Tag: statue

Michelangelo Lives in Bruges

For me in any case, nothing better illustrates the historical prominence and wealth of Bruges than the magnificent Madonna and Child sculpture by Michelangelo on display in the Church of Our Lady. Wikipedia explains that the statue of Italian marble, completed in Italy in 1506, was destined for a location in Italy, but after a disagreement about money, Michelangelo sold the statue to the Mouscron brothers, two wealthy Bruges merchants. The Madonna was delivered to the buyers in Bruges and donated to its present home in 1514.

In fact Bruges played an oversized role in the revival of trade in Europe that began roughly in the 11th and 12th centuries. As European trade that had collapsed after the fall of the Western Roman Empire began to expand and flourish, Bruges for a time was northern Europe’s wealthiest leading city. In the third volume of his Civilization and Capitalism, 15th to 18th Century, French historian, Fernand Braudel, writes of Bruges:

It was all to culminate in the dazzling fortune of Bruges. By 1200, this city […] was included in the circuit of the Flemish fairs. This in itself made Bruges a more important place: she was receiving foreign merchants, her industry was thriving and her trade was reaching England and Scotland where she found the wool needed both for her looms and for re-export to the cloth-making towns of Flanders. […] And finally the arrival in Bruges of Hanseatic ships confirmed and developed her prosperity.

In 1277, the first Genoese ships put in to Bruges. The establishment of a
regular maritime link between the Mediterranean and the North Sea ushered in a decisive invasion by the southerners for the Genoese were but a foretaste of what was to come: the last of the newcomers, the Venetian galleys, arrived in 1314. […] But it was also a new departure [for Bruges] in the sense that the arrival of the sailors, ships and merchants of the Mediterranean brought in a wealth of goods, capital, and commercial and financial techniques. Rich Italian merchants came to live in the city, and brought with them consignments of some of the most precious commodities of the time: spices and pepper from the Levant which they exchanged for the industrial products of Flanders.

Thus Bruges came to be the centre of a huge trading area, covering no less than the Mediterranean, Portugal, France, England, the Rhineland, and the Hansa.

(Braudel, Fernand, tr. from the French by Siân Reynolds, Civilization and Capitalism 15th-18th Century, Volume III, The Perspective of the World, Harper & Row, New York, 1984, p99)

My interest in Europe’s medieval and early modern history, fueled by scholars like Braudel, got me to Bruges in the first place. I was curious and wanted to take a look. The fact that the old part of the city is a beautifully preserved, magnificent UNESCO World Heritage Site was unexpected and most welcome icing on the cake.

The sanctuary of the Church of Our Lady is open to the public for viewing, and like so many venerable European churches, it is impressive in and of itself. This church, however, has a part of its ground floor set aside as a museum that, if I am not mistaken, I paid €10 to enter. There was virtually nobody about when I walked around; I enjoyed an almost private viewing of the Michelangelo masterpiece. Given the crowds that often surround works by well-known artists, I was both surprised and grateful to have some quiet time in the presence of genius.

Kirkegaard in the Library Garden

Søren Kierkegaard. Words like philosopher and theologian came to mind when I saw this statue in Copenhagen’s beautiful Royal Library Garden. I read the first paragraph of Kierkegaard’s Wikipedia entry. This told me the man was a prolific thinker writing about a wide range of topics – I did not read the lengthy article introducing his works – and is considered to have been the first existentialist philosopher. His was a name my dad dropped from time to time during his years at Harvard in the early 1960s, and that is most likely when I first heard of Kierkegaard.

The Royal Library Garden is a quiet, restful place, and I had been sitting on a bench near Kierkegaard for quite some time when a group of Chinese tourists walked into the area around the statue. They immediately began standing in front of Kierkegaard and posing for photos with hands raised in V salutes. I amused myself wondering how many, if any, of these Chinese had ever heard of Kierkegaard or knew anything of his work. Of course, it is very possible most of them knew more than I did. Be that as it may, I wanted to get a picture of this photo taking, but doing so would have required me to get in the face of some of the group. I was not inclined to do that and remained sitting on my bench.

Saint and Martyr, John of Nepomuk

The Charles Bridge has 30 statues that line the balustrades on each of its sides. The statue pictured here is that of Saint John of Nepomuk; it was installed in 1683 and is the oldest statue on the bridge.

John was born in a small town in Bohemia (today’s Czech Republic) in the 14th century. He studied canon law in Prague and Padua in Italy, and eventually became the head vicar of a large cathedral in Prague. At this point, John ran afoul of Wenceslaus IV, the king of Bohemia, over the appointment of an abbot to a powerful abbey in Bohemia. To add some spice to the stew of religious nonsense that John got caught up in, there were two popes at the time, one in Rome and one Avignon, France. Naturally, the two popes were antagonists quarreling over the kind of stuff that religious types always seem to be fighting about; you know, god, beliefs, doctrine, all of which generally boil down to money and power. In the case of the abbot’s appointment, the king’s man was favored by the pope in France, while the choice of the Archbishop of Prague, John’s boss, was supported by the pope in Rome. In the event, John appointed the archbishop’s nominee. The king threw a hissy fit and, on 20 March 1393, had the hapless head vicar tortured and thrown off the Charles Bridge to drown in the Vtlava River. John was canonized some 300 years later; there was only one pope in Rome at the time.

Belvedere Garden, Vienna

Belvedere Garden is based on the design of the French garden at Versailles. The Garden slopes down gently from the Upper to Lower Belvedere, which is the building with the red roof at the end of the promenade. The Garden has great water features featuring classical or mythical characters spouting fountains of water high into the air. The domed building on the right belongs to a Catholic church, which is not part of the Belvedere.

Vienna is full of statues of mythical, bare-breasted female figures. The statues are highly stylized and, I assume, not expected to be taken seriously as representations of women. What an arm! Looks like this girl could bench press a couple of hundred pounds without taking a deep breath. This statue and a partner out of the frame to the right sit in front of the main entrance to the Upper Belvedere pictured here.

A sign tells visitors this is one of several fountain statues called the Large Cascade. Apparently, when the Garden was built some 300 years ago, a complex system of pipes was installed to force water out of the mouths of the fountains, and keep it flowing downhill towards the Lower Belvedere. Today, I presume electric pumps are doing the heavy lifting.

The Upper Belvedere from the southern entrance to the Garden. I really could not have asked for a nicer day to visit this place.

The main entrance to the Lower Belvedere is shown here. Prince Eugene, the military leader who had the entire Belvedere complex built to serve as his residence in Vienna, used this building as his house; I wonder if he ever set foot in all of the rooms the place has during the years he lived here. I have no idea what he did with the Upper Belvedere. Maybe he had a big family. Today, both facilities serve as museums.

At play in front of the Lower Belvedere.

Ludwig von Beethoven in Bronze, Vienna

The Beethoven Monument pictured here was unveiled in 1870 and is the centerpiece of Beethovenplatz. Beethoven was one of several musical geniuses who spent some or most of their lives in Vienna. In fact, a plaque on the wall of the school overlooking the statue informs us that Franz Schubert was a student at this gymnasium. I came upon this tribute to Beethoven by accident while walking from the Stadtpark subway station to the Hofburg and other historical monuments to Vienna’s glory days. Excellent way to start my walk.