Girl with parrot
The Girl with a Parrot is a gold-plated cast zinc sculpture based on the model of the sculptor Heinrich Berges , which was made in the Berlin iron foundry by Siméon Pierre Devaranne . From the sculpture standing on a white and blue striped column made of individual glass tubes, three identical copies were made by order of Friedrich Wilhelm IV . He gave one of his wife Elisabeth Ludovika , one of his cousin Marie of Prussia and her husband, the Bavarian King Maximilian II , the third copy to his sister, Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna .
description
The gilded cast zinc sculpture depicts a girl with a fluttering parrot sitting on her left shoulder . With her left hand the girl strokes the back of the parrot, which stretches forwards and downwards towards the grapes that the girl is feeding him with her right hand.
The approx. 550 cm high column consists of fifteen opaque- white and opaque-blue glass tubes, which are arranged alternately, creating a vertical, white-blue stripe pattern and thus the impression of fluting . The wall thickness of the individual tubes is approx. 4 mm. The individual tubes taper conically towards the top; their diameter is 35 mm at the lower edge and 28 mm at the upper end. The glass tubes were manufactured in two steps, in that they were both drawn and hand-blown.
Inside the column there is an elaborate support structure made of iron, zinc and glass, hidden by the tubes, on which the glass tubes are suspended tension-free so that the glass can withstand strong temperature fluctuations without damage.
The capital , artfully decorated with floral motifs , the base and the ornamental casing at the base of the column, which is used to conceal the inner structure, are also made of gold-plated cast zinc.
history
The column and sculpture were commissioned in 1853 by Friedrich Wilhelm IV. In three identical designs. According to the design of the court architect Ludwig Ferdinand Hesse , the Silesian Josephinen glassworks of Count Schaffgotsch in Schreiberhau in 1854 produced the columns.
The sculpture of the girl with a parrot was designed by Heinrich Berges and shown in the years 1839 and 1842 at the Berlin art exhibition of the Royal Academy of the Arts . The company of the Berlin silver and goldsmith Siméon Pierre Devaranne (1789-1859), who had specialized in the production of zinc sculptures, cast the statuette using the lost wax technique , gilded it and included the figure in its 1847 catalog.
Marlygarten in Potsdam
The sculpture in Potsdam's Marlygarten was a gift from Friedrich Wilhelm IV to his wife Elisabeth Ludovika , to whose Bavarian home the white and blue color of the glass tubes should refer. Elisabeth was also a great parrot lover and is said to have owned a parrot as a child. It is believed that the sculpture is supposed to represent the queen as a child. A reference to her is also suspected in the Flora Albert Wolffs in the Marlygarten. The sculpture and column were placed in the south-western part of the Marly Gardens.
Shortly after the Second World War, the column and the plastic fell from its base. The broken column was reconstructed from all available fragments and the sculpture was restored, as it showed corrosion in several places and extensive weathering of the gilding. If the plinth was underdimensioned , the stability was no longer given. To ensure this, the plastic was raised by approx. 5 mm by an aluminum frame screwed onto the pedestal. Since no detailed original images were available, during the restoration it was decided not to replace broken parts on the tail and on the left wing tip of the parrot. In May 2002, the glass column with the sculpture was inaugurated together with the restored southern part of the Marly Gardens.
Rose Island in Lake Starnberg
Friedrich Wilhelm IV gave a second version of this column in 1854 to the Bavarian royal couple Maximilian II and Marie of Prussia (1825–1889). Friedrich Wilhelm IV's wife Elisabeth Ludovica (1801–1873) was a sister of Ludwig I and thus an aunt of the young Bavarian king. The column was set up in the Rosarium on Rose Island in Lake Starnberg.
Maximilian II is said to have become so enthusiastic about the zinc casting technique because of the sculpture of the girl with a parrot that several zinc art foundries were built in Munich. Since there were no zinc deposits in Bavaria, the zinc required was imported from Upper Silesia, which allowed the zinc mines there to flourish. Among other things, Maximilian II had eight zinc figures made by the sculptor Friedrich Kirchmayer to decorate the Mint in Maximilianstrasse in 1862 . He also designed some of the figures in today's Museum of Five Continents as well as several Victorias and statues of King Maximilian I and Ludwig I for the Liberation Hall near Kelheim. The zinc sculpture of a lion at the entrance to the Lindau harbor also comes from this era.
