Shop Talk. A Conversation about the Augsburg Pictures of the Months
4 September 2024
Four large-scale paintings from the 16th century, the so-called Augsburg Pictures of the Months, are highlights of the DHM collections. They were favourites of visitors to the Permanent Exhibition, which has been closed for renovation since 2021, and they will be displayed again when the exhibition is reopened in the Zeughaus. The picture of the months “January – February – March” is currently the centrepiece of the children’s exhibition “Dive into the Picture! Time Travel for Kids”. What do these paintings tell us about their epoch and to what degree are they historical sources? What do we know today thanks to the extensive restoration work on the pictures? And what new cultural-historical questions has this work raised?
Brigitte Reineke, head of DHM’s Central Documentation and Provenance Research, Mathias Lang from the Department of Conservation and Restoration, and Ulinka Rublack, historian of the Early Modern Age at Cambridge University, recently came together in the DHM’s restoration workshop to talk about the Augsburg Pictures of the Months. Stephanie Neuner, head of the Permanent Exhibition Department, conducted the interview. The text was first published in German in the 6th issue of the magazine of the Deutsches Historisches Museum “Historical Judgement”.
“Rolled-up Canvases and Salami”, Ulinka Rublack
Stephanie Neuner: One of the four so-called Augsburg Pictures of the Months is lying on the floor in front of us. It is the picture of the months April, May, June. It has been removed from its old stretcher frame. Why?
Mathias Lang: All of the Augsburg Pictures of the Months are getting new decorative Renaissance-style frames for the upcoming Permanent Exhibition. We think that they were originally in a townhouse or the country estate of a patrician family and built into the wall panelling. They were probably cut out later, which explains why the pictures have slightly different formats. When they were remounted, the painted canvas was simply folded over the new clamping frame. We have now decided on the unusual step of bringing all of the pictures to the same height. To do this, we had to add canvas to the original paintings and complete them by retouching them.
Neuner: Does the back of the painting reveal anything about its history? Are there impressions or inscriptions?
Brigitte Reineke: The reverse sides can often reveal something about the pictures and their history and in the best case about their previous owners. The back side here did not disclose much. We don’t know who commissioned them. We are not looking at the original canvas, but at the canvas of a doubling from the 19th century, in other words a supplemented back side of the painting. There are theories about the provenance, whereby the painting cycle was belonged to the Wittelsbacher dynasty in the late 19th century and showed up again in the mid-20th century in a castle near Regensburg. In any case, the pictures came to the DHM through the art market in 1990 after having travelled around quite a lot.
Lang: When the pictures arrived at the DHM, they were in very poor condition. They were seriously damaged and had been worked over several times and unprofessionally patched up and overpainted. The surface was severely damaged, probably through improper treatment, perhaps with scouring powder and a scrubbing brush, no doubt with the aim of removing a high-protein varnish that had turned brown. In the course of time the large-format works were probably bent and folded for transport and storage. This can still be seen in the defects in the painting. The seamlines in the middle show that the support, or painting surface, consisted of two panels of material.
Neuner: The Augsburg Pictures of the Months are painted on canvas. The original canvas plays an important role in the dating of the painting. Why?
Lang: We know hardly any painting north of the Alps on grounded canvas from the first half of the 16th century. The support usually consisted of wood. An exceptional case are the large wings of the organ on painted canvas in the St. Anna Church in Augsburg, attributed to Jörg Breu the Elder. In addition, the grey imprimatur used in the Augsburg Pictures of the Months first appeared in the German regions at the end of the 16th century. This allows for the possibility that the paintings were made in the second half of the 16th century.
Neuner: Nevertheless, we find paintings on canvas earlier in the 16th century, particularly in relation to patrician life, isn’t it so?
Ulinka Rublack: Canvas was used especially for ephemeral and representative pictures that didn’t necessarily need to last a long time, for example for depictions of processions or tournaments. It is also well-known that Lucas Cranach the Elder painted on canvas. That’s why the theory that there were hardly any paintings on canvas north of the Alps in the first half of the 16th century seems to me to be a bit too categoric.
Lang: Of course canvas was used earlier, starting with the so-called cloth painting, but in this case the canvas was not grounded. In the scientific examination of paintings, for example, we find observations about painting techniques using certain materials that can point the way to a dating. In the Augsburg Pictures of the Months, for example, we find remains of late Gothic painting techniques but at the same time a quick and “economic” execution that is unusual for the first half of the 16th century and usually first appears at the end of the 16th century.
Neuner: The imperial city of Augsburg is considered an important art city of the Renaissance. Did important artworks and artists find their way to Augsburg from other European countries?
Rublack: Due to the Imperial Diets, Augsburg was an international city. In 1548 Tizian painted the famous portrait of Charles the Fifth on canvas there. In my studies I have also dealt with Hans Fugger – he died in 1598 – and he received deliveries from his agents in Venice, such as rolled-up Flemish paintings on canvas, together with other things like salami.
“An absolute craving for new colours”, Ulinka Rublack
Neuner: It is above all the many individual scenes in the Pictures of the Months that captivate us. You have reconstructed numerous details. How did you go about it?
Lang: To better understand the images we used glass roundel designs (Scheibenrisse) by Breu and contemporary depictions to reconstruct relevant motifs that had been rudimentarily preserved. For example, there were only parts of the bird on the arm of the falconer remaining or of the man holding one of the first handguns on the edge of an artificial lake. There were only starkly damaged remains of the figure in the depiction. A tiny red fleck was all that was left of the ignition fire, with a bit of white next to it. This was the powder smoke that occurred through the ignition – we found this out together with the head of our militaria collection. Altogether, the scenes on all four paintings are of very different quality and vouch for the fact that different painters from a workshop were involved.
