Smiling Madonna
The Smiling Madonna , created around 1260, is a sandstone sculpture and is located in the Church of Johannes Beheading in Lauter . The artist is unknown and the provenance of the work is disputed.
description
The approx. 107 cm high sculpture made of gray sandstone is a seated Madonna . The entire composition rests on an irregular hexagonal plinth ; the Mother of God is enthroned on a bench with a profiled seat plate and is dressed in a long-sleeved undergarment and a coat. A richly decorated tiara and a headscarf adorn the curly hair. The shawl in which the baby Jesus is wrapped is comparable to the headscarf. The boy, who turns playfully towards her and holds on to his mother's robe with his right hand, is supported with her left arm. Her right hand comes towards the viewer in an inviting gesture, as if she wanted to accept a gift. The design of the Madonna's face does not correspond to any idealization: the rounded shape, the slightly arched forehead, the receding chin are probably based on a real model.
In addition to the contrast between the agitation of the Jesus boy and the rest of the Mother of God, the play between body and clothing is particularly noteworthy. On the legs of the seated figure, different ways of depicting the garment can be observed: The left foot steps on the coat, which causes folds to form towards the right knee. Above that, the robe throws deep bowl folds and falls in flat folded bags over the right knee. Underneath, the fabric piles up voluminously on the plinth and falls slightly over the edge.
Art historical classification
A determination of the provenance or a stylistic categorization of the Smiling Madonna turns out to be difficult, as there is little comparable in the Franconian-Thuringian sculpture of the time of origin. Parallels have already been drawn with the portraits of the donors in Frauenroth , the figures in Naumburg and in the Strasbourg Cathedral , the Madonna in Laub and the Nuremberg Madonna of the Epiphany of St. Lorenz , but mostly with the result that there are corresponding details, but a clear relationship cannot be proven.
One can safely assume that the sculpture came from the Cistercian convent Frauenroth . In the 13th century, the Cistercians had their spiritual center in Burgundy and had their own construction huts in which sculptors were also active. Stylistically, the Smiling Madonna corresponds entirely to works on the right bank of the Rhine , which are the work of similar construction works. It is therefore quite plausible that the Smiling Madonna could be the work of wandering stone craftsmen. In this case it is also likely that Beatrix von Courtenay and her husband Otto von Henneberg / Botenlauben , who founded the Frauenroth monastery in 1235, acted as clients. At that time, only the Henneberg family (in the area around Frauenroth) was able to finance such a work of art.
Installation in Lauter church
Nothing is known about the whereabouts of the sculpture in the following centuries. It can be assumed that it was lost during a transport between Stralsbach and Frauenroth, near the junction to Aschach , with the head and left hand of the baby Jesus breaking off. According to local tradition, this is where the portrait is said to have been found in the late 19th century. At the beginning of the 20th century, the sculpture came to Stralsbach and was subsequently installed in the Lauter branch church . A few years later a farmer is said to have stumbled upon the head of the boy Jesus while plowing, which was then cemented by a bricklayer. In the new church built in 1974, the sculpture found its place in a kind of rectangular apse to the left of the choir. There is a copy of the sandstone portrait in the former Frauenroth monastery church.
literature
(in chronological order)
- Theodor Henner: Old Franconian Pictures. Born 19. Würzburg 1913 ( digitized at Franconia-Online).
- Barthel Hanftmann: The treasure to Frauenroth. In: Franken Calendar 1933. Richter Verlag, Würzburg 1933, p. 65.
- Karl Kolb: Franconian Madonnas through the centuries. Echter, Würzburg 1975, ISBN 3-921056-11-X .
- Beatrize Söding: The Epiphany in Würzburg Cathedral. Studies on high Gothic monumental sculpture in Germany at the turn of the 13th to the 14th century. (= Studies in Art History. Volume 96). Olms, Hildesheim / Zurich / New York 1994, ISBN 3-487-09980-2 , pp. 235-238.
- Georg Dehio , Tilmann Breuer: Handbook of German art monuments . Bavaria I: Franconia - The administrative districts of Upper Franconia, Middle Franconia and Lower Franconia. 2nd, revised and supplemented edition. Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich / Berlin 1999, ISBN 3-422-03051-4 , p. 573.
- Wolf-Dieter Raftopoulo: Rhön and Grabfeld culture guides. A complete documentation of the old cultural landscapes in terms of art and cultural history. RMd Verlag, Gerbrunn 2017, ISBN 978-3-9818603-7-5 , pp. 80-81.
Web links
- Rudolf Schubert: The Smiling Madonna von Lauter . In: Website of the municipality of Burkardroth