Goethe as collector 3

J.H. Tischbein der Ältere, Gamblers at the "Ridotto"

Nietzsche: “It is the work of the artist that invents the man who created it. ‘Great men’ as they are venerated are subsequent pieces of minor fiction.”

Some additional thoughts re Goethe as a collector and about Der Sammler und die Seinigen. The DKV commentary notes that Goethe’s journey to Italy, with the opportunity to view works of classical sculpture, was prefaced already by his father’s journey there as a young man. In that sense, Goethe and his father, like the English cognoscenti in Ruth Guilding's book, were representatives of a class of men who found inspiration in Italy.

Goethe reports in Dichtung und Wahrheit of his father’s patronage of local artists whose works hung on the walls of the home in Frankfurt. In this connection, Ernst Beutler mentions in his commentary (Gedenkausgabe, vol. 13) that there were few public galleries in German lands: in Dusseldorf, Dresden, Kassel, Pommersfelden. Even in Leipzig and Frankfurt, one’s access to paintings required a visit to the many private galleries, as the one depicted in Der Sammler. Interestingly, these private collections, including that of Goethe’s father, were  listed among the notable sights in travel guides.

What struck me in particular about Der Sammler was the emphasis on taste. The “rubrics” that I mentioned in the first post were a summation of what the “small academy” had perceived among the reactions of visitors to the collection. In the Fourth Letter, the collector wrote of the spontaneity of such reactions: “Kunstwerke reizen auf und vor ihnen genirt sich niemand, niemand zweifelt an seiner eignen Empfindung, und daran hat man nicht Unrecht, niemand zweifelt an der Richtigkeit seines Urteils …” Each of the one-sided tendencies of viewers and of collectors speaks to individual subjectivity. Goethe did not want to leave the matter there. Our appreciation of art should go beyond our own subjective reaction. It was necessary to leave aside the “insouciant Woosterism” of the English cognoscenti of whom Guilding writes. To do so clearly required study.

The DKV commentary notes that though Goethe saw quite a bit of art in his life, his viewing experience was actually quite limited. He even avoided informing himself of the large “Academy” exhibitions in Berlin and Dresden, while the exhibitions he curated in Weimar lacked an overview of the larger German artistic production of his time. In Goethe’s defense, however, I would say that it is not necessary to know all the instances in order to get an impression of what all the instances “express.”

Giulio Romano, The Fall of the Giants (1532-34)

For instance, I have not read a newspaper for years (or, similarly, followed the news on the internet), for which I am often criticized by friends. “How do you know what is going on in the world?” they ask. In general, however, I am quite aware what is going on in the world, simply by a quick glance at the headlines, but more important is an assessment of what the news "means." For instance, Turkey shot down a Russian jet the other day; but Russia, although Putin is angry, does not attack Turkey. I understand that for Russia to have acted (e.g., to have shot down a Turkish plane in retalliation) would have been “one-sided.” A lack of response may anger some Russians, but Putin is in this for the long run. He is playing a larger game. The incident itself is simply one of many incidents that fall under the rubric of “international affairs,” an abstract category under which can be subsumed many particulars. One cannot let oneself be distracted by the particulars but, instead, try to interpret their meaning within the larger international context.

So, the fact that Goethe did not have the knowledge of art works possessed by even a university graduate in art history does not vitiate his interpretation. Even miniature works sufficed. His mineralogical collection replicated the same purpose: small specimens as representatives of an “integral” idea and as avenues of  intuition, of “Anschauung.” Goethe, in contrast to the English collectors, was indeed a “library mouse.”

Johann Heinrich Lips, Portrait of Lavater

Der Sammler requires more study than I have given to it in these posts. I was initially attracted by the seeming abstractness of the discussions and sought to add a little flesh to my understanding. Thus, the images I have posted. The long second letter in Der Sammler concerns the length to which an obsession with exacting naturalism leads, and at one point Goethe appears to mock the life-size family portraits by Johann Heinrich Tischbein, father of Goethe's friend. The collector mentions in his own collection a portrait of his parents that is concealed behind a “blind” door that, when opened would cause the viewer some consternation.

Mein Vater trat mit meiner Mutter am Arme gleichsam heraus und erschreckte durch die Wirklichkeit, welche theils durch die Umstände, theils durch die Kunst hervorgebracht war. Er war abgebildet, wie er, gewöhnlich gekleidet, von einem Gastmahl, aus einer Gesellschaft, nach Hause kam. Das Bild ward an dem Orte, zu dem Orte, mit aller Sorgfalt gemahlt, die Figuren aus einem gewissen Standpuncte genau perspectivisch gehalten und die Kleidungen, mit der größten Sorgfalt, zum enschiedensten Effecte gebracht.

