German art and architecture, as defined in this article, refers to the artistic production of the many principalities and kingdoms that were united into a single German state in 1871. The art and architecture of Austria, although they share the same German cultural heritage, are treated in a separate article (see \TAustrian art and architecture\t). CAROLINGIAN PERIOD The roots of German art lie in Charlemagne's (r. 768-814) attempt at restoring, along Christian lines, the ancient grandeur of the Roman Empire. Mirroring this ideal, \TCarolingian art and architecture\t blended classical and Early Christian forms and styles (see \TEarly Christian art and architecture\t). The monumental Palace Chapel (consecrated 805) at Aachen (French: Aix-la-Chapelle), Charlemagne's northern capital, reproduced the octagonal central space and domed vault decorated with \Lmosaic\ls of the Early Christian basilica of \TSan Vitale\t in Ravenna, Italy. Similarly, the gatehouse, incorporating a \Ttriumphal arch\t of three bays, of the monastery at Lorsch (c.774) is one of numerous imperial buildings modeled after various parts of Old \TSaint Peter's Basilica\t in Rome. The imperial monasteries at Fulda (founded 774), Hersfeld (founded 831), and Seligenstadt (founded 828) also emulated the basilican plan (see \Tbasilica\t). New developments were also taking place, however: at the basilicas of the monasteries at Centula (Saint-Riuier, 790-99), Corvey (873), and Werden (943), elaborate new entrance structures called westworks, consisting of massive, fortresslike \Lfacade\ls flanked by twin towers, made their first appearance. OTTONIAN PERIOD Under Otto I (r. 936-73), who established the Holy Roman Empire, Hildesheim and Magdeburg in central Germany became the most important centers of the first flowering of a truly German art (see \TOttonian art and architecture\t). As Otto I struggled to integrate independent-minded bishops into his empire, building activity shifted to the episcopal cathedrals, such as those erected at Magdeburg (begun 955) and Mainz (begun 975). The basic design of these structures--two choirs and a large \Ttransept\t--recalls that of the Constantinian basilicas. So influential was this building type that the unvaulted basilica of Saint Michael's in Hildesheim (1001-33), with its two choirs, \Tnave\t flanked by aisles, two transepts, and groups of dual towers, served as an exemplar for German architecture over the next two centuries. Ottonian manuscript illumination (see \Tilluminated manuscripts\t), which reflects Byzantine influence, flourished at Reichenau, where the famous Gospels of Otto III (c.1000; Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich) was produced, along with the only surviving series of Ottonian monumental paintings, the Miracles of Christ (950-75; Oberzell, Reichenau). Goldsmiths in Trier, Fulda, and probably Essen played a leading role in making Ottonian goldwork, whose light and luminous materials reflect the spirituality of the day (see \Tgold\t AND \Tsilver\t \Twork\t). Deeply felt religious emotion also lay behind the expressive realism of Ottonian sculpture. The Byzantine-inspired modeling of the Gero Crucifix (c.975; Cologne Cathedral) cannot mask the intense emotion conveyed by the sculptor, an emotion similar to that expressed so forcefully in the biblical scenes in relief of the two monumental bronze doors, now in Hildesheim Cathedral, commissioned (1015) by Bishop Bernward for Saint Michael's Church in Hildesheim (see \Tbronzes\t). The expressionism so apparent in these two works has ever since remained a strong current in German art. ROMANESQUE PERIOD The reign of the Salian emperors (1024-1125) witnessed a spate of building activity, particularly in the flourishing urban centers of the Rhineland. In the cathedrals of Speyer (begun c.1030) and Goslar (begun c.1050), some Romanesque elements are incorporated into the continuing tradition of the Carolingian-Ottonian basilica (see \TRomanesque art and architecture\t). Romanesque vaulting (see \Tarch and vault\t) and restrained architectural sculpture in the classical mode differentiate the Speyer Cathedral, in particular, from its predecessors. The 12th