Giotto (gest. 1337) hat die Malerei gleich mehrfach neu erfunden. Schon früh in seinem Leben wurde er überregional berühmt. Seine Kunst ließ die Zeitgenossen den christlichen Glauben sinnlich intensiv erleben. Der wenig später einsetzenden Renaissance aber hat Giottos wandlungsreiches Werk die entscheidenden Wege gewiesen. Michael Victor Schwarz stellt höchst anschaulich dar, was wir über das Leben des Künstlers wissen, für wen er malte, was seine Bilder bezweckten und wie sich sein Werk zwischen Rom und Assisi, Padua, Florenz und Neapel entwickelte.
Visuelle Kultur des 13. Jahrhunderts Die zwölf Beiträge des kunsthistorisch ausgerichteten Bandes bieten einen Einblick in aktuelle Forschungen zu Dynamiken und Charakteristika der visuellen Kultur des 13. Jahrhunderts. In Verbindung von Ideengeschichte und Detailanalyse wird ein facettenreiches Bild dieser innovativen Epoche entworfen. Der Band ist in drei große Schwerpunkte gegliedert: Zunächst werden allgemeinere, medienübergreifende Fragen behandelt. Es kommen unter anderem rezeptionsgeschichtliche Aspekte wie die im 13. Jahrhundert zu beobachtenden Veränderungen in der Darstellung von Emotionen zur Sprache. Der zweite Teil befasst sich mit der Intensität und Wirkung des regionalen und überregionalen Austauschs. Dieser hinterließ in der künstlerischen Entwicklung greifbare Spuren, deren Auswertung Rückschlüsse auf die Strukturen des für die europäische Entwicklung entscheidenden kulturellen Transfers zulässt. Die Beiträge des dritten Abschnittes sind wichtigen Phänomenen der Zeit gewidmet, zu denen das Aufkommen eines neuen Altartypus und bemalter Hornplatteneinbände sowie die zunehmende Verbreitung von Psaltern für Laien und Veränderungen in den Maltechniken zählen.
Die Konzepte der Kunstgeschiche sind im 19. Jahrhundert entwickelt worden. Das erschwert den Dialog mit vielen Nachbardisziplinen. Das Konzept „Medium“, das dem ausgehenden 20. Jahrhundert angehört, soll dem abhelfen und das Argument der Kunstgeschichte mit dem gegenwärtigen Bewusstseinsstand mindestens in denjenigen Kulturwissenschaften verknüpfen, die sich mit Kommunikation befassen. Demnach stehen im Mittelpunkt des Buches die Fragen nach Gebrauch und Wirkung der Objekte. Eingeübt wird eine Betrachtungsweise von teils sehr hochrangigen Kunstwerken, die sowohl historisch fundiert als auch modernen Diskursen kompatibel sind.
Vol. 1: Life Giotto (1334) is the first European artist about whom it is possible to write following the schema of “life and work”. The situation of the sources, however, is complicated: On Giotto’s life, there are – on the one hand – biographical accounts from the mid-fourteenth century onwards that responded to various ideological requirements (patriotism, humanism, Renaissance ideology, cult of the artist); on the other, there is extensive documentary material from Giotto’s lifetime, which seems to reflect less the biography of an artist than that of a bourgeois businessman resolutely climbing the social ladder. The present volume focuses on this second aspect of the Giotto figure’s double life relating it to the form of existence of the pre-modern artist. Vol. 2: Works The paintings examined and contextualised in this volume are those secured for Giotto through early written sources. These sources also help to reconstruct the sequence of his works and artistic inventions as is plausible in the context of media culture in the decades around and after 1300: while Giotto was spiritually and intellectually formed in the sphere of the Florentine Dominicans, his artistic path began in Rome in the shadow of the Curia. The breakthrough to his own artistic concept came immediately before and during his work in Padua. In addition to prominent churchmen, ecclesiastical institutions, and the King of Naples, his clients were predominantly members of Italy's urban and financial elites. The adoption and further development of his inventions by other - especially Sienese - painters pressured him in his later years to try new approaches again. Vol. 3: Survival Giotto is considered by many to be the founder of modern painting. This thesis is discussed and modified in the present volume on an empirical basis. What emerges is that Giotto's impact cannot be reduced simply to the introduction of the study of nature. Rather, his art was involved in the development of pictorial idioms that were attuned to the skills and interests of their audiences. The new approaches in his painting contributed in particular to the possibility of examining and communicating psychological, narrative and allegorical content of great complexity outside the media of language and text, which not only changed the face of European art but certainly contributed to the intellectual opening of Western societies.
The paintings examined and contextualised in this volume are those secured for Giotto through early written sources. These sources also help to reconstruct the sequence of his works and artistic inventions as is plausible in the context of media culture in the decades around and after 1300: while Giotto was spiritually and intellectually formed in the sphere of the Florentine Dominicans, his artistic path began in Rome in the shadow of the Curia. The breakthrough to his own artistic concept came immediately before and during his work in Padua. In addition to prominent churchmen, ecclesiastical institutions, and the King of Naples, his clients were predominantly members of Italy's urban and financial elites. The adoption and further development of his inventions by other - especially Sienese - painters pressured him in his later years to try new approaches again.
With a Collection of the Documents and Texts up to Vasari and an Appendix of Sources on the Arena Chapel
Giotto (1334) is the first European artist about whom it is possible to write following the schema of “life and work”. The situation of the sources, however, is complicated: On Giotto’s life, there are – on the one hand – biographical accounts from the mid-fourteenth century onwards that responded to various ideological requirements (patriotism, humanism, Renaissance ideology, cult of the artist); on the other, there is extensive documentary material from Giotto’s lifetime, which seems to reflect less the biography of an artist than that of a bourgeois businessman resolutely climbing the social ladder. The present volume focuses on this second aspect of the Giotto figure’s double life relating it to the form of existence of the pre-modern artist.
Giotto is considered by many to be the founder of modern painting. This thesis is discussed and modified in the present volume on an empirical basis. What emerges is that Giotto's impact cannot be reduced simply to the introduction of the study of nature. Rather, his art was involved in the development of pictorial idioms that were attuned to the skills and interests of their audiences. The new approaches in his painting contributed in particular to the possibility of examining and communicating psychological, narrative and allegorical content of great complexity outside the media of language and text, which not only changed the face of European art but certainly contributed to the intellectual opening of Western societies.
Giotto ist für manche der Pionier des Naturstudiums, für manche der Begründer der neuzeitlichen Kunst, für manche der Erfinder des Bildes. Im vorliegenden Band werden die für ihn gesicherten Werke in ihren spezifischen Kontexten besprochen und die erreichbaren Fakten zu Auftraggebern, Publikum und historischem Gebrauch präsentiert. Das Oeuvre erweist sich als eingebettet in eine uns ferne Welt. Ihre Bewohner suchten in Äußerungen bildender Kunst vor allem spirituelle Erfahrung und Hoffnungszeichen für Erlösung. So kreativ wie kein anderer entwickelte Giotto Techniken der Visualisierung, die dem Publikum ein sinnlich intensives Erleben der Glaubensinhalte ermöglichten.
