DOI article:
Szybisty, Tomasz: Between light and shadows: reflecting on varied conceptual perspectives on the peculiar lambency suffusing gothic churches as evidenced by German literature from the latter decades of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth century
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.51154#0010
9
Géza von Molnar, who believes that it is generally in
Novaliss character to perceive reality in terms of ‘polar-
ization and fundamental unity’,23 notes that the peculiar
dialectic of day and night that is present in his writings
is largely beholden to Goethes theory of colours, an early
version of which was published between 1791 and 1792 in
the form of the treatise entitled Beiträge zur Optik; later,
soon after the release of Elective Affinities, the content of
the former work was incorporated in Farbenlehre, a com-
pendious publication released in 1810 and comprising
the results of his many years of research. In opposition
to Newton, Goethe claimed that colours were a product
of the interpenetration of light and darkness. That con-
ception inevitably led to the designation of any chromat-
ic manifestations (along with other phenomena, such as
penumbra, indwelling the borderline between light and
darkness) as a symbolic representation of the union be-
tween varied dimensions of being as well as knowledge.
In the chromatic system elaborated by Philipp Otto
Runge, who was well versed in Goethes beliefs, which
can also be borne out by the fact of an encounter and ex-
change of letters between these two individuals,24 colour
was by no means reducible to a physical phenomenon
only, as it also intermediated between the realms of matter
and spirit. This conception, it was widely held after a 1909
publication by Siegfried Krebs,25 in part was a legacy of Ja-
kob Böhmes mystical writings, which evidently were read
by Runge as early as 1802.26 And it would be a serious un-
derstatement to claim that the reception of Böhmes out-
put was limited only to Runge; instead, it would be fully
justified to speak of the explosion of a fully-fledged ro-
mantic renaissance of Böhme’.27
For Runge, colours interspersed in the liminal area be-
tween light (good) and darkness (evil) represent a path
to the Absolute. They have been given to man, as other-
wise he would not be capable of comprehending pure,
23 Ibidem, p. 426.
24 H. Matile, Die Farbenlehre Philipp Otto Runges. Ein Beitrag zur
Geschichte der Künstlerfarbenlehre, Munich and Mittenwald, 1979
(Kunstwissenschaftliche Studientexte, 5), pp. 139-141.
25 S. Krebs, Philipp Otto Runges Entwicklung unter dem Einflüs-
se Ludwig Tiecks, Heidelberg, 1909, passim; cf. K. Möseneder,
Philipp Otto Runge und Jakob Böhme. Über Runges “Quelle und
Dichter” und den “Kleinen Morgen”. Mit einem Exkurs über ein
Palmenemblem, Marburg/Lahn 1981 (Marburger Ostforschungen,
38), passim.
26 H. Matile, Die Farbenlehre Philipp Otto Runges, p. 130 (as in note 24).
27 J. Sänchez de Murillo, Der Geist der deutschen Romantik. Der
Übergang vom logischen zum dichterischen Denken und der Her-
vorgang der Tiefenphänomenologie, Munich, 1986, p. 191. We
should not overlook the fact that the Romantic understanding
of light and colour was influenced by other mystics, for exam-
ple Swedenborg and Oettinger; see among others L. Miodoński,
Całość jako paradygmat rozumienia świata w myśli niemieckiej
przełomu romantycznego, Wrocław, 2001, pp. 210-234.
supernatural light.28 Similar assertions were made by Jo-
hann Wilhelm Ritter, the most illustrious representative
of Romanticism’s natural scientists; he maintained that
colours were the product of the refraction of the rays em-
anated by the soul of the universe.29 This short study must
also make a mention of Tudwig Tieck, for whom colours
encapsulated the language of ‘the spirit of the world’, and
this spirit was both revealed and hidden by them.30
Studies investigating phenomena associated with light,
gathering momentum at the turn of the nineteenth centu-
ry and spawning the elaboration of mystical and religious
interpretations of colour, were undoubtedly a significant
backdrop for the perception of gothic interiors. As stained-
glass window panels emanated colourful beams, the ambi-
ent light of the interiors prompted the reflection that such
premises constituted anterooms ushering observers in to
a spiritual reality, and both metaphysical and eternal, too.
