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4/12/2004

Rubens in Wien

Liechtenstein Museum, Wien

Liechtenstein Museum in conjunction with the Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna and the Picture Gallery of the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna

With the opening of the Liechtenstein Museum not only has one of the most important private collections in the world returned to its erstwhile home: this additional museum has put Vienna firmly on the map as a centre for lovers of art in general and Rubens enthusiasts in particular. With 33 autograph paintings by the Flemish artist, the Princely Collections possess remarkably large holdings of Rubens, most of which have now been made accessible again to the general public after more than 60 years with the reopening of the LIECHTENSTEIN MUSEUM in March 2004.

From 5 December 2004 to 27 February 2005 the picture galleries of the Liechtenstein Museum, the KUNSTHISTORISCHES MUSEUM, and the ACADEMIE OF FINE ARTS, will present their combined treasures to the public. Rubens' works in the three museums will be newly installed and augmented by additional loans in order to showcase the magnificent oeuvre of this outstanding Flemish painter. In addition to the works on permanent display the LIECHTENSTEIN MUSEUM will be showing paintings and sketches by Rubens and his circle, supplemented by loans.

PETER PAUL RUBENS
The Academy's Picture Gallery is a monument to the endeavours of a private collector: during the final years of his life, Count Anton Lamberg Sprinzenstein, one of the last aristocratic collectors in Vienna, assembled a comprehensive collection of European paintings. He admired above all virtuoso brushwork and was thus particularly interested in paintings by Peter Paul Rubens – concentrating, however, on small-scale works that could be displayed in his apartment in town. In 1821, the year before he died, the Count bequeathed his collection to the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, thus founding the Academy's Picture Gallery.
That is the reason why a university's collection is able to contribute ''small'' works by Rubens to this joint exhibition -celebrating the artist - preliminary studies, colour sketches, ''modelli'' and ''ricordi''.

SMALL-SCALE WORKS IN RUBENS' OEUVRE
Today, Rubens' ''small works'' are particularly admired and valued as only they allow us to understand the creative and autograph process of painting of this outstanding Flemish Baroque master. Today our perception of a work of art is greatly influenced by our understanding of what constitutes an ''original'', that is, the question of whether a painting is an autograph – that is, an ''authentic'' – work by a particular artist. When looking at the work of Peter Paul Rubens we should not forget that this is true only of his oil sketches and similar preparatory works, and that it is only in these that we encounter his very own artistic ''idiom'', that is his autograph handling.
The reason for this is that during Rubens' lifetime an artist's creativity was measured not in terms of the actual execution of a painting but in terms of his artistic inventions, his ideas. This emphasis on the creative process is clearly discernible in the contracts concluded between Rubens and his patrons for all larger commissions.
The master's sketch was handed to an assistant who copied and enlarged the composition according to the dimensions stipulated in the contract.

THE PAINTINGS
It is noteworthy that several of the seventeen autograph paintings by Rubens that Count Lamberg bequeathed to the Academy are closely connected with important commissions.
For example, the Academy boasts a total of four works by Rubens from his formative years in Italy (1600-1608). Like many other artists from the Low Countries before him, Rubens traveled to Italy to see and study both Italian sixteenth century art and works from classical antiquity in order to broaden his artistic horizons. Inspired by this encounter with Italy Rubens' style began to reflect the ''grande maniera'' of Italian Early Baroque art, and this he subsequently transplanted to his hometown of Antwerp.

THE CIRCUMCISION OF CHRIST (C. 1605)
The Academy's Picture Gallery owns the ''modello'' for the first commission for an important altarpiece that Rubens received during his stay in Italy: he had gone to Spain in the service of his patron, Vincenzo I Gonzaga Duke of Mantua, and on his return had stopped at Genoa to be reimbursed for his travelling expenses by the Duke's bankers, the Pallavicini. Rubens made the most of this fortuitous opportunity to garner contacts and commissions. The most important commission the young and still-unknown artist received was from the brother of the Duke's banker who was head of the Jesuits in Genoa. He commissioned from Rubens a painting for the main altar of the city's newly-erected Jesuit church of S. Ambrogio.
The painting's subject, the ''Circumcision of Christ'', was obligatory for all Jesuit churches as the Society was keen to display in all their churches depictions of the monogram of Christ – IHS – and the ceremony in which the child is named. Although Jesus Christ was baptised by St John the Baptist in the river Jordan, the infant had initially been given the name of Jesus according to Jewish customs, which included His circumcision in keeping with Mosaic law.

