BE - Fine Arts- 2003

2003

BE -- Fine Arts

Künstlerspuren in Berlin vom Barock bis heute: ein Führer zu Wohn-, Wirkungs- und Gedenkstätten bildender Künstlerinnen und Künstler [Artists’ Traces in Berlin from the Barock Period until Today: A Guide to the Dwellings, Places of Activity, and Memorials to Artists]. Detlef Lorenz. Berlin: Reimer, 2002. 505 p. ill. 21 cm. ISBN 3-496-01268-4: EUR 39 [03-1-172]

Based on evaluation of extensive source materials and on-site inspections, this volume attempts to provide a listing of all places in Berlin with connections to artists from the last 300 years. The arrangement of the entries is alphabetical by street, using the street names of today’s Berlin with additions indicating the former names of neighborhoods, earlier street names, and changes in house numbers. Entries for each street describe the relevant historical objects using typographical variations to distinguish between buildings still existing essentially unchanged or reconstructed and those no longer existent or replaced by a different structure. In the case of Potsdam Street, for example, of 30 house numbers only three survive today. One housed an artists’ school attended by Käthe Kollwitz and Paula Becker-Modersohn; a second was the location of the architecture office of Walter Gropius; the third was the home of the painter Anton von Werner. In each case the entries contain information on the artist(s), on the building, and on the artist’s activities at the address. Indexes of artists’ names and streets by neighborhood provide access to the entries. This work succeeds well as an inventory. However, although the author characterizes his work as a specialized city guide, its usefulness as such is limited because, apart from public monuments, in most cases there is little to see except exteriors of buildings, not to mention the fact that a great number of the sites described no longer exist. [sh/jc]

Sachsen-Anhalt [Saxony-Anhalt]. Ed. Dehio-Vereinigung, Vereinigung der Landesdenkmalpfleger in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, and Deutsche Stiftung Denkmalschutz. Rev. ed. München; Berlin: Deutscher Kunstverlag. 19 cm. (Handbuch der deutschen Kunstdenkmäler). [03-1-173]

1. Regierungsbezirk Magdeburg [Magdeburg District]. Ed. Ute Bednarz and Folkhard Cremer. 2002. x, 1,071 p. ill. ISBN 3-422-03069-7: EUR 48

With the appearance of this volume, revised editions of the Dehio guides now exist for all of the former East German states. This is also the first volume produced by the Dehio-Vereinigung [Dehio Association] together with the Vereinigung der Landesdenkmalpfleger in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland [Association for State Monument Maintenance in the Federal Republic of Germany] and the Deutsche Stiftung Denkmalschutz [German Foundation for Monument Protection]. It is to be hoped that with this additional support, revised editions of the volumes for the other federal states (which now appear quite modest compared to the revised guides) will appear very soon. [For fuller information on the Dehio-Vereinigung and its publications, see the IFB review (01-1-071) of the festschrift, Georg Dehio (1850–1932): 100 Jahre Handbuch der deutschen Kunstdenkmäler (München: 2000); for reviews of selected previous volumes see also RREA 7:134, 135, 136, 137, and 138]. [sh/jc]

Art and Architecture in Central Europe, 1550–1620: An Annotated Bibliography. Thomas Da Costa Kaufmann, in collaboration with Heiner Borggrefe and Thomas Fusenig. Marburg: Jonas, 2003. 224 p. 25 cm. (Studien zur Kultur der Renaissance, 2). ISBN 3-89445-281-1: EUR 30 [03-1-174]

This is an updated version of the identically-titled work published in Boston in 1988. In it, Kaufmann, known for his many works on Renaissance art in Central Europe, has given us a bibliography of the art and architecture of the region from the mid-16th century to the beginning of the Thirty Years War.

Two chapters on sources and general works are followed by 20 on geographic regions, arranged in alphabetical order, and a final chapter on peripatetic artists. Titles are numbered within each chapter and given adequate bibliographic descriptions (although with the unfortunate omission of extent, in the case of monographs) and brief annotations. Introductory comments address problems of periodization and the essentially international character of the period, which renders the division of the subject by nation states, characteristic since the 19th century, unsuitable. Having these remarks does not make up for the absence of such basic information as to what the authors’ criteria for inclusion were.

Kaufmann does not aim to produce a comprehensive bibliography, and it is easy to find gaps here. The indexing leaves much to be desired: while there is an (incomplete) index of authors, there are neither subject indexes nor ones for places or artists. These faults, along with the unstated criteria for inclusion, do much to lessen the usefulness of this bibliography. [sh/dss]

Tirols Künstler 1927 [Tyrol’s Artists, 1927]. Ed. Ellen Hastaba. Innsbruck: Wagner, 2002. 388 p. ill. 25 cm. (Schlern-Schriften, 319). ISBN 3-7030-0365-0: EUR 42 [03-1-180]

In 1926, the Verein für Heimatschutz und Heimatpflege in Nord- und Osttirol [Association for Homeland Preservation and Stewardship in Northern and Eastern Tyrol] undertook the creation of a lexicon of contemporary Tyrolean artists on the basis of a questionnaire sent to them. Over 200 architects, sculptors, graphic artists, artisans, and painters responded, 143 of them adding photographs of themselves. The completed questionnaires and attached documentation were assembled into a volume entitled Tirols Künstler 1927 and presented to the Tiroler Landesmuseum Ferdinandeum [Tyrol State Museum Ferdinandeum]. Subsequently, some “late entries” and known update information (e.g., exhibitions, death dates, etc.) were added. This volume, which was not published or duplicated, found favor among users and showed the effects of heavy usage. For conservation reasons, as well as to enable access to its contents without visiting the Ferdinandeum, Ellen Hastaba has edited the volume and made it available as a published work. The complete content of the questionnaires, both queries and responses, is reproduced, along with the supplemental documentation, photographs submitted, and autograph signatures; moreover, she has researched follow-up information on the entrants, providing this in 1,332 footnotes. Indexes to persons and places have also been added. [sh/rlk]

Das Lexikon der Fotografen: 1900 bis heute [Encyclopedia of Photographers: 1900 to the Present]. Hans-Michael Koetzle. München: Knaur, 2002. 528 p. ill. 29 cm. ISBN 3-426-66479-8: EUR 98 [03-1-184]

Hans-Michael Koetzle is editor-in-chief of Leica World magazine and has published a number of works on the history of photography. When his Lexikon is compared to another 2002 publication, the Prestel-Lexikon der Fotografen (see RREA 8:155), a number of differences emerge. Koetzle covers around 550 photographers working from the World War I era to the present, while Prestel treats over 800 and includes the 19th century. Both concentrate on Europe and North America, but Koetzle limits his coverage to those areas, including some regions apparently marginal for photography, such as Scandinavia, southern Europe, and Russia. Entries in Koetzle are concise, as in Prestel, but are also uniform and visually structured. Elements include name, date and place of birth/death, assessment of importance, brief data about training and career, a quotation characterizing the subject’s impact, selected exhibitions, selected bibliography, and references to other dictionaries that include the subject. In general, the entries in Koetzle provide much more information than those in comparable works; the graphic elements and layout are richer and more stimulating, as well. Despite a significant overlap in coverage, however, libraries will want both dictionaries in their reference collection. [sh/gw]

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