Wednesday, July 11, 2007
All Well and Good...But Where's Chekov?
Yesterday, the Schiller Center arranged the first of several outings to museums near the Königsplatz (or if you prefer, Koenigsplatz), one of Munich's so-called "royal avenues."
The plaza was laid out by its eponymous "König" ("king") Ludwig I of Bavaria and he surrounded it with neoclassical temples to house his collections of antiquities. When the Nazis came to power, they paved over the grass in the square and used it as a staging ground for rallies and demonstrations, though one would hardly believe it now that it has been restored to its prewar state. (A better sense of what I mean can be seen by looking at this panoramic image courtesy of your friends and mine at Wikipedia.)
In addition to three separate museums devoted to Greco-Roman art and architecture, Königsplatz is also home to an internationally renowned collection of late 19th and early 20th century art: The Lenbachhaus, which for those of you with shaky German skills translates as "Lenbach's house." Of course, even if you do know a little German like yours truly, this translation still leaves more questions than answers. First and foremost, who the heck is this Lenbach guy? Fortunately, the kindly folks at Munich's public transit authority have attempted to address this issue as one leaves the Königsplatz U-Bahn station.
See the gentleman on the left with the beard? That's Franz von Lenbach, and if you were a wealthy Bavarian during the late 19th century and you wanted to have a portrait made in the style of the Old Masters, he was your go to guy. He set up shop in a swanky house near the king's square intended to mimic the style of a Florentine villa.
After Lenbach's death, the city acquired the property and used it to house collections of art by people who lived in or were affiliated with Munich, most notably the members of Der Blaue Reiter school. Founded in 1911, Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider) and its members promoted expressionist painting that emphasized bright colors, spontaneity, and the use of the abstract to evoke connections between art and music. Probably the most famous member of the group was Wassily Kandinsky, but the Lenbachhaus also has collections from his longtime companion and lover Gabriele Münter and other notable artists like Paul Klee and Franz Marc. I know all of this because of my calm, well-informed tour guide (especially compared to the Deutsches Museum), who managed the impossible as she walked us through all the galleries: She made modern art coherent! (Or at least more coherent than I would have ever expected, especially given the language difference.)
It can be very easy to get disoriented in the Lenbachhaus because there are so many different styles of art and architecture in such close proximity. For example, shortly after entry, we were led into this room, which has been preserved in the same style as Lenbach originally had it built.
But once you leave that room, you never know what sort of architectural madness lays in store. You might stumble upon a climbing wall made of recycled beer bottles!
Or perhaps a room where someone left some cans of spray paint next to a big pile of oily rags and waited for nature to take its course:
And while you're trying to keep your wits around you throughout this avant-garde experimental art-chitecture, you also need to focus on the paintings! If you're lucky, the painting will actually look like what it's supposed to, like this painting by Franz Marc entitled "The Tiger."
Or this portrait of Alexander Sacharoff by Alexej von Jawlensky. Yes. That is the portrait of a man named Alexander. He was a dancer. He was not, as far as art historians are aware, Batman's archnemesis.
But more often than not, you have to use your imagination, especially when you're dealing with something like this Kandinsky painting.
Or this one, which I believe is meant to show people leaving from a concert hall after a show.
Once you realize that the whole point of this expressionist style of painting is not literal representation but rather to experiment with color and shape as a means of capturing human experience, it transforms an otherwise frustrating experience into an engaging one. That doesn't mean that doesn't mean that I can explain some of the stranger temporary exhibits...
But by the time I left the gallery and looked out towards Königsplatz over the fountain in its Florentine style courtyard, I could legitimately claim a deeper appreciation of Expressionist art. And if a museum could convince a philistine like me of the merits of such things, it must be doing something right.
The whole experience left me looking forward to visiting Königsplatz's other museums, especially the Glyptothek which I visited today. However, that is a story for another time.
BY THE WAY...: No matter how convenient or straightforward it might be for the Lenbachhaus to claim, the Blue Rider school was not named after this painting of a blue horse by Franz Marc.
