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Pictorial Renaissance Bookbindings and the Domestication of Lucas Cranach’s Iconography: An Overlooked Medium of the German Reformation

Pictorial Renaissance Bookbindings and the Domestication of Lucas Cranach’s Iconography: An... Pictorial Renaissance Bookbindings and the Domestication of Lucas Cranach’s Iconography: An Overlooked Medium of the German Reformation By Daniel Gehrt I. AN OVERLOOKED MEDIUM Inthe sixteenth century, the Saxon university townof Wittenberg on the Elbe RiverwasnotonlyaninnovativeandflourishingcenterintheGermanEmpire forchurchandeducationalreforms,bookpublishing,painting,andengraving, butalsoforbookbindingdesign. Thedynamicinterplaybetweentheologians, humanists, artists, form cutters, and bookbinders of the town catalyzed the nascent transition of bookbinding design in theearly sixteenth century from a chiefly ornamental style to a distinctly pictorial style. It combined decorative Renaissance elements with biblical and mythical figures and scenes, well- known ancient personalities, allegorical personifications, portraits of contem- poraryreformers,scholars,andprinces,andcorrespondingemblemsandcoats of arms. Many of the most widespread motifs were derived from the icono- graphy that the innovative and highly versatile Renaissance court artist Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472–1553) had developed specifically to foster the Wittenberg Reformation. It is well known that Cranach was crucial in giving a face to this profound and sweeping reform movement. As Andrew Pettegree recently pointed out, the artist’s first groundbreaking advancement to this end comprised introduc- ingpictorialtitle-pageborderstopublicationsoftheprolificbest-sellingauthor Martin Luther (1483–1546) in the 1520s. Within the large central space framed by these portrait format woodcuts, typesetters could display title, au- 1. IamdeeplygratefultoStevenRhodeandthetwoanonymouspeerreviewersforhelp- ingmetoenhancethispaper.Abbreviations—CDA:CranachDigitalArchive:TheResearch Resource, https://lucascranach.org/; EBDB: Einbanddatenbank, https://www.hist-einband. de; FB Gotha: Forschungsbibliothek Gotha. VD16: http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte - Archive for Reformation History de Gruyter

Pictorial Renaissance Bookbindings and the Domestication of Lucas Cranach’s Iconography: An Overlooked Medium of the German Reformation

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Publisher
de Gruyter
Copyright
© 2022 by Gütersloher Verlagshaus
eISSN
2198-0489
DOI
10.14315/arg-2022-1130104
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Abstract

Pictorial Renaissance Bookbindings and the Domestication of Lucas Cranach’s Iconography: An Overlooked Medium of the German Reformation By Daniel Gehrt I. AN OVERLOOKED MEDIUM Inthe sixteenth century, the Saxon university townof Wittenberg on the Elbe RiverwasnotonlyaninnovativeandflourishingcenterintheGermanEmpire forchurchandeducationalreforms,bookpublishing,painting,andengraving, butalsoforbookbindingdesign. Thedynamicinterplaybetweentheologians, humanists, artists, form cutters, and bookbinders of the town catalyzed the nascent transition of bookbinding design in theearly sixteenth century from a chiefly ornamental style to a distinctly pictorial style. It combined decorative Renaissance elements with biblical and mythical figures and scenes, well- known ancient personalities, allegorical personifications, portraits of contem- poraryreformers,scholars,andprinces,andcorrespondingemblemsandcoats of arms. Many of the most widespread motifs were derived from the icono- graphy that the innovative and highly versatile Renaissance court artist Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472–1553) had developed specifically to foster the Wittenberg Reformation. It is well known that Cranach was crucial in giving a face to this profound and sweeping reform movement. As Andrew Pettegree recently pointed out, the artist’s first groundbreaking advancement to this end comprised introduc- ingpictorialtitle-pageborderstopublicationsoftheprolificbest-sellingauthor Martin Luther (1483–1546) in the 1520s. Within the large central space framed by these portrait format woodcuts, typesetters could display title, au- 1. IamdeeplygratefultoStevenRhodeandthetwoanonymouspeerreviewersforhelp- ingmetoenhancethispaper.Abbreviations—CDA:CranachDigitalArchive:TheResearch Resource, https://lucascranach.org/; EBDB: Einbanddatenbank, https://www.hist-einband. de; FB Gotha: Forschungsbibliothek Gotha. VD16:

Journal

Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte - Archive for Reformation History – de Gruyter

Published: Nov 1, 2022

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