Bronze door
Bronze doors , also bronze portals , are door leaves that are essentially made of bronze . The making of such bronze sculptures requires great craftsmanship.
Ancient and early Middle Ages
Bronze doors have been known since ancient times and some of these works have also been preserved, such as the door of the Temple of Romulus in the Roman Forum or the 6 m high portal at the Pantheon in Rome , which probably dates from the time of the Roman emperor Hadrian .
In the 5th century the last Roman doors were made from bronze: the door from the time of Pope Hilary for the Lateran Baptistery . Pope Hadrian I used an antique bronze portal from Perugia to build it into St. Peter in Rome.
In late antiquity and the early Middle Ages , bronze doors were still created in Constantinople : Hagia Sophia under Justinian I (527-565) and Theophilos (829-842).
There may also have been bronze workshops in the western Merovingian Empire; However, only the not unequivocal Dagobert throne has survived (today in Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale).
middle Ages
Only a few monumental bronze doors from church buildings have survived from the Middle Ages , some of which are said to have been made in Constantinople; in chronological order:
- Aachen , so-called wolf door from Carolingian times (around 800), non-figurative coffered door with lions' heads pulling the door
- Mainz , doors of the St. Maria ad Gradus monastery , today the west or market portal of the Mainz Cathedral (around 1000)
- Hildesheim , the Bernward door is now inside the cathedral (1015, workshop in Hildesheim), scenes from the Old and New Testament are depicted in juxtaposition. A monumental bronze column of Christ with reliefs dates from the same period
- Augsburg , bronze door of the Augsburg Cathedral (1065)
- Canosa (Italy)
- Tróia (Italy)
- Palermo (Italy)
- Verona , (Italy), San Zeno Maggiore , style similar to Novgorod
- Novgorod , (Russia), at the Sophienkirche ; it is assumed that this work was made by a Magdeburg workshop
- Gnesen (Poland), door of St. Adalbert in the Arch-Cathedral of Gniezno
- Ravello (Italy), Trani (Italy)
- Pisa (Italy) and Monreale (Italy)
- Benevento (Italy)
Bernward door in Hildesheim Cathedral , 1015
Bronze door from Płock , St. Sophia Cathedral in the Novgorod Kremlin , 1130–1144
Main portal of Monreale Cathedral , 1186
Gate of San Zeno Maggiore in Verona, 12./13. Century
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Some other works are preserved in the written sources (e.g. St. Denis , 745; this door was taken over by Abbot Suger together with an eagle from the 7th century ).
Pre-Renaissance and Renaissance
Technically and as a work of art , the bronze doors at the Baptistery of San Giovanni in Florence are outstanding : the south portal Andrea Pisano (completed in 1336), north portal Lorenzo Ghiberti (completed 1424) and east portal (paradise gate) also Lorenzo Ghiberti. The doors, made as a relief from one cast , with then new perspective representations by Lorenzo Ghiberti, belong to the early Renaissance .
In Pisa Giambologna created new doors after the cathedral fire in 1595 (1596–1603); the program , i.e. the selection of the scenes, the design and the sequence, was worked out by Domenico Portigiani , and the actual casting can also be traced back to him or his workshop.
Modern
Outstanding examples of the 20th century are z. B. the bronze portal of St. Kunibert in Cologne , created by Toni Zenz and the bronze portal of St. Jacobi in Hamburg , created by Jürgen Weber . After 1982, monumental bronze doors were installed in the entrance area of the base of the Statue of Liberty in New York , on which the restoration for the centenary of the statue in 1986 is symbolically depicted.
See also
literature
- Ursula Mende: The bronze doors of the Middle Ages. 800-1200. Hirmer, Munich 1983, ISBN 3-7774-3530-9 .
- Norberto Gramaccini: The Carolingian large bronzes. Breaks and continuities in material iconography. In: Anzeiger des Germanisches Nationalmuseum and reports from the Research Institute for Reality Studies. 1995, ISSN 1430-5496 , pp. 130-140.