THE MIRACULOUS IMAGE OF THE VIRGIN DELLA VALLICELLA IN ROME (C. 1608)
During his sojourn in Italy, Rubens concentrated not only on his development as an artist but also on his -burgeoning career. His last important commission before returning home was to paint the altarpiece for Rome's most popular church, Sta. Maria in Vallicella. However, the still relatively unknown Flemish artist would never have been able to beat his Roman competitors without his by now excellent connections: a friend of the Pallavicinis from Genoa was the Pope's treasurer in Rome. He made a private offer to the Oratorians – Sta. Maria in Vallicella was their church – to contribute to the -decoration of the area around the main altar. This had become necessary because the Oratorians had transferred the miraculous – and thus fervently venerated – image of the Virgin from a side altar to the main altar. The new patron, however, was only willing to finance the refurbishment if he could choose the artist commissioned to execute the painting for the high altar: and he named Peter Paul Rubens.
The Oratorians were anything but happy with this choice and tried to ''control'' Rubens by including in the contract as many stipulations as possible. Rubens painted a beautiful ''Sacra Conversatione'' in which the miraculous image of the Virgin appears to St Gregory. However, the Oratorians were not happy with this composition and returned it to the -artist. Rubens then painted a completely different second version with the altarpiece as a tabernacle painting in which the actual venerated image of the Virgin, visible through an opening in the altarpiece, is venerated by choirs of angels. The Gemäldegalerie der Akademie der bildenden Künste owns the ''modello'' for this second version of the altarpiece.

Rubens also received his most important commission in his hometown of Antwerp from the Jesuits. The Society wanted the architecture and decoration of its church to reflect its important role in the city's religious, political and economic life. Their newly-built church dedicated to St Charles Borromeo featured Antwerp's first Baroque façade, inspired by the Society's mother church in Rome, ''Il Gesù''. Naturally it was Peter Paul Rubens who was chosen to decorate the ceilings and altars.

SIX OIL SKETCHES FOR THE DECORATION OF THE CEILINGS OF THE JESUIT CHURCH IN ANTWERP (1620)
The commission to decorate the ceilings of the lateral aisles and their galleries was a huge challenge for the efficiency of Rubens and his well-organised workshop: they had to execute – and install – thirty-nine paintings on canvas in eighteen months. Here we encounter for the first time the efficient division of labour between Rubens and his assistants that -differentiated between the work of the master – who developed the composition – and the execution of a large-scale work by the workshop.
Today the sketches for this project are dispersed among numerous museums all over the world. Their non-material value is incalculable as the whole decoration of the nave and side aisles was destroyed in a fire in 1718 so that the sketches are all that remains to give us an idea of Rubens' power of imagination.
The sketches allow today's visitors to imagine they are looking over the master's shoulder, watching him at work – seeing how the idea is transferred from the brain via arm and hand to the small wooden panel: colour and form only emerge from a tissue of brushstrokes and intimations of colour.

THE GOOD RULE OF JAMES I: SKETCH FOR THE CEILING PAINTING ABOVE THE THRONE IN THE BANQUETING HOUSE, WHITEHALL, LONDON (BETWEEN 1631 AND 1633)
The Academy's Picture Gallery owns not only a group of sketches for the Jesuit church in Antwerp but also a representative example of an oil sketch executed in connection with an important commission that has remained in situ, i.e. installed in the location for which it was originally designed: the ceiling decorations in the Banqueting House in Whitehall, London, which celebrate the Stuart dynasty. The Banqueting House was the only building to survive the fire that destroyed Whitehall Palace. Here Rubens' painting encounters Inigo Jones' Palladianism, the latter's – for seventeenth-century London – incredibly modern architectural style.
In this sketch Rubens has outlined the composition celebrating the apotheosis of King James I. Genii place a crown of laurels on the head of the father of Rubens' patron – King Charles I – who is enthroned above the battle between Mars, the god of war, and Minerva, the goddess of wisdom, while Mercury, the god of commerce, together with the ladies Pax (peace) and Abundantia (abundance) are laughing up their sleeve: stripped of all allegorical attributes the composition means nothing but that trade flourishes in times of peace.