Apparently Tischbein's painting still survives. Such a perspectival treatment is also seen in the same artist's painting of gamblers in Venice, in which Tischbein also placed himself. In the letter to Schiller concerning Der Sammler, Goethe mentions Giulio Romano as belonging to the category of "Skizzisten," which seems somewhat at odds with the naturalism of the painting of The Fall of the Giants above, from Sala dei Giganti in the Palazzo del Te, in Mantua. And I had to wonder whether Goethe had seen Lips' portrait of Lavater.

Picture credits: Galerie Neuse

Dilettantism

The Metropolitan Museum of Art currently has a small exhibition entitled "Playing with Pictures: The Art of Victorian Collage." It contains charming examples of photocollages by a number of aristocratic ladies, including Alexandra, Princess of Wales; Victoria Alexandria Anderson-Pelham, Countess of Yarborough; and Constance Sackville-West.

The works combine photographic cutouts of humans or animals in fanciful landscapes or ordinary domestic settings that have been rendered in beautifully executed watercolors. The exhibit made me think of Goethe and Schiller's writing on dilettantism, which addresses the subject of "amateur art," especially as practiced by ladies.

According to Michael Niedermeier, who wrote the entry on dilettantism for the Goethe-Handbuch, "dilettante" was coined in the Italian Renaissance to distinguish the connoisseur of art from the "professional" artist. The term only began to have a negative connotation in the late 18th century. As part of this critical evaluation Goethe wrote a short epistolary novel in 1798 entitled Der Sammler und die Seinigen (The Collector and His Circle). The letters characterize different responses to art and contain a criticism of amateur art, especially the mixing of media, the tendency to naturalism, and subjectivism. Shortly after it was published, Goethe and Schiller began to plan a larger treatise on the subject, which remained fragmentary, however, and was published (as "Über den Dilettanismus") only after they had both died.

On this subject, Rüdiger Safranski notes in this book on the Goethe-Schiller friendship that amateur art (or, in German, Laienkunst) was widespread in aristocratic and bourgeois circles. Watercolors, papercuts, versifying, singing, acting in amateur performances -- everyone was being "artistic." Goethe's Iphigenie was first performed in the Weimar court theater made up of non-professionals, including the young duke Carl August. Goethe, when he went to Italy in 1786, still wasn't sure whether he would be a writer or an artist; in other words, he was still trying to find himself, as we would say today. He had drawing instruction from Tischbein and others while in Italy and discovered that he was not an artist, but an amateur. (See example below, executed in Pozzuoli in 1787.)

This immersion in art, however, and the exposure to classical and Renaissance art made him think more seriously about the aims of art. When he had returned to Weimar and became, in 1790, the director of the theater there, he became much more professional about the business of acting. By 1796, part of the "classical" program of art that he and Schiller were developing was concerned with the objective rules of art and with the training and attitudes that distinguished "real" artists (which would include literary artists) from those who were only playing at being ones.

Here are some of their thoughts on the subject (in the translation of Ellen and Ernest von Nardroff):

The dilettante always shies away from serious study, avoids acquiring essential knowledge in order just to practice, and confuses art and subject matter. Thus, one will never find a dilettante who draws well. If he did draw well, he would be on the path to art. ... Precisely because most dilettantes lack a true concept of art, they prefer quantity and mediocrity, the unusual and costly to what is select and god. Many dilettantes have large collections. We might even say that all large collections owe their existence to dilettantes. For the dilettante's desire to collect, particularly when supported by great wealth, usually deteriorates into an obsession to amass as much as he can. He wants only to possess, not to select judiciously, and be satisfied with less, but of good quality. ...

Art creates its own laws and sets the standards of the time; dilettantism follows the trends of the time. ...

Toying with the serious and important corrupts man. [The dilettante] skips some levels, lingers on others, which he regards as goals, and he thinks he is justified in judging the whole from this vantage point, thus hindering his advancement. ...

All dilettantes are essentially plagiarists. They undermine and destroy all natural beauty in language and thought by mimicking and aping it in order to cover up their own vacuity.

By the time this was written there were many women who wrote and painted and performed. Helen Fronius, in her book Women and Literature in the Goethe Era, writes that Schiller and Goethe saw a connection between dilettantism and the presence of women in the literary scene. At the same time they acted as mentors to certain women, e.g., the poet Amalie von Imhoff, pictured here in a charming portrait miniature, an artistic genre that certainly must be included in the ranks of amateur arts. Indeed, the Metropolitan devoted a rather large exhibition and catalogue to painted miniatures several years ago.