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16/3/2006

Adam Elsheimer

Stadel Museum, Frankfurt

Discovering the World in Detail

Curated by Michael Maek-Ge'rard

Adam Elsheimer (1578-1610) is one of the few German artists of renown in the context of European Baroque painting. Nonetheless, in the canon of the great painters, his name is seldom mentioned in public - more seldom than he deserves in view of his outstanding artistic significance. In his lifetime already a legend among collectors and connoisseurs, admired by such artists as Rubens and Rembrandt, Elsheimer was not destined to enjoy his success for long: His career was brought to an abrupt end by his death at the age of thirty-two. He had been born in Frankfurt in 1578 and set out for the south when he was twenty, stopping in Munich and Venice before arriving in Rome in 1600.

The lifework he left behind is small in number - forty paintings and thirty drawings and gouaches are known to date - but extraordinary in terms of influence. Today the small-scale copper plates which constitute his painting oeuvre are among the most precious holdings of major museums. With their narrative diversity, poetic charm, and lighting dominated by dramatic light-dark contrasts, these paintings had an impact that was felt throughout Europe. The Stadel, which owns the world’s largest collection of Elsheimer’s works and also hosted the last exhibition to have been dedicated to him (forty years ago), is now presenting the first comprehensive Elsheimer retrospective, based on the very latest research findings.

The exhibition “Discovering the World in Detail: Adam Elsheimer (1578-1610)" is being carried out with support from the Deutsche Bank and the city of Frankfurt am Main.

Who was Adam Elsheimer? That question will already have been asked in around 1600, when the young artist came to Rome. The exhibition retraces the inquisitive painter’s footsteps and offers its visitors an inexhaustible journey of discovery. Adam Elsheimer was born in Frankfurt in 1578, the son of a tailor. There are few sources pertaining to his youth and apprenticeship in his native town. He is assumed to have been a pupil of Philipp Uffenbach, a respected artist of his day who never lost sight of the example set by the German Renaissance painters, particularly Durer and Grunewald. Upon completion of his training, Elsheimer left the city of his birth and is thought to have visited Munich in 1598 on his way to Italy.

It was in Italy that he chose to remain. During his sojourn in Venice, where he worked with Hans Rottenhammer of Munich, Elsheimer became acquainted with the work of the Venetian painters, especially Tintoretto. As he developed his style, he drew from both the old German tradition and the atmospherically painterly manner of the Venetian masters, an unusual mixture which left a lasting mark on his work. Elsheimer is certain to have reached Rome by the Holy Year 1600, if not earlier. There he was befriended by Peter Paul Rubens, an artist one year his senior, and Rubens’ brother Philipp. He also cultivated contact with German scholars devoted to the study of literature, theology and the natural sciences, who inspired him and patronized his art.

In 1607 he was admitted to the reputable painters’ guild Accademia di S. Luca, an honour few Germans enjoyed. In Rome Elsheimer developed his “poetic painting," which anticipated the ideas of Romanticism by some two hundred years. His mood-filled moonlit landscapes and enigmatic nocturnal interiors, illuminated by nothing more than the glow of a candle, were what made him famous. Elsheimer was interested in the depiction of light throughout his career, and concerned himself with dramatic contrasts of the kind characteristic of Caravaggio’s paintings, as well as with the staging of artificial light sources, a practice considered the specialty of the Dutch painters sojourning in Rome. At the same time, however, Els­heimer was also an intriguing narrator: He captured marvellous Christian miracles, brutal scenes of murder and martyrdom and dramatic events such as the Great Flood with the same piercing compactness as he did a small still life.

Today we are particularly aware of Elsheimer’s fascination with the natural sciences. The investigation of the Milky Way had as much its place in his paintings as the discovery of the eucalyptus tree by his contemporaries. He contemplated the world through the telescope and the magnifying glass, and his insights into the laws of the cosmos revolutionized art. Fusing the empirical observation of nature with the poetic pictorial language of his artwork, Elsheimer created an exceedingly lively, narrative style distinguished by richness of detail.

He examined the oriental costumes he saw in Venice with the eye of an ethnologist, and they lent his paintings of biblical themes an aura of authenticity. He brought classical antiquity to life in like manner, painting the Roman ruins, acquainting himself with human anatomy by studying antique sculpture and rendering age-old mythological themes in enthralling new compositions. Naturally, he applied the same approach to traditional Christian subjects as well: The “Frankfurt Tabernacle of the Holy Cross", for example, - one of Elsheimer’s major works and one of seven works by Elsheimer in the Stadel’s own collection - tells the story of the invention and glorification of the true cross in a series of suspense-laden scenes.

Unlike his friend Rubens, Elsheimer limited himself to small formats, nevertheless affording us views of a world recorded in a wealth of detail. His talent for filling the events in his compositions with life, never losing sight of human nature, made Elsheimer one of the most renowned artists of his time. A man known by his contemporaries for his kindness and his melancholic disposition, Elsheimer was torn from life at the age of thirty-two, leaving his family in abject poverty. Our exhibition invites visitors to rediscover this unusual painter and his pictorial worlds.

It pays tribute to Elsheimer’s artistic standingby showing his major works in the context of his artistic environs in Rome. The sequel to the only other Elsheimer retrospective to have taken place to date - in the Stadel in 1966 -, the current show presents works not yet known at that time or not included in that event. Newly discovered documents and numerous special investigations have led to a new perspective on Elsheimer.

These research findings are hereby being introduced to a broad public for the first time. With the support of the Gabriele Busch-Hauck Foundation, the Elsheimer Archive in the Stadel has just instituted a two-year grant for research on Adam Elsheimer’s draughtsmanship, another expression of the museum’s lasting dedication to the scholarly study of the Frankfurt artist’s oeuvre. The gift from the foundation moreover enabled the Stadel to purchase an Adam Els­heimer drawing for its Department of Prints and Drawings in 2005, a work which will also be included in the show.

The “Adam Elsheimer" exhibition was organized jointly with the National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh and the Dulwich Picture Gallery, London. Following its presentation at the Stadel it will be shown in Edinburgh from June 23 to September 3 and in London from September 20 to December 3.

Catalogue: Adam Elsheimer 1578-1619, ed. by Michael Maek-Ge'rard. With contributions by Rudiger Klessmann, Emilie E. S. Gordenker and Christian Tico Seifert. German and English edition, approx. 248 pages, all exhibited works in colour plus 191 further illustrations, Wolfratshausen: Edition Minerva, 2006, ISBN 3-938832-07-X, E. 29.90 (German Edition)

Stadel Museum
Schaumainkai 63 - Frankfurt

Opening hours: Tuesday, Friday to Sunday 10 am - 7 pm; Wednesday and Thursday 10 am - 9 pm
Admission: Gallery and special exhibition 8 Euros, reduced fee 6 Euros

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