Johannes Schroth (architect)

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Johannes Schroth (born December 18, 1859 in Jöhlingen near Karlsruhe , † November 23, 1923 during a business trip near Offenburg ) was a German architect . As an employee in the building administration of the Catholic Archdiocese of Freiburg , he designed numerous churches in Baden between 1890 and 1915 , making the transition from historicism to art nouveau .

Life

Schroth's father was a carpenter . He completed his architecture studies at the Technical University of Karlsruhe and the Technical University of Charlottenburg . Even without an academic degree, he became an employee at the Archbishop's Building Office in Mosbach in 1884 . In 1888 he worked again for a year in Berlin, before he first worked at the Archbishop's Building Office in Karlsruhe from 1889 and then headed it from 1893. Here he was responsible for the many church buildings that became necessary during the industrialization of Baden due to the population explosion in the big cities. At first he represented historicism with a preference for Romanesque forms. Examples of neo-Gothic buildings are rarer. His goal, however, was not to imitate historical models, but to creatively deal with historical architecture, taking into account the specific situation of the local environment. From 1905, however, he turned to more modern architectural styles, such as Art Nouveau , and increasingly dispensed with decorative, historicizing accessories.

buildings

Liebfrauenkirche Mannheim
Boniface Church Karlsruhe
Trinity Church Offenburg
  • Achern- Oberachern : Church of St. Stefan , built in 1903/05 in the neo-Romanesque style while retaining the tower, which was partly from the Middle Ages.
  • Achern- Wagshurst : Church of St. John the Baptist , built in 1899 in neo-Romanesque style
  • Sinzheim : neo-Gothic parish church of St. Martin , built between 1898 and 1900
  • Karlsruhe: Administration building of the Catholic Upper Foundation Council, today Police Headquarters , Beiertheimer Allee 16, 1902
  • Mannheim-Jungbusch : Church of Our Lady
  • Bischweier : Kuratiekirche St. Anna ; The neo-Gothic church was built between 1899 and 1900.
  • Kuppenheim : Parish Church of St. Sebastian ; The large neo-Gothic parish church was built between 1902 and 1905 with the inclusion of an older church tower. It was shaped like a Latin cross with a high transept.
  • Ettlingen : Herz Jesu Church ; It was created outside of the old town in neo-Romanesque forms from sandstone. The foundation stone was laid on June 21, 1902, and the church was consecrated by Archbishop Thomas Nörber on June 24, 1906 . The columnar basilica has the plan of a Latin cross. The mighty front tower, crowned by a tall pointed helmet, is over 70 meters high. During the major renovation in 1964/65, the original furnishings were largely destroyed.
  • Kappelrodeck : New construction of the neo-Gothic parish church of St. Nikolaus from 1902 to 1907
  • Karlsruhe : The parish church of St. Bonifatius with rectory in the Weststadt was built between 1904 and 1908 in a historicizing style with isolated Art Nouveau elements.
  • Bickesheim : The pilgrimage church of Maria Bickesheim near Durmersheim was renovated or partly rebuilt under Schroth's direction between 1905 and 1908.
  • Offenburg : Holy Trinity Church . The church was built from 1906 to 1908 in the style of a Romanesque basilica. It has the shape of a basilica with a transept, whereby only the choir, side aisles and gallery are vaulted due to economy, while the nave is provided with a wooden ceiling. For the same reason, the exterior wall was not clad with stone and only plaster was used. The building with its two massive towers, around fifty meters high, defines the street scene in Offenburg's eastern city. The church has a total length of 60 meters and originally offered space for up to 1,300 people. It was inaugurated on October 18, 1908 by Auxiliary Bishop Friedrich Justus Heinrich Knecht .
  • Ottersweier : Parish Church of St. John the Baptist ; The neo-Gothic church was built between 1906 and 1909. The Romanesque southern choir tower and the Gothic choir of the previous church were integrated into the double tower facade of the new building. The Romanesque choir has been preserved in the basement of the tower, four corner columns support a cruciate vault. The late Gothic choir now forms the entrance hall, its three-sided end protrudes into the nave of the neo-Gothic church. The forecourt of the church was built in place of the old nave. An unusually large and representative three-aisled basilica made of red sandstone blocks with a transept has been created for the village environment. The towers are crowned by a circumferential tracery gallery with corner wardrobes and slim, eight-sided helmets.
  • Karlsruhe-Daxlanden : Holy Spirit Church ; The parish church with attached rectory was built according to preliminary planning since 1906 between 1910 and 1912 on the site of a former cemetery east of the old village. Due to its urban dominance, it is the symbol of Daxlanden. The three-aisled neo-Romanesque basilica is of large dimensions and has an open vestibule, chapel extensions, a semicircular closed apse and an unusually high tower on the choir flank. The simply plastered, ornamentless structure is not characterized by style quotations, but by its simplistic, monumental shape. Schroth's attempt to open the historicizing Catholic church building to the contemporary stylistic tendencies of the years before the First World War is clear here.
Catholic Church Hockenheim
  • Hockenheim : St. Georg parish church ; This large church was built from 1909 to 1911 and consecrated on October 15, 1911 by Archbishop Thomas Nörber . It is characterized by the late Art Nouveau era, where asymmetrical figures and surfaces, but also geometric figures are used to decorate friezes, walls, ceiling sections and pillars. The basic pattern in this church is the capped diamond, which can be seen everywhere, also as a stone inlay in ribbon form in the floor of the choir, carved in wood on the pews and the confessionals. The diamond can also be seen on the copper-clad entrance doors and on the facade. The tower is 60 meters high.
  • Kehl : The Church of St. Johannes Nepomuk was consecrated in 1914, on the day the First World War broke out. It was badly damaged in the Second World War and restored by 1953. The strikingly high tower with its 56 meters, the neo-Romanesque style with its massive arches, the painted gable field (“Ascension of Christ”) on the facade give the building in the immediate vicinity of an old Rhine arm an imposing impression. With the parsonage next to it, the church forms a “picturesque assembly”, as Johannes Schroth estimated. The overall impression of the interior is coherent and harmonious in its proportions. The church patron, the bridge saint St. John Nepomuk (1350–1593), is depicted above the high altar.
  • Gengenbach : The motherhouse church of the Franciscan Sisters in Gengenbach was built from 1913 to 1915. After a major renovation in 1968, the church was restored in 1999/2000 and restored to its original neo-baroque design.

Other buildings:

literature

  • Ulrich Coenen: Johannes Schroth - Architect of Late Historicism and Art Nouveau. In: Die Ortenau 94, 2014, pp. 243–278.
  • Congregation through the ages - 100 years of the Liebfrauenkirche Mannheim. (Festschrift) Mannheim, 2003.
  • Wolfgang Weismann: On the planning history of the parish church St. Johannes d. T. in Ottersweier. In: Die Ortenau 95, 2015, pp. 319–350.
  • Wolfgang Weismann: The most sacred as profane. On the use of old choirs as entrances to historicist churches in the Ortenau In: Die Ortenau 99, 2019, pp. 283-310.

Web links

Commons : Johannes Schroth  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Schroth, Johannes
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Schroth, Johann
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German architect
DATE OF BIRTH December 18, 1859
PLACE OF BIRTH Walzbachtal
DATE OF DEATH November 23, 1923
Place of death Offenburg