century marked the flowering of High Romanesque architecture, characterized by vaulting and sculptural articulation of the walls. The cathedrals of Mainz (c.1100), Worms (c.1100), and Bamberg (begun c.1205) are the most prominent examples. Romanesque architectural sculpture was slower to penetrate into Germany, and in its formal appearance, in the Freudenstadt lectern (c.1150; Freudenstadt Parish Church), seems closer to the sacral loftiness of Ottonian art than to the new humanism of the Gothic style then developing in France. The most important centers of Romanesque goldwork and metalwork were Cologne, Hildesheim, Braunschweig, and Magdeburg. Workshops in Magdeburg produced the Novgorod Cathedral's bronze doors (c.1150; originally made for the cathedral in Plock, Poland) and the only surviving medieval sculpture in the round--a monumental lion cast in bronze that Duke Henry of Saxony (Henry the Lion; 1129-95) had set up in front of his Braunschweig castle in 1166. Equally famous is the workshop of \TNicholas of Verdun\t whose Klosterneuburg Altar (1181; Stiftskirche, Klosterneuburg) and Shrine of the Three Kings (1186-96; Cologne Cathedral) are two of the richest examples of goldwork in the Hohenstaufen period (1138-1268). THE GOTHIC PERIOD French Gothic style, as manifested in portal sculpture, in vaults with an ogival arrangement of groins, and in \Tstained glass\t, was late in gaining ground in Germany, where the late Romanesque tradition persisted (see \TGothic art and architecture\t). French stonemasons brought the early Gothic sculptural style from Chartres to \TStrasbourg Cathedral\t, where the south transept portal and the pillar known as the Pilier des anges (1225-30) reflect the iconography and style of the Reims school. At about the same time, another group of Reims-influenced sculptors executed (1237-52) the Bamberg Rider and the Visitation group for Bamberg Cathedral. The elegance and lightness of High Gothic \Tsculpture\t, however, did not fully replace the monumentality of German Romanesque until the appearance of the portal sculptures of Magdeburg Cathedral (c.1247) and the lectern sculptures and donor figures in the west choir of Naumburg Cathedral (1249-70). These important figural cycles are placed not on the facade, but in the interior, and their artistic form results from the tension between the Byzantine tradition of book illumination and wall painting and the newer forms of French Gothic. Architecture Germany's important Gothic architectural achievements belong to the Late Gothic era: the Liebfrauen Church in Trier (begun c.1240); Cologne Cathedral (begun 1248); and the nave and exterior of Strasbourg Cathedral, whose western facade (1284-93), by Erwin von Steinbach, would be glorified by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and the German romantic artists (see \Tromanticism\t, art). This period is characterized by what Nikolaus Pevsner calls the "contrast between the dreamy romanticism of the interior and the concise lucidity of the exterior," for which the term Sondergotik has been coined. Other German contributions to Gothic art include the one-tower facade--a German form inherited from the Romanesque--as in the Frieburg im Breisgau Minster (1275-1350); north German brick architecture, the finest example of which is the Church of Saint Mary in Lubeck (1291); and the so-called hall churches, ecclesiastical structures in whose unified interiors the nave and aisles were of equal height. In the 14th century the hall church became the spatial trademark of Germany, and even in the 15th and 16th centuries this remained one of the most favored building types. The Parler family, a Swabian family of architects and sculptors, brought this new architectural design to Nuremberg, Ulm, and Prague. Perhaps the most significant artistic contribution of the Parlers, however, was the group of 21 portrait busts carved (1374-85) by Peter Parler (1330-99) for the \Ttriforium\t of the Cathedral of Saint Vitus in Prague. This group has been called one of the principal forerunners of modern sculptural portraiture. Painting and Sculpture In the latter part of the 14th century, panel \Tpainting\t assumed a prominent