Art Week 1!

When I went back this afternoon and looked at my 2013 blog posts, but I especially loved about them was how careful I was to document all the paintings I saw in museums! It's really sweet now to be able to go back and look at what I was most struck by on those early museum trips. In honor of my 2013 efforts, here is a (very) brief write-up about some art highlights i've seen in my first week here in Sweden.

Uppsala Cathedral 

Uppsala Cathedral is the seat of the (protestant) archbishop of Sweden, as well as being the national cathedral. It is equally as tall as it is long, and is made of local brick and limestone quarried in Gotland, a large island off the eastern coast that was particularly important in the medieval period. The cathedral was begun in the 13th c, replacing an older church in Old Uppsala, which was, in turn, replacing a pre-Christian sacred grove. While this Gothic structure was being built, the people of Uppsala used a nearby Romanesque church (which I hope to visit soon!). As soon as the chancel was complete, they moved in and began doing their services in the cathedral.

Since the 13th c, the cathedral has burned twice, which means very little of the original structure survives. The spire and towers are nineteenth century, as is most of the decoration. There are a few historiated capitals around the chancel, but I think there were originally more, and that they're probably not in their original positions. One of these capitals is horribly anti-semitic, though it wouldn't be immediately obvious to someone unfamiliar with medieval iconography. The cathedral has placed a plaque beside it alerting visitors to its difficult subject matter (not pictured).

The large apse of the church, originally a site of Marian devotion, was converted in the reformation to a shrine to King Gustav Vasa, the Swedish king who, upon his election, converted the country to Protestantism. He also decided that his sons would inherit his kingship, and elections ended. What a guy! There is now a contemporary piece outside this apse, a hyper realistic woman in a blue scarf, staring sadly into the apse. She looks so real that for a moment, I thought it was another visitor to the cathedral. Actually, it is a sculpture of Mary, peeking pensively into the venerated apse that she used to occupy.

One thing I particularly loved about the cathedral was the late nineteenth century wall paintings! Most cathedrals in Europe are no longer painted in their interiors, the medieval paint long gone and never replaced. However, many Scandinavian churches still have wonderful wall painting inside, much of it original Romanesque works. This church obviously lost its medieval paint, but wall painting was still important enough in Swedish church settings to require new images. These are done in a beautiful, Art Nouveau style, reminiscent of cigarette cases and posters scandalizing Paris in the same period. The angels are beautiful, but they do remind of liberated women in Golden Age Paris.

Job Cigarette poster, Alphonse Mucha, 1896

Angels in the spandrels of nave arches in Uppsala Cathedral, c. late 19th c 

The Augsburg Kunstkammer

In the early modern period, the very wealthy and educated loved collecting cabinets of curiosity in order to display how learned and important they are. Filled with a number of enchanting drawers and compartments, the wild assortment of objects inside was meant to contain the entire world in one cabinet. This is a very special kunstkammer, because it still has its entire original 17th c collection. It was given to the Swedish king by the city of Augsburg when he happened to be passing by with a large army and was interested in it. The cabinet includes paintings, corals, shells, gold coins, scientific instruments, a tiny sculpture excavated from the earliest Egyptian excavations, and a great many other perplexing and amazing items! A self-playing harpsichord type instrument was hidden in the top, beneath the enormous nut that crowns the entire piece. For a seventeenth century dinner guest, music coming magically from inside the cabinet would have been quite a party trick. 

My favorite detail is the beautiful marbles set in the doors. The marble itself may have been looted from Classical villas, maybe brought from Constantinople, Rome, or Athens. The colors are amazing, representing quarries from all over the mediterranean and who knows where else. Most interestingly, the marble has been painted with scenes! The natural colors of the marble make amazing backdrops for the little paintings. 

The Uppsala Anatomy Theater

Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778) was the most famous Enlightenment-era scientist to come out of Uppsala. A botanist, naturalist, biologist and archaeologist, he was a foundational researcher who achieved international renown for his work on cataloguing the world's plants, his advancements in medicine, and his invention of stratigraphical archaeology (analyzing layers of soil deposits to determine the age of buried objects). Linnaeus designed this anatomy theater, which is amazingly cramped and steep. The faux-marble columns on each level of the theater represent one of the orders of classical columns, and the windows in the ceiling let in an amazing amount of light so that students could see the dissection happening down on the table. 

When he got older, Linnaeus came up with a crackpot theory about Uppsala being the same place as Atlantis. When our guide told us this, I was cheeky and said "that's what happens once you get tenure!" and a full professor a few rows down was a little bit miffed. hee hee. 

Whew, that was a lot! I'm tired now. But I hope 2013-me would be proud.