Michael Hönel

Michael Hönel (* around 1590 in Pirna , † around 1653 in Judenburg ) was a German sculptor .

Appreciation

Hönel is one of the outstanding sculptors in today's Austria and Germany in the first half of the 17th century. He is a master of the early baroque , who drew from the formal language of mannerism and, taking up the baroque, created images of high quality and artistic density. Hönel's altarpieces underline the efforts of the Counter-Reformation in their figurative expressiveness in a pictorial way .

biography

Michael Hönel was born around 1590 in Pirna in the margraviate of Meißen . It was there that he received his artistic training. Hönel could have learned from Michael Schwenke († 1610) or from his brother David († 1620) or from Lorenz Hönigk († 1624) or in Dresden from Christoph Walther IV († 1626).

High and side altars in the Gurk Cathedral

In 1624 Hönel received his first smaller orders from the Gurk Cathedral Monastery . In the following year he received the order for a new high altar from St. Paul Abbot Hieronymus Marchstaller , which he completed by 1628. Already on May 30, 1629 Hönel was given the task of producing a new cross altar and a prelate's chair for the St. Paul Abbey in Lavanttal . Hönel started the large-scale high altar for the Gurk Cathedral while working on the St. Paul high altar. Apparently, the cathedral provost of Gurk was so impressed by the St. Paul altar, which was being completed, that on October 28, 1626 he signed a contract with Hönel, who is named in the contract as a " resident " in Gurk, for the new high altar of the Gurk cathedral . The Gurk high altar was not completed, as contractually agreed, at Pentecost 1630, but only in 1632. On April 30 of this year, the last payment for the altarpiece was made to Hönel.

Gurker Verbruederungsbuch 3

Jakob Deinsperger, Canon of the Collegiate Chapter of Strasbourg signed a contract with Hönel on August 24, 1632 for a new altar for the Hospital Church of the Holy Spirit in Strasbourg. According to the provisions of the contract, the new altar should fill the entire altar of the church and be built on three floors: at the bottom the tabernacle, above the altar shrine, the painted picture of which should be changed depending on the time of the festival. The altar should also have two wings and the statues of St. Rochus and St. Sebastian. Above the gable part with the depiction of St. Spirit and the English Greeting or Annunciation. The top floor should have smaller figures of St. Martinus and St. Elisabeth to be flanked.

1633–1636 Hönel worked on the Hercules statue of the Lindwurmbrunnen on the Neuer Platz in Klagenfurt am Wörthersee . The overall appearance of the Lindwurmbrunnen today goes back to designs by Hönel; on June 3, 1634, he submitted a new fountain design to those who were appointed to the landscape. According to this, the head of the Lindwurm, created by Ulrich Vogelsang around 1590, was directed not to the north, but to the east. On June 2, 1636, the fountain was completed.

The Lindwurm Fountain in Klagenfurt

In the winter of 1637 to 1638, Hönel carved the statues and figures for the two altars in the side apses of Gurk Cathedral. The setting of the two side altars was not made until 1653/54 together with the setting of the high altar. In the next year, 1639, Hönel moved his residence to St. Lambrecht . On January 2, 1639, the new abbot Benedikt Pierin of the Benedictine monastery of St. Lambrecht had signed the "Bildsnizer von Gurgg" for his monastery. According to a contract dated June 9, 1639, he made an altar with a depiction of St. John the Evangelist, which was probably set up in the abbey church. At the same time he is working on the statues, figures and reliefs of St. Side altars consecrated to Emmeran in the St. Lambrecht Collegiate Church. In 1640/41 Hönel made the figures of the 4 church fathers on the parapet of the west gallery of the collegiate church. In 1641, Hönel carved two more crucifixes for the pen. On June 6, 1639, he issues the prelate a receipt confirming that he has been paid in full for all the work he has done in St. Lambrecht. He signs: "Michel Hönell sculptor from Pirna in Meißen born mp"

Abbot Benedikt Pierin also commissioned Hönel to create a high altar for the pilgrimage church in Mariazell . In June 1641, Hönel relocated his workshop to Aflenz . He worked there on the Mariazell high altar together with his journeyman Sebastian Maß. The altar was replaced in 1704 by the current high altar, which was built according to a design by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, and transferred to the nearby St. Sebastian Church, where it still stands today. It is not known when the altar was consecrated. Hönel has certainly worked on this enormous work for several years. Today it is in a reduced form and changed around 1730 in the St. Sebastian's Church, built by Domenico Sciassia , the last stop for the pilgrims coming from Vienna before the pilgrimage destination of the pilgrimage church in Mariazell. Like almost all high altars in collegiate and Marian pilgrimage churches from the first half of the 17th century, it is a Marian altar. It is unclear whether the original altarpiece represented a coronation of Mary. With the original arrangement, a sculptural group in the center would also be conceivable. In 1642, Hönel carved a larger-than-life statue of Our Lady, which is now in the vestibule of the collegiate church of St. Lambrecht. Possibly it was originally intended for a group of figures in the center of the Mariazell high altar. In 1651, Hönel can be traced to have a workshop in Judenburg . It appears in the tax list there and appears in it for the last time in 1653.