Such ideas were perfectly in sync with the plan, albeit
abortive, for a construction undertaking designed by Karl
Friedrich Schinkel in 1810. It would have been a mauso-
leum of Queen Louise of Prussia. Its blueprint displayed
some affinities with the chapel envisioned a year before
by Goethe in his Elective Affinities.31 In the outline of
the vision for the structure, the architect did not associ-
ate the Gothic with darkness but with subdued colour-
ful light. He himself affirmed that his chief desire was to
highlight the cheerful face of death’ {heitere Ansicht des
Todes), embraced as a passage to a more beautiful, eternal
life.32 Therefore, it stands to reason that in his design the
mausoleum was to be an invocation of the image of such
a transition, where the shaded anteroom was to lead to an
interior steeped in ‘the bright red light of the morning’.
Likewise, in many literary works dating from the early
decades of the nineteenth century, the colourful lighting
and twilight prevailing in Gothic churches were perceived
as an intermediary between the material and spiritual
realms. In the first of his cycle of sonnets (released in 1824,
two years after their author’s religious ordination33) dedi-
28 See among others Philipp Otto Runges letter to his brother Da-
niel, Nov. 7th 1802, in Hinterlassene Schriften von Philipp Otto
Runge, Mahler, ed. by dessen ältestem Bruder, part 1, Hamburg,
1840, p. 17; cf. H. Matile, Die Farbenlehre Philipp Otto Runges,
p. 130 (as in note 24).
29 J. W. Ritter, Fragmente aus dem Nachlaße eines junges Physikers.
Ein Taschenbuch für Freunde der Natur, Heidelberg, 1810, p. 166.
30 L. Tieck, Phantasien über die Kunst, für Freunde der Kunst, Ham-
burg, 1799, pp. 122-123.
31 T. Critzmann, Goethes Wahlverwandtschaften als Jahresmärchen,
pp. 161-168 (as in note 15).
32 K.E Schinkel, ‘Entwurf zu einer Begräbnißkapelle für Ihre Maje-
stät die Hochselige Königin Luise von Preußen, in Aus Schinkels
Nachlaß. Reisetagebücher, Briefe und Aphorismen, mitgetheilt und
mit einem Verzeichniß sämmtlicher Werke Schinkels versehen
von A. Freiherrn von Wolzogen, vol. 3, Berlin, 1863, p. 160.
33 A. Portmann-Tinguely: ‘Smets, Wilhelm’, in Biographisch-Bi-
bliographisches Kirchenlexikon, vol. 10, Hamm, 1995, cols 655-666.
Géza von Molnar, who believes that it is generally in
Novaliss character to perceive reality in terms of ‘polar-
ization and fundamental unity’,23 notes that the peculiar
dialectic of day and night that is present in his writings
is largely beholden to Goethes theory of colours, an early
version of which was published between 1791 and 1792 in
the form of the treatise entitled Beiträge zur Optik; later,
soon after the release of Elective Affinities, the content of
the former work was incorporated in Farbenlehre, a com-
pendious publication released in 1810 and comprising
the results of his many years of research. In opposition
to Newton, Goethe claimed that colours were a product
of the interpenetration of light and darkness. That con-
ception inevitably led to the designation of any chromat-
ic manifestations (along with other phenomena, such as
penumbra, indwelling the borderline between light and
darkness) as a symbolic representation of the union be-
tween varied dimensions of being as well as knowledge.
In the chromatic system elaborated by Philipp Otto
Runge, who was well versed in Goethes beliefs, which
can also be borne out by the fact of an encounter and ex-
change of letters between these two individuals,24 colour
was by no means reducible to a physical phenomenon
only, as it also intermediated between the realms of matter
and spirit. This conception, it was widely held after a 1909
publication by Siegfried Krebs,25 in part was a legacy of Ja-
kob Böhmes mystical writings, which evidently were read
by Runge as early as 1802.26 And it would be a serious un-
derstatement to claim that the reception of Böhmes out-
put was limited only to Runge; instead, it would be fully
justified to speak of the explosion of a fully-fledged ro-
mantic renaissance of Böhme’.27
For Runge, colours interspersed in the liminal area be-
tween light (good) and darkness (evil) represent a path
to the Absolute. They have been given to man, as other-
wise he would not be capable of comprehending pure,
23 Ibidem, p. 426.
24 H. Matile, Die Farbenlehre Philipp Otto Runges. Ein Beitrag zur
Geschichte der Künstlerfarbenlehre, Munich and Mittenwald, 1979
(Kunstwissenschaftliche Studientexte, 5), pp. 139-141.