position in German art. The first well-known German panel painters were the Bohemian artists known as the Master of Hohenfurth (fl. c.1350) and the Master of Wittingau (fl. c.1380-90), whose works reveal the influence of the 14th-century painters of Siena. The courtly \TInternational Style\t in art, generally prevalent in Europe around 1400, made only a fleeting appearance in Germany. The expressive realism first noticeable in Ottonian sculptures, and preserved and amplified in wooden sculptures of the Romanesque and early Gothic periods, reappears in the 15th-century paintings of \TMaster Francke\t in northern Germany. This native tradition, heavily influenced by such Flemish masters as Jan van \TEyck\t and Robert \TCampin\t (the Master of Flemalle) developed into the Late Gothic realism espoused by Lukas Moser (fl. c.1430) and Konrad Witz (c.1400-44). This movement found its figural counterpart in the sculptures of Hans \TMultscher\t, Bernt Notke (c.1450-1509), and Nikolaus Gerhaerts van Leyden (fl. 1460-73), whose presumed Self-Portrait (c.1467; Musee de l'Oeuvre Notre-Dame, Strasbourg) represents realism raised to expressiveness. THE RENAISSANCE Toward 1500 the art forms developed by Italian Renaissance artists, who viewed nature organically but within the idealizing framework of classical art, made their way into Germany. Abetting this infiltration of Italian ideas and styles were study trips to Italy by German artists; the hiring of Italian artists by northern patrons; and extensive commercial connections between German cities such as Augsburg, Nuremberg, and Basel, and Italian cities such as Florence, Milan, and Venice. No renaissance, in the sense of a conscious renewal of its classical heritage, took place in Germany because the continuing influence of Gothic traditions prevented the development of a homogeneous German style in the 16th century. These circumstances, however, did foster a rich variety of artistic styles and forms throughout Germany. In the \Tgraphic arts\t, the crafts, the plastic arts, and the schools of painting, the outpouring of forms and ideas from the Italian Renaissance combined with the indigenous German medieval tradition in a variety of ways. In the cities the fine arts flourished, and artists began to free themselves from the constraints of one particular craft, becoming conscious of the uniqueness of individual creativity and, frequently, becoming active in more than one field (see \TRenaissance art and architecture\t). Painting The Renaissance ideal of the Universal Man found its German exemplar in Albrecht \TDurer\t--woodcutter, engraver, painter, publisher, theorist and teacher of art, designer of fortifications, scientist, and humanist. Durer's graphic art, including his so-called Master Engravings (1513-14), his great woodcut cycles in book form, and his 16 scenes in the copperplate Engraved Passion (1513), took much of their inspiration from Italian art, but eventually exerted a strong influence south of the Alps as well. The same interplay between German and Italian art takes place with Durer's drawings and paintings, from his early Self-Portrait (1493; Louvre, Paris) to his monumental Four Apostles (1523-26; Alte Pinakothek, Munich). In addition to panel paintings, \Lengraving\ls, and woodcuts (see \Twoodcuts and\t \Lengraving\ls), Durer tried his hand at intimate \Lbook illustration\ls, as in The Emperor Maximilian's Prayer Book (1515; Staatsbibliothek, Munich). It would be difficult to overestimate Durer's impact on German art, for he was the chief conduit through which the lessons of the Italian Renaissance flowed into the artistic traditions of his native land. Each German artist responded in a unique fashion to the impact of Renaissance ideas and forms. Durer's numerous representations of nudes reflect and develop the Renaissance ideal of the harmoniousness of human proportions. At the same time, however, Hans \TBaldung-Grien\t introduced a pessimistic memento mori into his Death and the Woman (1517; Kunstmuseum, Basel), and the disturbing reminder of mortality effectively undermines the harmony of the nude study. In panel painting, the huge nine-paneled Isenheim Altarpiece (1512-15; Unterlinden Museum, Colmar) by Matthias \TGrunewald\t (Mathis Gothart-Nithart) represents a rejection of Renaissance humanism in favor of Late Gothic expressionism. In this work the use of vivid colors and glowing light bring the late medieval visions of temptation and martyrdom to a fierce pitch of expressive monumentality. Although Grunewald's work contrasts strongly with that of Durer, the two artists can be seen as complementary, each representing different aspects of German art in a time of cultural upheaval. Notable in this golden age of German painting are the humanist portraits of Hans \THolbein\t the Younger; the landscape paintings of Albrecht \TAltdorfer\t, whose Danube Landscape near Regensburg (1520; Alte Pinakothek, Munich) may have been the first pure landscape in Western painting; and the works of Lucas \TCranach\t the Elder. Sculpture In sculpture, the Renaissance period witnessed the apogee of German bronze casting in the Nuremberg workshop of Peter Vischer the Elder (see \TVischer\t family), whose reliquary Shrine of Saint Sebald (1507-19; Church of Saint Sebald, Nuremberg) is embellished with decorative Renaissance motifs. Vischer, his sons, and several other sculptors also developed a German version of Renaissance monumentality in the group of 28 larger-than-life bronze statues for the tomb of Emperor Maximilian I (1508-50; Hofkirche, Innsbruck). Aside from Michelangelo's plan for the tomb of Pope Julius II, the Maximilian project was the largest monument of its kind made in the early 16th century. BAROQUE AND ROCOCO PERIOD The heroic age of German art soon ended, as bronze casting came under Italian and Dutch influence, ecclesiastical architecture flagged under the effects of the Reformation, and the graphic arts came to be used mostly for illustrations and reproductions. In painting, Adam \TElsheimer\t followed in the footsteps of Altdorfer with a series of small-scale history paintings and superb landscapes, such as the nocturnal Flight into Egypt (1609; Alte Pinakothek), which had an important influence on 17th-century Dutch and Flemish painting. The destruction wrought by the Thirty Years' War, however, practically eliminated artistic production in the first half of the 17th century. After 1650, German architecture can be divided geographically into that of the Protestant north, influenced by the Low Countries and France, and that of the Roman Catholic south, influenced by Italy. Baroque tendencies appeared in German architecture, but a distinctly German baroque style quickly developed into the last peak of the European baroque in ecclesiastical and palace architecture (see \Tbaroque art and architecture\t). In Berlin, Andreas \TSchluter\t began (1698) to build the Royal Palace (destroyed 1945), the epitome of the severely monumental character of the German high baroque style. Schluter also produced the finest example of German baroque sculpture, the large equestrian group of the Great Elector (1696-1709; Charlottenburg Palace, Berlin). In Saxony, Matthaus Daniel \TPoppelmann\t, working from French models, achieved a sublime harmony of ornamentation and spatial design and of interior and exterior in his Zwinger (arena) of the Dresden Palace (1711-22), one of the high points of the late phase of baroque architecture called \Trococo style\t. Regional styles of rococo architecture also evolved in southern Germany. Johann Balthasar \TNeumann\t, in \TWurzburg Residenz\t (begun 1719) and Schloss Bruchsal (begun 1728), with their technically and artistically unparalleled staircases, used pictorial and illusionistic devices to achieve breathtaking effects. At about the same time Dominikus \TZimmermann\t, especially in his Bavarian pilgrimage church known as Die Wies, or Church in the Meadow (1745-54), created an integrated and fluid spatial design of rich beauty. In nearby Munich the Bavarian court architect Francois \TCuvillies\t created many exuberant rococo buildings, including the famed \TAmalienburg Pavilion\t (1734-40) with stucco decoration by Johann Baptist Zimmermann (1680-1758), the elder brother of Dominikus Zimmermann. The richly inventive works of Cuvillies, Neumann, and the brothers Zimmermann capped