Association for the dissemination of religious images

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The Association for the Dissemination of Religious Images was an association for the production and distribution of small devotional images with Christian motifs. The Kunstverein , founded in Cologne in 1841 , was based in Düsseldorf .

history

Archbishop Johannes von Geissel , patron of the association, around 1864

The association, whose main concern was "to disseminate religious images by established older and newer artists through steel engraving in all classes of the public", was founded in 1841 under the patronage of the coadjutor and later Archbishop of Cologne, Johannes von Geissel . With the spread of popular religious graphics, the founders and members of the association not only strived to strengthen popular piety by using the then ultra-modern reproduction technique of steel engraving , which made it possible to produce high editions at a low price. The aim was also to create general taste through the artistic quality of the small devotional picture, which was widely used as a memorial sheet and insert in prayer books and as illustrative material and hardworking paper in Christian religious instruction . Contemporary criticism shows that the latter in particular was an important goal. The historical-political papers for Catholic Germany , which were published in Munich in 1843 by Georg Phillips and Guido Görres , wrote about the then conventional images of saints and devotional images and the purpose now pursued with the founding of the association:

“With very few exceptions, these pictures are hideously bad, sometimes without any taste, often in the most repulsive Roccocostyle, angels with allong wigs, the saints distorted into true grimaces, so that such pictures are by no means suitable for the human soul to instill a pleasant memory of the saints they are meant to represent. And yet the ones made so far in Germany are still by far the best; from Italy the most tasteless, from France the sweetest, most affecting pictures of the species are brought to us. By founding such an association, which consists of artists and promoters of Christian art, an urgent need is to be remedied in every respect. "

Joseph von Keller (photo by Matthias Radermacher ), professor of copperplate engraving at the Düsseldorf Art Academy, as a member of the association's board of directors, had a decisive influence on the selection of motifs.

Membership in the association cost two thalers a year . In return, they received at least sixty prints a year and the right to order reprints for seven pfennigs each. Some of the artists who provided the association with their models, among them mainly Nazarenes from the Düsseldorf School of Painting , are: Carl Clasen , Franz Heinrich Commans , Ernst Deger , Fritz Dinger , Wilhelm Dürr the Elder , Anton Eitel , Albrecht von Felsburg , Gebhard Flatz , Carl Ernst Forberg , Joseph von Führich , Eduard Geselschap , Adam Goswin Glaser , Godefried Guffens , Ludwig Heitland , Franz Ittenbach , Joseph von Keller , Josef Kohlschein , Friedrich Ludy , Franz Paul Massau , Theodor Mintrop , Peter Joseph Molitor , Andreas Müller , Karl Müller , Heinrich Nüsser , Anna Maria von Oer , Carl Wilhelm Overbeck , Friedrich Overbeck , Carl Gottlieb Peschel , Eduard Rittinghaus , Wilhelm von Schadow , Johann von Schraudolph , Alexander Maximilian Seitz , Joseph Anton Settegast , Rudolf Stang , Xaver Steifensand , Edward von Steinle and Philipp Veit . Wilhelm von Schadow, the director of the Düsseldorf Art Academy , saw the association's task as “creating beautiful, worthy images of saints by the thousands, and suppressing the taste of the braid.” Schadow, who had endeavored to develop religious art since he started working on the Rhine To promote the academy, the association was given the opportunity to implement the beliefs of the late Nazarene art concept and school represented by it broadly and to make them known far beyond the Rhineland.

Joseph von Keller, who was professor of copperplate engraving at the Düsseldorf Academy, played a special role on the board of the association, as it was his responsibility to supervise and direct the selection of the objects to be engraved from older paintings by famous masters or from the works of Contemporary artists. The Schulgen-Bettendorff copper printing works in Bonn , and from 1849 onwards in Düsseldorf, with its excellent technical prerequisites, came into play as the production company. The French market was supplied through the Paris branch Schulgen & Schwan founded in 1854 .

The association was highly regarded across denominations and internationally. Its members and subscribers came mainly from Germany, Austria, France, Belgium and Italy. The Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm IV. Praised his achievements and participated with five shares. In 1844 he was recommended by the Archbishop's General Vicariate in Cologne. And with a letter of January 4, 1855, Pope Pius IX was delighted . that the association "has spread almost innumerable images of saints not only in Germany, but also in France, Belgium, Great Britain and other parts of the world among the faithful." In the following year, the association announced that the Austrian Empress Elisabeth , her mother-in-law, Archduchess Sophie , and the widowed Empress Karoline Auguste had become members of the association. In the United States, the magazine Hours at Home , published by Charles Scribner & Co. , which was ambitious in the field of religious art, praised the work of the association in 1865.