Yesterday, the Schiller Center arranged the first of several outings to museums near the Königsplatz (or if you prefer, Koenigsplatz), one of Munich's so-called "royal avenues."
The plaza was laid out by its eponymous "König" ("king") Ludwig I of Bavaria and he surrounded it with neoclassical temples to house his collections of antiquities. When the Nazis came to power, they paved over the grass in the square and used it as a staging ground for rallies and demonstrations, though one would hardly believe it now that it has been restored to its prewar state. (A better sense of what I mean can be seen by looking at this panoramic image courtesy of your friends and mine at Wikipedia.)
In addition to three separate museums devoted to Greco-Roman art and architecture, Königsplatz is also home to an internationally renowned collection of late 19th and early 20th century art: The Lenbachhaus, which for those of you with shaky German skills translates as "Lenbach's house." Of course, even if you do know a little German like yours truly, this translation still leaves more questions than answers. First and foremost, who the heck is this Lenbach guy? Fortunately, the kindly folks at Munich's public transit authority have attempted to address this issue as one leaves the Königsplatz U-Bahn station.
See the gentleman on the left with the beard? That's Franz von Lenbach, and if you were a wealthy Bavarian during the late 19th century and you wanted to have a portrait made in the style of the Old Masters, he was your go to guy. He set up shop in a swanky house near the king's square intended to mimic the style of a Florentine villa.
After Lenbach's death, the city acquired the property and used it to house collections of art by people who lived in or were affiliated with Munich, most notably the members of Der Blaue Reiter school. Founded in 1911, Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider) and its members promoted expressionist painting that emphasized bright colors, spontaneity, and the use of the abstract to evoke connections between art and music. Probably the most famous member of the group was Wassily Kandinsky, but the Lenbachhaus also has collections from his longtime companion and lover Gabriele Münter and other notable artists like Paul Klee and Franz Marc. I know all of this because of my calm, well-informed tour guide (especially compared to the Deutsches Museum), who managed the impossible as she walked us through all the galleries: She made modern art coherent! (Or at least more coherent than I would have ever expected, especially given the language difference.)
It can be very easy to get disoriented in the Lenbachhaus because there are so many different styles of art and architecture in such close proximity. For example, shortly after entry, we were led into this room, which has been preserved in the same style as Lenbach originally had it built.
But once you leave that room, you never know what sort of architectural madness lays in store. You might stumble upon a climbing wall made of recycled beer bottles!
Or perhaps a room where someone left some cans of spray paint next to a big pile of oily rags and waited for nature to take its course:
And while you're trying to keep your wits around you throughout this avant-garde experimental art-chitecture, you also need to focus on the paintings! If you're lucky, the painting will actually look like what it's supposed to, like this painting by Franz Marc entitled "The Tiger."
Or this portrait of Alexander Sacharoff by Alexej von Jawlensky. Yes. That is the portrait of a man named Alexander. He was a dancer. He was not, as far as art historians are aware, Batman's archnemesis.
But more often than not, you have to use your imagination, especially when you're dealing with something like this Kandinsky painting.
Or this one, which I believe is meant to show people leaving from a concert hall after a show.
Once you realize that the whole point of this expressionist style of painting is not literal representation but rather to experiment with color and shape as a means of capturing human experience, it transforms an otherwise frustrating experience into an engaging one. That doesn't mean that doesn't mean that I can explain some of the stranger temporary exhibits...
But by the time I left the gallery and looked out towards Königsplatz over the fountain in its Florentine style courtyard, I could legitimately claim a deeper appreciation of Expressionist art. And if a museum could convince a philistine like me of the merits of such things, it must be doing something right.
The whole experience left me looking forward to visiting Königsplatz's other museums, especially the Glyptothek which I visited today. However, that is a story for another time.
BY THE WAY...: No matter how convenient or straightforward it might be for the Lenbachhaus to claim, the Blue Rider school was not named after this painting of a blue horse by Franz Marc.
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