Imre Györgyi szerk.: A modell, Női akt a 19. századi magyar művészetben (A Magyar Nemzeti Galéria kiadványai 2004/2)

Tanulmányok / Studies - Werner Hofmann: Venus ég és föld között / Venus between Heaven and Earth

a wall of the Paris Salon. What at first sight seems to be an elegant and exotic caprice turns out to be a many-layered sublimation of sexual desire, in which concealment and revelation balance each other. The undulating spindle in which the nude is embedded makes it appear like a fruit whose peel falls away. In the spindle motif, which Ernst used in many variations, we re-encounter the mandorla in organically flowing form. The lithe body is not only a fruit, but also the central area of an early creation landscape, similar to that which appears in Runge's Aurora. The path, that began with Giorgione's and Titian's lying figures, and reached a high point in the 19th century with Courbet, is summed up with this pictorial coda. Not now "born of the foam", but created from the elements of water and earth, Venus returns to the mythical world of the matriarch. T R A N S L A T E D B Y NICHOLAS T

. PARSONS * In Memory of Günther Metken From the Catalogue: Venus - Bilder einer Göttin von Cranacb bis Cabanel. Wallraf-Richartz-Museum, Köln 2000. NOTES 1 Réau, L.: Iconographie de l'Art chrétien. 8 Vol. Paris 1956. 83. 2 See Guldan, E.: Eva und Maria. Eine Antithese als Bildmotiv. Graz-Köln 1966. The author illustrates the subtitle of his book with a coloured reproduction of the relevant page from the Salzburg Missal. He describes it as the "most mature representation of the theme" (P. 142), which the other works did not emulate (III. 156 to 159). Schreiner, K.: Maria, Jungfrau, Mutter, Herrscherin. München-Wien 1994. 139. 4 The pre-historical origins of the sleeping figures suggest priestesses with healing powers; see ClesReden 1962 and Kultermann, U.: Woman Asleep and the Artist. Artibus et históriáé XXII. (1990) with illustrations of the small sculptures of "Sleepers" found in Malta (130 ft".). The basic study on this is Hinz, B.: Aphrodite. Geschichte einer abendländischen Passion. München-Wien 1998. 6 Schreiner op. cit. 181. (Chap. 5: "Your Breasts are Sweeter than Wine"). 7 Wind, E.: Heidnische Mysterien in der Renaissance. Frankfurt a. M. 1981., Chaps. VII-IX. 8 Ibid. 173. ' Libri Carolin!. IV, 16, quoted from Schlosser, J. von: Schriftquellen zur Geschichte der karolingischen Kunst. Wien 1892. 307 ff., Nr. 887. See Hofmann, W. in: Luther und die Folgen für die Kunst. Exhibition Catalogue. Hamburg 1983-84. 27. Scholarship is divided over this ambivalence. For M. Camille it is evidence for the custom of "renaming", that enabled the church "to appropriate the images of the other for itself," (Camille, M.: The Gothic Idol. Ideology and image-making in Mediaeval art. Cambridge 1989. 221). Hinz op. cit. 153. stresses the "purely theoretical standpoint" of the passage "however the intellectual basis was thereby laid for the reciprocal exchange of figures and statues." '" 1 have used the translation in: Bologna, F.: Die Anfänge der italienischen Malerei. Dresden 1964. 7. " In 1897 Lenbach painted a seductive half-nude that recalls Munch's work (Museum der bildenden Künste, Leipzig), but he avoided provoking the public with such an insidious title. 12 The Triumph of Venus (Louvre, RF 2089) is attributed to the Master of the Conquest of Tarento, who was active approximately between 1380 and 1425. On account of its inferior quality (!) the wood panel (49:48.5 cm) is not displayed, even in its home museum, and as a result is also not sent on loan (in the Dossier Exhibition Le Studiolo d'Isabelle d'Esté /1975/ it was only represented by a photograph.) The picture belongs to the genre of wedding panels (desco da parto). Everett Fahy has already compared the "Venus verticordia suspended in mid-air" with the "Virgin Mary in Glory", without however exploring this insight further (Hommage à Michel Laclotte. Paris 1994. 231. ft). Clive Hart saw an "apotheosis of the destructive profane Venus," (Hart, C.: Heaven and Flesh. Imagery of Desire from Renaissance to Rococo, Cambridge 1995. 7). Raymond van Marie noted its singular directness and its moralising background: "...l'illustration la plus importante, mais aussi la plus crûment indécente(l) de l'être feminin comme la cause de toutes les misères..." (Iconographie de l'art profane au Moyen-Age et à la Renaissance. The Hague 1932. 464). Kenneth Clark saw in the "Triumph" a Venus naturalis and an anticipation of the "Garden of Vice" described by Filarete (Clark, K.: Das Nackte in der Kunst. Köln 1958. 99). 13 See Weisbach, W: Trionfi. Berlin 1919. I See Roettig, P.: Zeichen und Wunder. Weissagungen um 1500. Hamburger Kunsthalle 1990. Cat. 30. II Schreiner illustrates an Italian Madonna giving milk (Schreiner op. cit. 174). 16 As far as I know, we owe this concept to Oskar Wulff, who coined it in order to distinguish between the "reversed perspective" and a central perspective. Die umgekehrte Perspektive und die Niedersicht. In: Kunstwissenschaftliche Beiträge A. Schmarsow gewidmet. Leipzig 1907. 1 ff. See Hinz op. cit. 223. 18 Réquisitoire de M. l'Avocat impérial in: Œuvres de Flaubert I. Bibl. de la Pléiade, Paris 1958. 667. ' See on this Toussaint, H. in: Courbet. Exhibition Catalogue. Paris 1977-1978. I 17. 20 Cachin, F. in: Manet. Exhibition Catalogue Paris 1983. 105 ff. On the relevant context: Hofmann, W: Nana. Eine Skandalfigur zwischen Mythos und Wirklichkeit. Köln 1999. Proudhon, P.-J.: Von den Grundlagen und der sozialen Bestimmung der Kunst. Transi, from the French by Herding, K. Berlin 1988. 217. 23 Ibid. Pp. 209 ff. 24 Nagel 1997 Flaubert to Louise Colet (4./5. September 1846) in: Correspondance I. Bibliothèque de la Pléaide, Paris 1973. 328. Gustave Courbet: La femme à la vague, in: Exhibition Paris. 1977-1978. "