Despite the criticism that the small devotional pictures received from art critics in the middle of the 19th century, they enjoyed great popularity well into the 20th century. The religious art of the Nazarenes was able to reach audiences well into the age of industrialization in the form of the “little pictures of saints”, which were easy to understand due to their simple compositions. Thanks to the content and artistic simplification of the Nazarene ideals, “Nazarenism” developed into a church style. Thanks to its products, the Düsseldorf Association for the Dissemination of Religious Images played a significant role in this development, as it managed to sell around seven million copies of 251 images worldwide in the first 25 years of its existence. 716 steel engravings were made by 1905, 737 engravings by the 1940s. A list of the engravings published up to 1935 can be found in the association's 1935 copper engraving catalog.

gallery

literature

  • Edmund Schwickert: The artists of the association for the distribution of religious images in Düsseldorf. Foesser, Frankfurt am Main 1895.
  • Ludwig Gierse: The small devotional picture and the association for the distribution of religious images in Düsseldorf . In: Archbishop's Diocesan Museum Cologne (ed.): Religious graphics from the time of the Cologne cathedral building 1842–1880. Cologne 1980, pp. 21-28.
  • Ludwig Gierse: The beginnings of the association for the distribution of religious images in Düsseldorf. In: Düsseldorfer Jahrbuch , Volume 64 (1993), pp. 155–162.
  • Peter Mayr: The association for the dissemination of religious images in Düsseldorf. In: Max Tauch (editor): Small pictures - big impact. Clemens-Sels-Museum Neuss, Neuss 1997, pp. 33–44.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Cordula Grewe: Nazarene or not? Reflections on the religious in the Düsseldorf painting school . In: Bettina Baumgärtel (Hrsg.): The Düsseldorf School of Painting and its international impact 1819–1918 . Michael Imhof Verlag, Petersberg 2011, ISBN 978-3-86568-702-9 , Volume 1, p. 84
  2. ↑ See for example Friedrich Schäffer: Association for the distribution of religious images . In: Allgemeine Schulzeitung , 19 (1842), Heft 191, p. 1558 ( digitized version )
  3. ↑ Historical-political papers for Catholic Germany , year 1843, second volume, Munich 1843, p. 199. ( Google Books )
  4. ↑ Cordula Grewe: "Create beautiful, worthy images of saints and completely suppress the taste of braids in this region" - On Wilhelm von Schadow's depictions of saints . In: Neusser Jahrbuch , 1997, p. 16 f.
  5. ^ The Association for the Dissemination of Religious Images in Düsseldorf. In: Friedrich Baudri (Ed.): Organ for Christian Art, Volume 1, No. 4 from August 15, 1851, p. 26. ( Google Books )
  6. ↑ Henning Pahl: The image as a popularization medium in the service of religion. In: Carsten Kretschmann (ed.): Knowledge popularization. Concepts of knowledge diffusion in transition. Akademie Verlag, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-05-003770-9 , p. 271 f. ( Google Books )
  7. ↑ Martinus Huber (editor): Katholische Blätter aus Tirol, Volume XIV, second volume, supplement to No. 25, Verlag der Wagner'schen Buchhandlung, Innsbruck 1856, p. 595. ( Google Books )
  8. ^ JM Sherwood: German Painters of the Modern School: The Academy of Dusseldorf. In: Hours at Home: Popular Monthly devoted to Religious and Useful Literature . Charles Scribner & Co., New York City 1865, Volume 1, No. 4, p. 303 - See Cordula Grewe, pp. 78, 84 and footnote 37
  9. ↑ Frank Büttner, Andrea Gottdang: Introduction to Iconography. Ways to interpret image content. Verlag CH Beck, Munich 2006, ISBN 978-3-406-53579-6 , p. 42 ( Google Books )
  10. ↑ Dominique Lerch: Nazarenic devotional pictures from the AW Schulgen publishing house in Paris. In: Konrad Vanja. Detlef Lorenz, Alberto Milano, Sigrid Nagy, Irene Ziehe (eds.): Working group image printing paper. Conference proceedings Berlin 2012. Waxmann Verlag, Münster 2013, ISBN 978-3-8309-7905-0 , Volume 17. S. 35. ( Google Books )
  11. ^ Association for the distribution of religious images: copper engraving catalog of the association for the distribution of religious images . Schwann, Düsseldorf 1935, 72 pp.