To say that the effect is beautiful,
is too limited praise. It is harmonious; thoroughly satisfying to the
eye; perfect.
Cross with me now, if you be not weary, one of the dozen picturesque
bridges over the Pegnitz, and let us see what Adam Krafft, another great
Nuremburger of that same age, has done in the same line of Gothic
decoration for the Church of St. Lawrence. His work is a shrine, or I
should rather say a repository for the sacramental wafer of the Roman
Catholic rite. It is an open-work spire, tapering to the height of sixty
feet, with an infinity of graceful detail, and rare sculptures in high
and low relief. One fantasy is, I think, unique of its kind. The roof is
a little too low to admit the crowning summit fairly; and the top,
therefore, has been made to bend over. The effect--purposely designed, I
cannot doubt--is odd; nor can I agree with the fantastic remark of
Murray's Handbook, that it "has the air of a plant which is chocked in
its further growth." Spires and plants are not endowed with equal
pliability, and the idea of one of the former waving about, or nodding
gracefully, suggests an immediate "stand from under." And this all the
more in this instance, because--which brings me thus round-aboutedly to
my main point--the material hereon employed is stone, a clean and
white-toned stone, that looks as though its excellent carvings and
mouldings had been completed only for the last Crystal Palace
Exhibition. The apparent newness is downright provoking; and if Adam
Krafft could peep at it from his honoured grave, he would never dream
that he has lain therein three centuries and a half. Let me say
further--having thus stumbled upon personalities--that he too made
himself as durable as his work. And with more modesty than Master Peter
Vischer above named, who moulded for himself a niche in his monument
corresponding, in size and position, to the one assigned to the patron
Saint, though being at the opposite end of the shrine, the glorifier and
the glorified could not be taken into one glance and a comparison
forced. There was more modesty, I say, in Adam Krafft's mode of
travelling down the stream of Time as showman of his show, though he was
not methinks without a dash of _craft_, as befits the bearer of his
name. Down upon their marrow-bones (as the school boys have it) with
rounded backs grope Adam and his two apprentices, the three backs
forming a base of operations, or in plainer words upholding the
sixty-feet structure, and doing for it that which is done beneath his
rival's shrine by a snail at each of the four corners. Perhaps, after
all, the sculptor-architect was wiser than the bronze-caster, in his
mode of identifying himself with his work. Amid a multitude of figures
and emblems, Peter Vischer, as well as St. Sebald, may be overlooked,
for they are small in size; but you can scarcely avoid asking "who are
these three?" when you note how lofty is the edifice that the large
quasi-Atlases bear.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account