Neuner: The picture is referred to as a “hidden object picture” due to the many individual figures and scenes. The term suggests a parity of the depictions, which takes us on a wrong track, however, because there are also compositions in the picture that clearly tell us who or what is at the centre of attention.
Reineke: Not everything is given equal importance. The pictures were presented at eye-level, and it is good and entertaining to discover all these details. But there are clearly compositions here with a distinct foreground, middle ground and background. The painting drew on the tradition of pictures of the months that have scenic representations of typical agricultural activities during the months of an annual cycle. Of course the patricians of Augsburg are in the foreground. They have immortalised themselves here.
Neuner: The people who commissioned the pictures used the traditional form of pictures of the months to depict their own economic and political power. Can the pictures of the months be seen as a comparable media of representation? Say, for example, Matthias Schwarz’s Book of Clothes, which you, Frau Rublack, have closely studied, or the famous friendship albums, like that of the art agent Philipp Hainhofer.
Rublack: You can surely see it that way. But the friendship albums also had the purpose of documenting social networks – and once again power.
Neuner: Here the patricians document their power through their outward appearance, their clothing and jewellery. The details are not as skilfully depicted here as in the portraits by Lucas Cranach the Elder or Hans Burgkmair the Elder. But to what extent do the Augsburg pictures nevertheless reflect the fashion, materiality and colourfulness of the 16th century?
Rublack: Alongside the quality of the materials, such as velvet as material for the summer or fur for the winter, it was also about the volumes of the sleeves and skirts that showed how much of the expensive materials, which were largely imported goods, one could afford. That can clearly be seen in the picture. The quality of the materials is also suggested, evident in the shimmering colours of silk. What determines the whole 16th century is the absolute sensitivity for new shades of colour and the craving for them. Hans Fugger, for example, searched for new colour tones through Danish agents. And for those belonging to the social elite, it was always possible to re-dye the materials if they had faded. It is quite possible that that the green shown here was the fashion hit of the time. Also the pink – the absolute fashion for men in the first decade of the 16th century as can be seen in many pictures of the time. In Dürer’s Jabach altar, for example, there is this brilliant pink coat that the artist is wearing in his self-portrait. I’m currently experimenting with a dyer to see whether such pink shades can be achieved using brazilwood.
Neuner: We see a lot of yellow or golden yellow clothing. Why do you think that is?
Rublack: Yellow is used in the pictures above all as a painterly element. The eyes are drawn by it to details in the background. That doesn’t mean that people didn’t wear yellow. If that were the case, it would not be plausible to have yellow clothing in the picture. Yellow was related to natural philosophies and views of life. With the Italian philosopher Marsilio Ficino, there is the idea that one dresses in gold in order to attract the energy of the sun to oneself. Gold thread was a component of clothing and headgear. The gold cap of Jakob Fugger, which can be seen in the Pictures of the Months, became downright iconic.
Neuner: The clothes of the craftsmen or market women in the winter picture have the same colourfulness as that of the patrician men and women. What about the colour of fashion of the time in general, were colourful clothes common outside of the upper classes?
Rublack: Writing about contemporary painting at the end of the 16th century, Giovanni Paolo Lomazzo said that the pictures suggested that all people wore only silk. This was of course wrong. High-quality material and elaborately made clothing were expensive. For a few wealthy residents in the cities it was nevertheless possible to dress in colourful clothing and decorate themselves with accessories like belts and bags, as can be seen in many of the pictures. For example, there were colourful silk ribbons that were woven into the hair buns alongside artificial hair pieces. That was not expensive and looked good. Actually, you would almost expect to find a greater palette of colours that would identify the social differences more clearly. For me that is an indication that a bit of fantasy is also involved in the representations in the Pictures of the Months. On the other hand, it is positive to note that through the kind of representations and colourfulness the pictures create an atmosphere of joy and in this way underscore the participation of all people in society as a whole.
“A modern time which women claimed for themselves”, Ulinka Rublack
Reineke: In the square you see a conspicuous retinue of women who more or less form a frame around a patrician on horseback. Two of the women wear strapless dresses, without a linen shirt. Unlike them, the other women are wearing long coats and a traditional bonnet.
Rublack: This scene does, in fact, stand out completely. Women traditionally wore high-necked clothing. Basically, the scene points to prostitution. In these parts, women wore overshirts and their shoulders and neck were covered, not open like the two in the picture. Or the picture refers to foreign visitors. Contrary to women in the imperial cities, English women did not cover their décolleté. When Anne of Cleves arrived in England as a bride with her neck and shoulders covered, Henry the Eighth found it entirely unattractive. Another thing you can see in general in the Pictures of the Months is that at that time it was normal for women to show hair – even though hair visibility always meant a certain social challenge. Here we already have to do with a modern time which women claimed for themselves.
Neuner: The Augsburg Pictures of the Months show an idyllic society. War or religious conflicts do not play a role. Was the message of the pictures also: We patricians govern well, we have our conflicts under control?
Rublack: Social harmony is in fact shown here. It is part of the pictorial programme that social exclusion is not displayed here. Street vendors and people with common occupations like spinning or selling wood are depicted next to patricians in the forefront of the pictures. It is about the idea of what an ideal city could be.
Neuner: The pictures portray a golden age and anything but a crisis-ridden society. Even though we know how idealised the depictions are, is the basic feeling the pictures convey historically sound? Were 16th century contemporaries borne up by a positive attitude towards life despite the many upheavals?
Rublack: It is a time of awakening, of looking to the future for the elite classes that identified with the internationalism of the empire. It is not only about crisis. The Augsburg Pictures of the Months transport a forward-looking attitude towards life amidst the everyday existence of the imperial city.