The column stood in the center of the rosarium in front of the casino from 1854 to 1946. In 1946 it was dismantled, after which it was considered lost. In 1996 parts of the column were rediscovered in a storage room of the casino. The restoration of the column was made possible by a support group and the Franziska Günther Foundation. Almost 90% of the glass tubes were preserved, which together with a reconstruction of the missing fragments could be put back together to form a column. The sculpture of the girl with a parrot , however, remained lost, which is why it was recreated using the original sculpture from the Potsdam Marlygarten as a template.
The reconstructed column was put up again on May 23, 2001 in the center of the rose circle in front of the casino on the east side of the Rose Island.
Peterhof (Russia)
Friedrich Wilhelm IV gave a third identical pillar to his sister Charlotte of Prussia , who married Tsar Nicholas I in 1817 and lived in Russia as Tsarina Alexandra Fjodorovna. She initially had the sculpture set up at the Cottage Castle, the summer residence of the tsarist family in the Alexandria Park of Peterhof Palace , and later on the Tsarin's Island in Kolonistskiy Park (Колонистский парк) in Peterhof . A copy of the column that was destroyed in World War II was placed on Tsarina Island in 2004.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e f g h Otto Krätz: On the splendor of bygone days - The story of a statue on Starnberg's Rose Island. In: Culture & Technology. Magazine of the Deutsches Museum, 4/2010, pp. 36–41.
- ↑ Art Exhibition of the Royal Academy of Arts 1839, No. 974, 1842, No. 1094.
- ^ Carol A. Grissom: Zinc Sculpture in America, 1850-1950. Associated University Press, 2009, p. 629.
- ↑ Plastic cast zinc works based on drafts and models by proven builders, sculptors and draftsmen of our time; just like after ancient sculptures and older works of art and executed in the zinc foundry for arts and crafts of SP Devaranne . Booklet 1, Plate IV, No. 1066, Sachse, Berlin.
- ↑ Margret Dorothea Minkels : The founders of the Neues Museum: Friedrich Wilhelm IV. Of Prussia and Elisabeth of Baiern. 2012, p. 514
- ↑ Friedrich Wilhelm IV., Artist and king: for his 200th birthday: Exhibition from July 8th to September 3rd, 1995, New Orangery in the Park of Sanssouci . Fichter, January 1, 1995 ( books.google.com [accessed November 13, 2015]).
- ↑ Klaus Bruske: Where the soldier king grew herbs and vegetables. In: Berliner Zeitung. September 23, 1995, accessed November 18, 2015.
- ↑ a b Saskia Hüneke: White-blue glass column. In: Andreas Kitschke: Ludwig Ferdinand Hesse (1795–1876). Court architect under three Prussian kings. Munich / Berlin 2007, p. 327.
- ↑ D. Donecker: The restoration of the zinc cast sculpture "Girl with a Parrot". In: zinc casting. Workbook of the Bavarian State Office for Monument Preservation. Volume 98, 1999, pp. 165-168.
- ↑ Yearbook of the SPSG, 4, 2001/2002, p. 252.
- ↑ Saskia Hüneke: White-blue glass column. In: Andreas Kitschke: Ludwig Ferdinand Hesse (1795–1876). Court architect under three Prussian kings. Munich / Berlin 2007, p. 328. Cf. letter from Ludwig Ferdinand Hesse to Maximilian II of Bavaria dated October 26, 1854. Secret house archive at the Bavarian Main State Archives, Oberstmarstallstab No. 1073.
- ↑ a b On the garden history of the rose island. Press release of the Bavarian Palace Administration, July 2003, accessed on November 12, 2015
- ↑ a b c The glass column. on the homepage of the Roseninsel Starnberger See e. V., accessed on November 13, 2015
- ↑ Moscow German newspaper of July 23, 2008, accessed on November 18, 2015.