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Modernism, Liberation and a New Way of Seeing

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Modernism, Liberation and a New Way of Seeing Diploma Lecture Series 2013 Revolution to Romanticism: European Art and Culture 1750-1850 Ruins and Romanticism Georgina Cole 3/4 July 2013 Lecture summary: Ruins are compelling ways of contemplating the passage of time, the rise and fall of civilisations, and destruction and decay. This lecture examines the fascination for ruins in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century and their representation in painting. It examines the various meanings of ruins in art and their changing depiction in response to the re-evaluation of time, history and experience generated by the French Revolution. Slide list: 1. Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein, Goethe in the Campagna, 1787, oil on canvas, Städel-Museum Frankfurt 2. The John Soane Museum, London 3. Johan Zoffany, Charles Townley’s Library, No. 7 Park Street, Westminster, 1781-83, oil on canvas, Towneley Hall Art Gallery and Museum 4. Francesco Piranesi after Louis Jean Desprez, The Gate of Herculaneum (called "L'entrée de Pompeii"); classical ruins with figures and animals, c.1758-1804 5. Left: Hubert Robert, Triumphal Arch at Orange, 1778 (detail); Joseph Gandy, The Bank of England in Ruins, 1830 6. Ruins of Umm al-Jimāl; vaults of a Roman basilica, 2nd century AD, Jordan 7. Zagorz Monastery, Poland 8. The ruins of Tanuf, Hajar Mountains, Oman 9. Roman ruins at Jerash, Jordan 10. Roman forum, Rome 11. Andrea Mantegna, St Sebastian, 1457-59, oil on poplar wood, 68 x 30 cm, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna 12. Nicolas Poussin, The Arcadian Shepherds, c.1650, oil on canvas, 85 x 121 cm, Louvre 13. Giovanni Paolo Pannini, Gallery of views of ancient Rome, 1758, oil on canvas, 2.31 x 3.03m 14. Giovanni Paolo Pannini, Gallery with views of modern Rome, 1758, oil on canvas, 2.31 x 3.03m *15. Hubert Robert, Roman Ruins, 1760, oil on canvas, Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, Massachusetts 16. Hubert Robert, Ruins with an obelisk in the distance, 1775, Pushkin Museum 17. Hubert Robert, Landscape with aqueduct, 1767, oil on canvas 18. Robert, The Fountains, 1787-88, oil on canvas, 255.3 x 221.2 cm, The Art Institute of Chicago; Robert, The Old Temple, 1787-88, oil on canvas, 255 x 223.2 cm, The Art Institute of Chicago 19. Robert, Fire at the Opera of the Palais-Royal, View from the Louvre, 1781, oil on canvas, Bibliotheque de l'Opera Garnier, Paris *20. Hubert Robert, Demolition of the Houses on the Bridge of Notre Dame, 1786, oil on canvas, 73x140 cm 21. Hubert Robert, The Bastille in the first days of its demolition, 1789, oil on canvas, 77 x 114 cm, Musée Carnavalet, Paris 22. Revolutionary calendar and decimal clock 23. Hubert Robert, Project for the Arrangement of the Grande Galerie of the Louvre, 1796, oil on canvas, 46 x 55 cm, Louvre Proudly sponsored by 24. Hubert Robert, Imaginary view of the Long Gallery of the Louvre, 1796, oil on canvas, 115 x 145 cm, Louvre; Hubert Robert, Imaginary view of the Long Gallery of the Louvre in ruins, 1796, oil on canvas, 114 x 146 cm, Musée du Louvre 25. Hubert Robert, The long gallery of the Louvre, 1796, oil on canvas, 115 x 145 cm, Louvre *26. Hubert Robert, Imaginary view of the Grande Galerie of the Louvre in ruins, 1796, oil on canvas, 114 x 146 cm, Musée du Louvre 27. Henry Fuseli, The Artist Moved by the Grandeur of Antique Fragments, 1778-79, red chalk on sepia wash, 41.5 x 35.5cm, Kunsthaus, Zürich 28. Joseph Gandy, Bank of England in ruins, 1830, watercolour 29. Joseph Gandy, Bank of England drawings: interior of Rotunda, 1798 30. Gandy, Rotunda of the Bank of England in ruins, 1830 31. Karl Blechen, Gothic Church in Ruins, 1826, oil on canvas, New Masters Gallery, Dresden 32. J.M.W. Turner, Tintern Abbey: West Front and Interior of Tintern Abbey, both c.1794, watercolour and graphite 33. JMW Turner, The Ruined Abbey of Marmoutier, near Tours, c.1826-8, Watercolour, gouache and pen and watercolour on paper, 140 x 192 mm 34. JMW Turner, Sunlight on Ruins, c.1820-30, Watercolour on paper, Tate 35. JMW Turner, Moonlight among Ruins, c.1820. Watercolour on paper, Tate Reference: Nina Dubin, Futures and Ruins: Eighteenth-Century Paris and the Art of Hubert Robert (Los Angeles: Getty Research Institute, 2010) Sophie Thomas, Romanticism and Visuality: Fragments, History, Spectacle (New York: Routledge, 2008) Stephen D. Borys, The Splendor of Ruins in French Landscape Painting, 1630-1800 (Ohio: Allem Memorial Art Museum, 2005) Ruins in British Romantic Art from Wilson to Turner (Nottingham Castle Museum, 1988) Lola Kantor-Kazovsky, Piranesi as Interpreter of Roman Architecture and the Origins of His Intellectual World (Florence: L. S. Olschki, 2006) Richard Wendorf, “Piranesi’s double ruin”, Eighteenth-Century Studies 34, no. 2 (2001): 161-180 Hubert Robert, Roman Ruins, 1760, oil on canvas, Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, Massachusetts Hubert Robert, Demolition of the Houses on the Bridge of Notre Dame, 1786, oil on canvas, 73 x 140 cm Hubert Robert, Imaginary view of the Grande Galerie of the Louvre in ruins, 1796, oil on canvas, 114 x 146 cm, Musée du Louvre Joseph Gandy, Bank of England in ruins, 1830, watercolour, John Soane Museum JMW Turner, Interior of Tintern Abbey, c.1794, watercolour and graphite, Tate .
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