7 See Metken, G. C.; Der Ursprung der Welt. Ein Luststück. München-New York 1997. 28 Bachofen, J. J.: Vorrede zum "Mutterrecht"

. In: Mutterrecht und Urreligion. R.Marx (Ed.) Leipzig 1926. 129. "

9 Hofmann, W: Die Moderne im Rückspiegel. Munich 1998. ,ü Runge, Ph. O.: Hinterlassene Schriften. [-II, Hamburg 1840. I. 6. 31 Traeger, J.: Philipp Otto Runge und sein Werk. München 1975. 200. At my request, Dr. Kordelia Knoll, Senior Curator at the Dresden Sculpture Collection, supplied me with detailed documentation, whereby she concurs with my supposition. It may certainly be assumed that Runge, when copying the Medici Venus in 1801, also saw the cast of the Wounded Amazon (Amazon Mattéi) from the Vatican. Sybile Ebert-Schifferer directs our attention to the Apollo Belvedere, which might have been an inspiration, as a reversed image, for Runge's Große Morgen (Great Morning). Moreover, she even sees the Christ of the Last Judgement in the Sistine Chapel "resonating" in Runge's Morgen. I am indebted to my Dresden colleagues for their fruitful suggestions. 33 Hohl, H. in Runge in seiner Zeit. Exhibition Catalogue. Hamburg 1977. 295. 4 Catalogue of the Musée Gustave Moreau. Paris n.d. Cat. 37. (with 111.) Dorra, H.: The first Eves in Gauguin's Eden. Gazette des Beaux-Arts, Vol. 90, March 1953. 189 ff. 36 The Art of Paul Gauguin. Exhibition Catalogue, Washington/Chicago 1988-1989. Cat. Nr.85. 3 Krumrine, M. L. in Paul Cézanne. Die Badenden. Exhibition Catalogue. Basel 1989. 3 Iff. 8 Meyer Schapiro: Cézanne Äpfel. In: Moderne Kunst- und 20. Jahrhundert. Köln 1981. 42. 39 Boehm, G. in Exhibition Catalogue, Basel 1989. (as for Note 37) 13. 40 See Paas, S. in the Exhibition Catalogue Hamburg 1986. Cat. No. 99.