2008 - Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden

Musée du Louvre, Grand Galerie, condition in 1939,
Slide collection, Technische Universität Dresden
Anton Raphael Mengs, Self-portrait in a red coat,
c.1744, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister
Studies at the Technische Universität Dresden marked the
280th anniversary of the birth of the Saxon court painter
Anton Raphael Mengs – and above all the donation of a
large research archive concerning the life and works of this
painter by the renowned Mengs expert Steffi Roettgen.
The subjects discussed at the colloquium included the
investigation of the artist’s Bohemian origins (he was born
in Aussig/Ústí nad Labem), his transnational activities, his
considerable influence on the art world in both Dresden
and Rome and, last but not least, his importance for the
development of European Classicism.
In addition, the participants had the opportunity to
become acquainted with a joint digitalisation project being
run by the Kunstbibliothek of the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen
Dresden and the Saxon State and University
Library (SLUB), which electronically compiles literature on
Mengs that is not easily accessible and makes it available
on the net. Hence, Dresden is well on the way to establishing
itself as a centre of Mengs research and of research on
Classicist painting in general.
Another congress which attracted attention was devoted
to an artist who lived and worked in Dresden. It was organised
by the Galerie Neue Meister and the Kupferstich-Kabinett
in association with the Institute for the History of
Medicine at the Technische Universität Dresden, the Art
History Institutes of the Freie Universität Berlin and the
Technische Universität Dresden as well as the Alte Nationalgalerie
of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin: “Carl Gustav
Carus – Wahrnehmung und Konstruktion” (Carl Gustav Carus
– Perception and Construction). Carus was not only a
painter but also a physician, naturalist, anthropologist and
View of a printmaker’s workshop, Abraham Bosse,
17th century, France, Kupferstich-Kabinett
art theoretician – in short, one of the leading personalities
in intellectual life in Germany during the 19th century, a
genuine “polymath”. The conference examined all aspects
of the work of this friend of Caspar David Friedrich. It brought
together academics representing various disciplines, ranging
from art historians to medical specialists. This meeting of
Carus researchers was an important stage on the way to a
major event: the exhibition that will take place in Dresden
and Berlin in 2009/10 under the title “Carl Gustav Carus –
Natur und Idee”.
Practical interdisciplinary collaboration also characterised
a conference organised by the Mathematisch-Physikalischer
Salon in association with the Institute of Art and
Music Studies at the Technische Universität Dresden and
the Art History Seminar of Humboldt University Berlin
entitled “Festung im Fokus – Mathematische Methoden in
der ‘architectura militaris’ des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts und
ihre Sublimierung in der ‘architectura civilis’ ” (Focus on
Fortresses – Mathematical Methods in 16th and 17th-century
“architectura militaris” and its Sublimation to “architectura
civilis”). International specialists in fortress architecture
in the early modern period discussed the
interrelationships between mathematical systems, fortress
architecture, aesthetics and political self-representation
and investigated how the development of new mathematical
systems was reflected in the design of fortifications
and hence also in architectural theory, civilian architecture
and urban design.
The relationship between aesthetics and technology was
also the subject of the congress on “Druckgraphik zwischen
Reproduktion und Kunst: zur Institutionalisierung eines
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