The Los Angeles County Museum of Art has opened a show on German art from the 16th century. The exhibition brings art from the European Renaissance to California.
Image: Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister/Hans-Peter Klut
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Martin Luther and the Renaissance on show in Los Angeles
The LA County Museum of Art is now showing some 120 paintings, drawings and sculptures from the 16th century. As the Luther Year begins, the works shed light on an era shaped by Martin Luther and the Reformation.
Image: Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister/Elke Estel, Hans-Peter Klut
Face of a revolution
This portrait of church reformer Martin Luther was painted in 1532 in the Cranach atelier in Wittenberg. Lucas Cranach the Elder and his son, Lucas Cranach the Younger, earned a fortune with their works. With their portraits of Luther and his contemporaries, they gave a face to the religious revolution between the Middle Ages and the Modern era.
Image: Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister/Hans-Peter Klut
Dürer's photo-like mastery
The Cranachs churned out an incredible number of paintings - experts believe more than 5,000 originated in their workshop. In part, they worked with stencils. This painting, on the other hand, was painted by Albrecht Dürer in 1526. It shows Jakob Muffel of one of Nuremberg's oldest aristocratic families. Dürer's attention to detail makes the work resemble a photograph.
Image: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie/Jörg P. Anders
Slanderous art
Hans Brosamer created this woodcarving in 1519, which polemically depicts Luther with seven heads for the cover page of a pamphlet. Each head has a different name. Luther is defamed as an anti-Christ in the image, as apocalyptic beasts also had seven heads.
Image: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett/Dietmar Katz
Using paintings to teach the Bible
The Western world in the Middle Ages was largely Christian, and it was typical for artists to base their motifs almost exclusively on biblical themes. Such images had pedagogical value, since most people were unable to read or write. This painting by Lucas Cranach the Elder, depicting the Israelites passing through the Red Sea which God had miraculously split, is from 1530.
The creator of this Mary and child statue from Tauberbischofsheim is clearly a genius. Tilman Riemenschneider (ca. 1460- 1531) is considered one of the most significant sculptors from the period between the Late Gothic and the Renaissance. He built impressive altars and occasionally non-religious works as well. The facial expressions of his figures are particularly vivid.
Image: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Skulpturensammlung und Museum für Byzantinische Kunst/Antje Voigt
Devil's business
In the early Modern era, people thought witches held regular meetings with the devil to arrange evil business. Hans Franck painted one such dark rendezvous in 1515 using ink and grey paper.
Image: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett/Jörg P. Anders
More artistic freedom
The Renaissance period brought numerous changes with it. At this time, art was gradually liberated from its religious context and appreciated for its aesthetic power. This marked the beginning of an era in which the independent artist played a central role. A good example is this work by Matthias Grünewald depicting a crying child.
Image: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett/Jörg P. Anders
Treasure chest
This elaborately decorated chest, made from copper, brass, gold and silver, was presumably created in the workshop of Wenzel Jamnitzer. Jamnitzer was one of the most famous goldsmiths of his day and worked for all of the German emperors.
Made of iron, this set of Maximilian armor belonged to Duke Wolfgang von Anhalt-Köthen and was fashioned between 1520 and 1530. The suit weighs a good 27 kilograms (nearly 60 pounds) and was nearly obsolete by the time it was made. In the early Modern era, polished plate armor was en vogue instead.
The exhibition "Renaissance and Reformation: German Art in the Age of Dürer and Cranach" is on show at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art through March 26. Works are on loan from museums in Berlin, Dresden and Munich.
Image: Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister/Elke Estel, Hans-Peter Klut
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The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) has brought European masterpieces to California that predate the discovery of America. Christopher Columbus only made it to the shores of America in 1492 - the same era when these artworks were created in Europe.
Nonetheless, the same influences that characterized European art at the time also went on to be incorporated into American cultural history.
The exhibition "Renaissance and Reformation: German Art in the Age of Dürer and Cranach" opened at LACMA on November 20. The show aims to shed new light on this historic age, which was largely defined by the impact of the Protestant Reformation and its ripple effects. The exhibit uses key pieces of German art from the 16th century to narrate this.
Lucas Cranach the Younger painted Adam and Eve in 1537Image: Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister/Hans-Peter Klut
As the Martin Luther anniversary year, marking 500 years since he pinned his 95 theses to the door of the church in Wittenberg, gets underway, three other US exhibitions in New York, Atlanta and Minneapolis, highlight Martin Luther's role in history. The show in Los Angeles, however, only focuses on the changes that the art world underwent at the time.
According to the directors of the three German museums that provided artworks on loan to LACMA - the National Museums in Berlin, the Dresden State Art Collections and the Bavarian State Painting Collections -, the intellectual revolution of the Reformation was not contained within theological or philosophical motivations.
Art with a lasting impact
If it wasn't for these loans from their abundant collections, the exhibition in California would not have been possible.
Michael Eissenhauer (National Museums in Berlin), Hartwig Fischer (Dresden State Art Collections) und Bernhard Maaz (Bavarian State Painting Collections) stress in a joint statement that artworks from this era rate among the most important chapters of German and of European art and cultural history.
They say that there was a great deal of disagreement among artists at the time: "Our collections demonstrate the rich variety of ways in which artists were searching for new means of expression. The exhibition in Los Angeles tells the story of how the Reformation created a lasting impact on central European culture and beyond."
Renaissance under the California sun
The art show resulting from the collaboration between the three museums is impressive, breathing new life into this multifaceted era with about 120 paintings, drawings, sculptures and more.
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art will host the exhibition until March 26Image: picture-alliance/Richard Cummi
These include works by Dürer, Cranach, Holbein, Riemenschneider and Grünewald. The exhibition hopes to reach a diverse audience by providing such varied insights into the religious, social and political upheavals of the times.
The organizers of the show also hope to attract new audiences that may not be that familiar with the events of the era and how they were reflected in art.
LACMA director Michael Govan says that the exhibition provides a "unique opportunity to experience the greatest achievements of German Renaissance art in southern California."
Not just any museum
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art is regarded as one of the most outstanding museums in the US. Established in 1965, it is now the biggest art collection in the western United States, holding a collection of more than 120,000 objects. From antiquity to contemporary art, the museum highlights art from across the world spanning across the entire history of art.
With such a stellar reputation it's no surprise that the German Foreign Ministry is one of the sponsors of the "Renaissance and Reformation: German Art in the Age of Dürer and Cranach" exhibition, as Germany celebrates 500 years of Reformation. German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier is the patron of the exhibition.