the festive German rococo era, which also manifested itself in the southern German rococo sculpture of Ignaz \TGunther\t and in the first European porcelain manufactory, in Mainz (founded 1710). NEOCLASSICISM AND ROMANTICISM Toward the end of the 18th century, under the leadership of the art historian Johann \TWinckelmann\t, the painter Anton Raphael \TMengs\t, and the poet Goethe, German artists and sculptors sought to escape what they considered the decadence of the rococo movement by taking inspiration from classical or Gothic art. Mengs's Parnassus (1761; Villa Albani, Rome) illustrates Winckelmann's program of \Tneoclassicism\t in art, to which the painters Asmus Jacob Carstens (1754-98) and the Swiss-English Henry \TFuseli\t, influenced by the \TSturm und Drang\t ("storm and stress") movement, added Romantic variations (see \Tromanticism\t, art). Apart from the universally influential writings of Winckelmann and Goethe, the German neoclassical and romantic movements lacked cohesion, a recurring phenomenon in German art until 1871, when the country was unified politically. Just as Gottfried \TSchadow\t and Christian Daniel RAUCH represented different tendencies in neoclassical sculpture, German romantic painting was divided into varied and contrasting trends. The romantic mood landscapes and nature symbolism of north German romanticism is found in Caspar David \TFriedrich\t's Cross on the Mountain (1808; Gemaldegalerie, Dresden) and in Philipp Otto \TRunge\t's Morning (1809; Kunsthalle, Hamburg). On the other hand, the painters who in 1809 formed the so-called Brotherhood of Saint Luke, or \TNazarenes\t, in Vienna subsequently went to Rome in an attempt to revive religious painting by consciously resuming the traditions of old German and Italian painting in a historic mold. The frescoes painted by Johann Friedrich \TOverbeck\t, Peter Cornelius (1783-1867), Ferdinand Olivier (1785-1841), and others of the Nazarenes in the Casa Bartholdi in Rome (1816-17; now in Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen, Berlin) exerted a strong influence not only on the English \TPre-Raphaelites\t but also on the course of 19th-century German history painting, the most grandiose expression of which occurs in Alfred Rethel's fresco cycle (1846-52) of scenes from the life of Charlemagne in the Aachen Rathaus (Town Hall). In the mid-19th century, along with the heyday of illustrative history painting, came the beginnings of pictorially realistic art, as in Adolph von \TMenzel\t's Room with Balcony (1845; Staatliche Museen, Berlin-Dahlem), which was later transformed by Wilhelm \TLeibl\t and by Max \TLiebermann\t into naturalistic and impressionistic art, respectively. Still other painters--Anselm \TFeuerbach\t and Arnold \TBocklin\t are the best known--went beyond even neoclassicism in trying to reproduce archaeologically correct evocations of classical style in their paintings. Generally, 19th-century German architects, like the contemporaneous painters, sought to follow the tenets of neoclassicism or those of the \TGothic Revival\t. Economic expansion after 1870, which coincided with the creation of the modern German state by Otto von Bismarck, created the need for new buildings, but these were designed principally in rather pompous historicizing styles. THE 20TH CENTURY Between 1890 and 1914, German architects occupied the vanguard of the revolutionary movements that brought European art into the modern era. The Jugendstil followers, adopting the new principles of the \TArt Nouveau\t movement, sought to instill in architecture and the applied arts the notion that materials must be used only as appropriate to their inherent properties. Even more important were the efforts of Peter \TBehrens\t, whose early 20th-century factory buildings revolutionized industrial architecture, and the Belgian architect Henry \TVan de Velde\t, who founded the Weimar School for Applied Arts in 1901. Van de Velde and his followers staged the famous Cologne Werkbund Exhibition of 1914, the first European statement of the coming wave of \Tmodern architecture\t. While German architects heralded the dawn of the functional age, German painters and sculptors in