Works (selection)

• 1624 First orders from the cathedral monastery of Gurk: coat of arms and an altar of St. Hemma (cf. Ginhart p. 171)
• 1625–1628: High altar for St. Paul Abbey in Lavanttal. The high altar was probably in place in St. Paul until 1705. Abbot Albertus Reichart then had it removed and a late baroque altar erected. The remains of this high altar are preserved in the branch church on the Josefsberg south-east above St. Paul. They are the figures of St. Johannes dT with the cross in his right hand, the book in his left and the lamb at his feet and St. Johannes Ev., Who looks up in faith with confidence, raises his right hand in blessing and holds a chalice in his left hand, the powerfully animated figure of the bearded St. Joachim and St. Jerome as a penitent hermit. He is bald, with a long beard, and only sparsely clad with a scarf thrown over his right shoulder and a scarf pulled up to his waist in his right hand. The left hand holds a large stone, the right the book with the skull on it. The lion lies at his feet.
• 1628: Delivery of 3 crucifixes and 2 angels and a picture of St. Jakobi to the parish church of Deutschgriff in the Gurktal (no longer preserved).
• 1629: Cross altar and prelate's chair for St. Paul Abbey in Lavanttal. Like Hönel's high altar, the cross altar was probably in place until 1705 when it was demolished by the redesign of the collegiate church under Abbot Albertus Reichart. In the kneeling Maria Magdalena, who holds a cross in her hands and looks up to the Savior in deep painful humility, a remnant of Hönel's cross altar has been preserved in the branch church on the Josefsberg, southeast above St. Paul.
• 1626–1632: High altar for the Gurk Cathedral. The Gurk high altar is divided into a basement and two upper floors on the sides, which leave a wide and deep niche in the middle. In this niche you can see the main group attached, the heavenly floating Mary, who has left the dismayed apostles below and is swarmed by angels playing music. The Trinity is waiting upstairs, breaking through the cranked beams on the second floor. Flaming shell pieces and a dance of angel heads frame God the Father, Son and the dove of St. Mind. The three archangels crown the altar with many statues and figures at the top of the vault. The four evangelists stand next to the sacrificial passage portals in the basement, above them the giant statues of the four church fathers rise in solemn majesty, and in the niches behind them are Emperor Heinrich II on the left, Count Wilhelm, the consort of St. Hemma, who donated the Gurk Cathedral. 160 figurative works have been counted on the altar. In terms of number and artistic wealth, this surpasses anything that has ever existed.
• 1632: Altar for the hospital church in Strasbourg . Of the architecture of its altar, which according to the description reveals the scheme of the late Gothic winged altar, nothing has survived. Today the back of the choir is adorned with a rococo frame of the descent of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost, which dates from around 1720. From the former carving of the master Hönel, however, four carved figures have survived, two of them on the Altarmensa, which depicts St. Bishop Martin and St. Representing Elisabeth as well as the two larger sculptures of St. Rochus and St. Sebastian standing on the side on consoles.

