Czére Andrea szerk.: A Szépművészeti Múzeum közleményei (Budapest, 2007)
SZILVIA BODNÁR: On the Draughtsmanship of Caspar Freisinger
Virgin may rather reflect the possibility that both drawings belonged to an altarpiece under preparation dedicated to the Virgin Mary, since the episode of Christ Bidding Farewell to his Mother can both be part of a Passion series and a cycle presenting the life of the Virgin, while the Presentation of the Virgin can only belong to the latter. 2 ' A final note is worth making on the iconography of a drawing in Wolfegg. Thöne mentions one of the compositions preserved in Wolfegg under no. 68, with the title "Venus im Hintergrund Schlafenden" (Venus with sleeping figures in the background). The drawing shows a naked, standing female figure, partly draped in a decorative cloth, who holds a long staff in her right hand and raises her left to her inclined, wreathed head (fig. 9). The right background is filled with three sleeping figures, while to the left a vista opens up on a remote church building. The drawing was exhibited in Ravensburg in 2003 at a show presenting a selection from the most important drawings of the princely collection of Wolfegg. 24 In his catalogue entry B. M. Mayer uncertainly described the female figure "holding a sceptre in her hand" as Juno, expressing his doubts about the interpretation, since the sleeping figures in the background can hardly be inserted into the iconography of Juno. The relationship between the female figure and the sleepers is indeed very important: the female figure can be interpreted as neither Juno nor Venus, but as the allegory of Night. She holds in her right not a sceptre, but an extinguished torch, the meaning of which is also reinforced by an iconographical dictionary published in 1830. According to it, the female figure personifying Night holds a torch either turned down or extinguished. 2> Cesarc Ripa's Iconologia also backs up the new interpretation of the drawing in Wolfegg. In the description of the fifth hour of the night, Ripa mentions poppies as the attribute of Night: "Per tanto Ovidio nel quarto de fasti incorona la sua placida fronte de papaveri./ Intereaplacidam redimitapapaverefrontem /Nox venit." 26 The female figure's headgear decorated with small capsules in the Wolfegg composition can also be regarded as a wreath of poppies. The interpretation of the drawing as an allegory of Night also lends the sleeping figures a clear meaning. Caspar Freisinger was an important provincial painter and draughtsman of late sixteenth century Bavaria. The landscape settings of his figurai compositions are reminiscent of works by the Danube School masters, like Albrecht Altdorfer and Wolf Huber. 2 ' His figurai style on the other hand suggests a thorough knowledge of Italian art and shows that he was well aware of the achievements of the contemporary Prague Mannerists through the activity of the Rudolphine masters also working in south German art centres. Szilvia Bodnár is Head of the Department of Prints and Drawings, Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest.
