Peter on the sea
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| Peter on the sea |
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| Philipp Otto Runge , 1806/1807 |
| Oil on canvas |
| 116 × 157 cm |
| Hamburger Kunsthalle |
Peter on the Sea is one of the two great religious paintings by the German painter Philipp Otto Runge ; it is exhibited in the Kunsthalle Hamburg .
instigation
The former teacher Runges in Wolgast, Ludwig Gotthard Kosegarten , had started as pastor of Altenkirchen on Rügen at the beginning of the 19th century to give beach sermons for the herring fishermen. In July 1805, Kosegarten planned the construction of a chapel in order to be able to deliver these sermons regardless of the weather, and commissioned Runge to make an altarpiece.
At the beginning of December 1806, Runge explained to Goethe his picture idea for this commission:
“It is the appearance of Christ, as he says to Petro: you little believer, why do you doubt? It is in the moonlight, and since the whole thing is to be made in a very respectable size for the building, and is also the only one in it, some imposing phenomena, those of the waves and the moonlight, the falling of the ship, which with the nearest surroundings in be in harmony with nature. "
Since Kosegarten's order was later withdrawn for lack of money, the picture has remained unfinished.
description
The motif of "Jesus and the sinking Peter on the lake" goes back to Matthew 14 : 25–31 EU .
Runge depicts the scene on the Sea of Galilee in the dark of night. The left half of the picture shows the boat of the disciples in a stormy sea with flapping sails. Christ stands on the water. The area behind him is smooth and so draws the way he came. Christ seizes the sinking Peter and pulls him up to him.
Trivia
A copy of the picture made by the Stralsund painter Erich Kliefert hangs in the Vitter Chapel in Vitt on Rügen, the second is in the Altenkirchen parish church .
literature
- Frank Büttner: Philipp Otto Runge (Beck series; Vol. 2507). Beck Verlag, Munich 2010, ISBN 978-3-406-60092-0 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Norbert Buske : The church in Altenkirchen and the chapel in Vitt . Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, Berlin 1988, ISBN 3-374-00524-1 , p. 62.