• 1633–1636: Hercules statue for the Lindwurmbrunnen in Klagenfurt, plans and execution of the redesign of the well, in which the Lindwurm's head was directed from north to east.
• 1637–1638: Statues and figures for the two altars in the side apses of Gurk Cathedral. Hönel created two life-size bishop statues flanking each side for the side altars of Gurk Cathedral; Martin and St. Nikolaus, on the right at the Petrus altar St. Rupert and St. Virgil. They are worthy, powerful figures that go well with the church fathers' statues on the high altar. At the top of the tower, on the left, the figures of St. Vincent and St. Lorenz, on the right the figures of St. Peter and Paul. Between the figures, exquisitely carved angels hold a flaming Sacred Heart monogram on the left and a Vera Ikon on the right .
• 1639: Altar with representation of St. John the Evangelist for the castle church Stift St. Lambrecht (the altar work is no longer preserved, cf. Ginhart, p. 187).
• 1639: Statues, figures and reliefs for the St. Emmeran's altar in St. Lambrecht's collegiate church. The altar structure, created by Christoph Paumgartner , shows, in memory of the shrine guardians of the late Gothic winged altars, on the side outside the twisted columns of the main floor decorated with vine leaves, the statues of St. Bishops Boniface and Blasius. Instead of the usual large altarpiece, Hönel carved the multi-figure relief depicting the torture of St. Emmeram. The slightly smaller relief on the upper floor depicts the beheading of St. Placidus and his companions. On the side are the statues of St. Stephan and Lorenz and outside the columns the statues of St. Johannes Evangelist and Georg. As a crown, the statuettes of the Sorrowful Mary tower above the blown gable, flanked by St. Catherine and St. Barbara up. When executing the figures, Hönel was contractually bound to take Paumgartner's already completed St. Benedict altar into consideration. The client Abbot Benedikt Pierin attached great importance to "that both these altars are kept at the same time." What is missing here is the gripping impetus, the inner glow behind the outer calm that makes the Gurk high altar so magnificent. Nevertheless, it is precisely in the two large reliefs that Hönel's mastery is revealed both in the composition of such multi-figured scenes and in the precise treatment of all details.
• 1640/41: Figures of the 4 church fathers for the parapet of the west gallery of the St. Lambrecht collegiate church. They are simplified repetitions of the statues of these saints on the Gurk high altar. The fine-stranded pleating of the clothes stands in effective contrast to the expressive heads of these weighty men.
• 1641: 2 crucifixes for St. Lambrecht Abbey (no longer preserved today? Cf. Ginhart, p. 189).
• from 1641: Work for the Mariazell high altar. The altar was replaced in 1704 by the current high altar, which was built according to a design by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, and transferred to the nearby St. Sebastian's Church. It is not known when the altar was consecrated. Hönel certainly worked on this enormous work for several years. Now there is a large painting in the middle of the main and upper floors, the Assumption of Mary and the Coronation of Our Lady. Originally, instead of the pictures, the altar had perhaps the same high reliefs as Hönel had effectively attached to these places on the St. Emmerams Altar in St. Lambrecht. The columns flanking the main picture are decorated with such masterful small-figure medallions and each time they are inscribed in Latin. The left column shows the Annunciation, the Visitation, the birth of Christ, the offering and the discovery in the temple from top to bottom; on the right column also Christ on the Mount of Olives, the flagellation, crowning of thorns, carrying the cross and crucifixion. In front of the outer columns, which are somewhat set back and wrapped with vines, are the monumental statues of St. Lambrecht and St. Benedict . Lambrecht (Lambert) is given as Bishop of Maastricht in full regalia and holds the bishop's staff in his left hand and the lance with which he was murdered in his right. St. Benedict carries the finely pleated flake with the wide sleeves, holds the staff in his left hand and carries the book with the broken cup on it in his right. A tall MItra stands at his feet. As always with Hönel, the heads of the two figures and their hands are full of expression and characterization.
• 1642: Statue of Maria Immaculata , today in the vestibule of the collegiate church of St. Lambrecht. Possibly it was originally intended for a group of figures in the center of the Mariazell high altar. This crowned Mother of the Lord stands on the crescent moon and globe, holds the blessing Child Jesus in her right arm, the scepter in her left arm and tramples the snake with her feet. A masterful, deeply felt and gripping work in the spirit of the Counter Reformation .
• 1651: Statues on the high altar of the Maria Buch pilgrimage church with the assistance of Sebastian Mass

literature

• Karl Ginhart : Michael Hönel and his relationship with the St. Paul i. L. In: Carinthia 1. 149, 1959, ISSN  0008-6606 , pp. 464-510.
• Jakob Obersteiner: The former high altar by Michael Hönel in the hospital church of Strasbourg in the Gurktale. In: Carinthia 1. 158, 1968, pp. 602-604.
• Benedikt Plank: History of the St. Lambrecht Abbey. Festschrift for the 900th anniversary of the death of the founder Markward von Eppenstein. 1076-1976. St. Lambrecht Abbey, St. Lambrecht 1978.
• Ingeborg Schemper-Sparholz: The high altar of JB Fischer von Erlach in Mariazell and its completion under Emperor Karl IV. In: Basilica Mariazell, Benedkitiner-Superiorat (ed.): The Mariazeller high altar. Landesverlag, St. Pölten et al. 2001, ISBN 3-85214-763-8 , pp. 54–78.

Web links

Commons : Michael Hönel  - Collection of images, videos and audio files