of the reign, but also became the most famous favorite in Spanish history altogether. To make way for his tomb, he did not refrain from removing three choir chapels of Toledo cathedral. His funeral monument even dwarfed the tombs of the Castilian kings once in the cathedral’s choir, just as he had outshone his royal patron in his lifetime. Given de Luna’s tragic downfall and his end on the scaffold, the sumptuous ostentation of his chapel is highly remarkable and its political backgrounds deserve further investigation. De Luna’s tomb was intended not only to rehabilitate the fallen favorite, but also to promote the further social ascension of his family.
Luciano Migliaccio (Universidade de São Paulo)
Renovatio and Translatio: Cultural Transfer in Spanish Tomb Sculpture in XVIth Century.
Tomb sculpture served as an important medium for the reception of ‘al romano’ Renaissance forms in monumental Gothic buildings in Spain in the first half of the 16th century. This is the case in the tomb of Cardinal Pedro González de Mendoza in Toledo Cathedral, whose authorship will be newly discussed. This is also the case in the tombs by Fancelli and Ordóñez in the Capilla Real at Granada, and those by Ordóñez in Alcalá de Henáres and Coca. Analyzing these works and their iconography will throw new light on the interpretation of the Roman ideas of Renovatio and Translatio Imperii in the Iberic countries and on the social role of the artist as proposed in Medidas del Romano by Diego de Sagredo.
REQUIEM II: Tomb strategies in the Era of the Reformation
Organizer: Ruth Slenczka (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin)
Co organizers: Anett Ladegast (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin), Judith Ostermann (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin)
Chair: David Drogin (Fashion Institute of Technology, New York)
Ruth Slenczka (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin)
The tomb of Martin Luther – a Protestant Relic?
Though attracting many visitors from the beginning, Luther’s grave in Wittenberg remained without a sepulchral monument for more than three hundred years. For the original bronze relief showing an almost life-size portrait and intended to mark the grave was transferred to Weimar in 1547 as soon as the court moved there. Later, after the Smalcadian War, the elector Johann Friedrich had lost his title and his capital and the tomb was transferred to Jena in 1571 where it was presented to the public just as a relic displayed behind glass. The episode allows further investigation of Protestant attitudes towards sepulchral monuments in general. I want to explore the question whether Luther’s presence in his tomb as exhibited in Jena was regarded as “real” in the way that relics suggested a “real” presence of saints in Roman Catholicism.
Esther Meier (Universität Dortmund)
Protestant Memory and images: the tomb of Philip the Magnanimous in Kassel
In the last decades research has focused on Catholic memoria, either on its verbal expression in liturgy or on the visual representation of the dead in images and tomb monuments. This paper, instead, will focus on Protestant memoria, in which the relation to the dead and the character of liturgical memorialization has fundamentally changed. Considering the emphasis on the word in Protestant theology, one may have think that tomb monuments would also look different from those of the Catholic Church. In the monumental and sumptuous tomb of Count Philipp (1504-1567) in S. Martin in Kassel, however, the visual component seems to be just as important as in Catholic tombs. This paper thus argues that even though Protestants may have emphasized the written word Protestant memoria is constituted primarily through images.
Nadine Lehmann (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Institut für Geschichtswissenschaften, Lehrstuhl Frühe Neuzeit)
Reformed Iconoclasm and the Representation of Rulers. Dynastic Tombs and the Sovereign – Monopolisation of the Church Interior
During the 17th century iconoclasms took place in the territories of the Holy Roman Empire whose sovereigns converted to Calvinism. The iconoclasms were officially decreed and especially took place in the main churches at the princely seats. Because of the absolute ban of images one would have expected that the tomb monuments of the dynasties were removed as well. But the exact opposite happened. The sepulchral monuments were left untouched during all iconoclasms. The reason for keeping these images in the church was their benefit to the sovereigns by underlining the continuity of rulership. After the iconoclasms the princely tombs became the focal point of sovereign power in the thus monopolised main church and as a consequence stabilised the princes who had experienced a crisis of legitimacy after their conversion.
REQUIEM III: Sepulchral Representation in Early Modern Rome
Organizer: Anett Ladegast, Co organizer: Judith Ostermann
Chair: Steven Ostrow (University of Minnesota, Minneapolis)
Philipp Zitzlsperger (Akademie für Mode und Design, Berlin)
The embodiment of the absent: Roman Cardinals’ Cenotaphs in the aftermath of Trent
Roman cardinal tombs of the 16th and 17th century developed into three important directions: 1. the portrait of the deceased changed from the representation of a dead to a living person—from the ‘gisant’ to the portrait bust; 2. in the Counter-Reformation the tomb architecture increasingly adopts the form of Roman high altars; 3. the remains of the deceased cardinal increasingly are separated from his monument, which thus transforms into a cenotaph. Considering these changes not as coincidences but as a logical development provides new evidence for the social role of the dead in early modern Rome. The history of tomb sculpture thus provides a key to a better understanding of memory and representation.
Laura Windisch (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin)
Casanate, Legros, and Dominican Memorial Strategies
In his testament, the influential Dominican Cardinal Girolamo Casanate (1620-1700) requested a modest tomb. Yet, the executors of his will did not respect this last wish: Commissioning a precious memorial in the Lateran from the fashionable and well established French sculptor Pierre Legros (1666-1719) they rather re-activated Italian High Renaissance traditions. Casanate’s sepulchral monument became a showcase for the intellectual and artistic prestige of the order renowned up to the Enlightenment for its struggle against presumed heresy. Founding a public library in Rome the cardinal intended to re-activate this tradition: the Biblioteca Casanatense was supposed to promote Catholic orthodoxy against the religious separatisms of Gallicanism, Jansenism, and Molinism. In my paper I intend to analyse Casanate’s tomb within the broader context of Dominican memorial strategies as well as of the ecclesia triumphans.
Tobias Weißmann (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin)
Il Gesù e Maria in Rome: A Family Mausoleum for the Bolognetti Brothers
When Giorgio Bolognetti (1595–1686), former papal nuncio at the French Court founded the high altar in the church of Il Gesù e Maria in 1678 it should constitute only the beginning of one of the most spectacular family representations in a Roman church. Until his death eight years later Bolognetti had turned the church of the Discaled Augustinians into a family mausoleum for him and his five brothers. Referring to diverse iconographic sepulchral traditions the monuments designed by Carlo Rainaldi interact with each other and the high altar in a theatrical composition that recalls Bernini’s Cornaro chapel and anticipates the sepulchral art of the early 18th century. This paper will discuss how the Bolognetti monuments served both the Discaled Augustinians and the patrons to establish themselves in Rome, resulting in a highpoint of funeral family representation in Rome.