THE JUDGEMENT OF PARIS (C. 1606)
Not every painting whose stylistic features might suggest it being termed a sketch was created in connection with such a major commission or project. This ''Judgement of Paris'' – one of only four paintings by Rubens executed on copper – must be regarded as one of the artist's most enchanting ''poesias''. It is probably one of the master's ''studies'' expressing his life-long interest in this pictorial subject: the beauty-contest between the three Olympian goddesses who ask Paris to be their judge.
The three mythological paintings in the Gemäldegalerie der Akademie der bildenden Künste, ''Boreas' Rape of Oreithyia'', ''The Dream of Silenus'', and ''The Three Graces'', represent the genre for which Rubens has always been famous: high Baroque history painting.

THE MYTHOLOGIES
BOREAS' RAPE OF OREITHYIA (C. 1615)
This abduction scene, a completely autograph work by Rubens – which was, incidentally, chosen as the image to represent RUBENS IN WIEN in advertisements and posters – is based on the artist's knowledge of Ovid's ''Metamorphoses'': the poet tells of the hopeless passion of Boreas, the wild god of the cold north-wind, for Oreithyia, the daughter of the king of Athens, and how in his anger Boreas finally turns into a snowstorm and carries off his bride against her will.
There is nothing in Rubens' painting to remind of us a freezing winter storm – only the cupids are enjoying a snowball fight and trying to catch hailstones. Rubens has chosen very different models for his composition of the group of -abductor and abducted girl. He is not interested in depicting a winter storm but in the participants' complex emotions between -violence and love: how in his strong embrace the girl abducted by force falls in love with her abductor. Rubens' modeled his figures on depictions of the rape of Proserpine on classical sarcophagi, although the latter does not fly through the air but -disappears into the underworld.

DREAM OF SILENUS (Between 1610 and 1612)
Rubens had some favourite subjects to which he returned again and again throughout his life regardless of commissions. Most of them were drawn from Greek mythology and Rubens approached them with the erudition of a classical scholar and archaeologist who was an expert in antique art.
A particular favourite were subjects connected with Bacchus which feature the god of wine and his followers – Silenus, Satyrs, nymphs and Maenads – and in which most participants are usually inebriated.
The painting in the Academy's Picture Gallery shows a drunken Silenus, who is dreaming vividly despite the fact that his heavy body is paralysed as a result of his intoxication: both the abundance of precious metal vessels and glasses and the lovers in the background must be seen as part of Silenus' dream. No Flemish painter would depict a still-life of such -disparate precious objects so carelessly assembled if these vessels were not symbols of a dream brought on by -intoxication.

THE THREE GRACES (Between 1620 and 1624)
Raphael painted them and so did Rubens in several versions: the three graces as naked beauties, who as daughters of Zeus brought gods as well as humanity grace, beauty and revelry. Aglaia stood for brilliance, Euphrosyne for cheerfullness and Thalia for blossoming. According to the Roman interpretation by Seneca the three graces symbolize the closed circle of giving, taking and giving in return. In his famous Vienna panel which was created between 1620 and 1624 Rubens chose a slightly different starting point in respect of content: he brings his group of three naked woman, clad only in transparent veils closer to the circle of meanig of the Horae – the ''goddesses of the seasons''. The idea of the ''Horae of spring'' is stressed by the beautiful landscape setting surrounding them as well as by the overflowing of flowers and points out the ethical aspect of natural fertility and seasonal ripeining.

On closer inspection these three examples – all of which seem to confirm our modern cliché of the Flemish voluptuousness so characteristic of Rubens' figures – turn out to be complex ''ponderings'' by the grand master of the Baroque on the art of classical antiquity and on the possibilities and limitations of a personal interpretation of classical subjects.

TICKETS
1 combined ticket valid for all three museums € 15.- incl. shuttlebus
valid for the whole exhibition from December 5, 2004 to February 27, 2005
Available in all 3 museums

CATALOGUE
A catalogue accompanying the exhibition will be available in German
as well as in English at the museum shops and online via shop.liechtensteinmuseum.at (price: € 36.-).

LIECHTENSTEIN MUSEUM. THE PRINCELY COLLECTIONS
Fürstengasse 1, 1090 Wien

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