25 S. Krebs, Philipp Otto Runges Entwicklung unter dem Einflüs-
se Ludwig Tiecks, Heidelberg, 1909, passim; cf. K. Möseneder,
Philipp Otto Runge und Jakob Böhme. Über Runges “Quelle und
Dichter” und den “Kleinen Morgen”. Mit einem Exkurs über ein
Palmenemblem, Marburg/Lahn 1981 (Marburger Ostforschungen,
38), passim.
26 H. Matile, Die Farbenlehre Philipp Otto Runges, p. 130 (as in note 24).
27 J. Sänchez de Murillo, Der Geist der deutschen Romantik. Der
Übergang vom logischen zum dichterischen Denken und der Her-
vorgang der Tiefenphänomenologie, Munich, 1986, p. 191. We
should not overlook the fact that the Romantic understanding
of light and colour was influenced by other mystics, for exam-
ple Swedenborg and Oettinger; see among others L. Miodoński,
Całość jako paradygmat rozumienia świata w myśli niemieckiej
przełomu romantycznego, Wrocław, 2001, pp. 210-234.
supernatural light.28 Similar assertions were made by Jo-
hann Wilhelm Ritter, the most illustrious representative
of Romanticism’s natural scientists; he maintained that
colours were the product of the refraction of the rays em-
anated by the soul of the universe.29 This short study must
also make a mention of Tudwig Tieck, for whom colours
encapsulated the language of ‘the spirit of the world’, and
this spirit was both revealed and hidden by them.30
Studies investigating phenomena associated with light,
gathering momentum at the turn of the nineteenth centu-
ry and spawning the elaboration of mystical and religious
interpretations of colour, were undoubtedly a significant
backdrop for the perception of gothic interiors. As stained-
glass window panels emanated colourful beams, the ambi-
ent light of the interiors prompted the reflection that such
premises constituted anterooms ushering observers in to
a spiritual reality, and both metaphysical and eternal, too.
Such ideas were perfectly in sync with the plan, albeit
abortive, for a construction undertaking designed by Karl
Friedrich Schinkel in 1810. It would have been a mauso-
leum of Queen Louise of Prussia. Its blueprint displayed
some affinities with the chapel envisioned a year before
by Goethe in his Elective Affinities.31 In the outline of
the vision for the structure, the architect did not associ-
ate the Gothic with darkness but with subdued colour-
ful light. He himself affirmed that his chief desire was to
highlight the cheerful face of death’ {heitere Ansicht des
Todes), embraced as a passage to a more beautiful, eternal
life.32 Therefore, it stands to reason that in his design the
mausoleum was to be an invocation of the image of such
a transition, where the shaded anteroom was to lead to an
interior steeped in ‘the bright red light of the morning’.
Likewise, in many literary works dating from the early
decades of the nineteenth century, the colourful lighting
and twilight prevailing in Gothic churches were perceived
as an intermediary between the material and spiritual
realms. In the first of his cycle of sonnets (released in 1824,
two years after their author’s religious ordination33) dedi-
28 See among others Philipp Otto Runges letter to his brother Da-
niel, Nov. 7th 1802, in Hinterlassene Schriften von Philipp Otto
Runge, Mahler, ed. by dessen ältestem Bruder, part 1, Hamburg,
1840, p. 17; cf. H. Matile, Die Farbenlehre Philipp Otto Runges,
p. 130 (as in note 24).
29 J. W. Ritter, Fragmente aus dem Nachlaße eines junges Physikers.
Ein Taschenbuch für Freunde der Natur, Heidelberg, 1810, p. 166.
30 L. Tieck, Phantasien über die Kunst, für Freunde der Kunst, Ham-
burg, 1799, pp. 122-123.
31 T. Critzmann, Goethes Wahlverwandtschaften als Jahresmärchen,
pp. 161-168 (as in note 15).
32 K.E Schinkel, ‘Entwurf zu einer Begräbnißkapelle für Ihre Maje-
stät die Hochselige Königin Luise von Preußen, in Aus Schinkels
Nachlaß. Reisetagebücher, Briefe und Aphorismen, mitgetheilt und
mit einem Verzeichniß sämmtlicher Werke Schinkels versehen
von A. Freiherrn von Wolzogen, vol. 3, Berlin, 1863, p. 160.
33 A. Portmann-Tinguely: ‘Smets, Wilhelm’, in Biographisch-Bi-
bliographisches Kirchenlexikon, vol. 10, Hamm, 1995, cols 655-666.