the early 1900s were drawing inspiration from an enduring tradition in German art. A group of artists who called themselves Die Brucke ("The Bridge"), the most famous of whom are Emil \TNolde\t and Ernst \TKirchner\t, rejected official academic art in favor of a radical form of expressionism (see \Texpressionism\t, art) that owed as much to Late Gothic German art as to French \Tpostimpressionism\t. Wilhelm \TLehmbruck\t and Ernst \TBarlach\t were the corresponding representatives of German expressionism in sculpture. After World War I, German artists and architects resumed their position in the European avant-garde. Particularly important in postwar European painting were Max \TErnst\t, a prime advocate of surrealism, the inimitable Paul \TKlee\t, and the expressionist Max \TBeckmann\t. Even more influential, in terms of their impact on world art, were the architects of the \TBauhaus\t School, principally Walter \TGropius\t and Ludwig \TMies van der Rohe\t. The functional glass-and-metal structures created by Bauhaus architects inaugurated what came to be called the \TInternational Style\t in architecture, which became one of the most potent and seminal artistic currents of this century. Ulrich Finke Progressive art movements in art were brought to a standstill by the rise of Nazism in the early 1930s. In 1937 the works of Germany's most accomplished vanguard artists were exhibited in the notorious Entartete Kunst (degenerate art) exhibition in Munich. Abused and mistreated by the Nazis, most of the work at the exhibition was sent to Switzerland, where it was sold at auction. Faced with the loss of their livelihood at the hands of censors and unable to purchase art supplies legally, most of Germany's most advanced artists and architects emigrated to France or the United States. Under Hitler's direction, the avant-garde was replaced by a highly political form of neoclassical painting, sculpture, and architecture, much of which was destroyed at the conclusion of World War II. Although Germany produced little important art in the decade following World War II, since 1960 influential work has again been produced on German soil, particularly in the form of expressionist painting. The predominant figure in this development has been Joseph Beuys (1921- ). As a teacher at the Art Academy in Dusseldorf in the 1960s and through his own work, Beuys has influenced such painters as Anselm Kiefer (1945- ), Jorg Immendorf (1945- ), Georg Baselitz (1938-- ), and Markus Lupertz (1941- ). While working in a variety of expressive painting modes, these artists have all dealt in their work with the problems of being an artist in the late 20th century and with themes relating to German literature and culture. Notable among contemporary German architects is Gottfried \TBohm\t. Maria Makela Bibliography: Baum, Julius, German Cathedrals (1956); Feuerstein, Gunther, New Directions in German Architecture, trans. by Thomas E. Burton (1968); Gropius, Walter, The New Architecture and the Bauhaus, trans. by P. M. Shand (1965); Haftmann, Werner, et al., German Art of the Twentieth Century, ed. by Andrew C. Ritchie (1957; repr. 1972); Hempel, Eberhard, Baroque Art and Architecture in Central Europe, trans. by Elizabeth Hempel and Marguerite Kay (1965); Hitchcock, Henry Russell, German Renaissance Architecture (1981); Kuhn, Charles L., German Expressionism and Abstract Art: The Harvard Collections (1957); Lindemann, Gottfried, The History of German Art, trans. by Tessa Sayle (1971); Metropolitan Museum of Art, German Masters of the Nineteenth Century (exhibition catalog, 1981); Muller, Theodor, Sculpture in the Netherlands, Germany, France and Spain, 1400 to 1500 (1966); Myers, Bernard S., and Copplestone, Trewin, eds., Art Treasures in Germany (1970); Posener, Julius, From Schinkel to the Bauhaus (1971); Royal Academy of Arts, London, German Art in the Twentieth Century: Painting and Sculpture, 1905-1985 (exhibition catalog, 1985); Von Der Osten, Gert, and Vey, Horst, Painting and Sculpture in Germany and the Netherlands, 1500 to 1600 (1969); Watkin, David, and Mellinghoff, Tilman, German Architecture and the Classical Ideal (1987); Whitford, Frank, Bauhaus (1984).