DOI article:
Kandt, Kevin E.: Some notes on two allegorical drawings attributed to Andreas Schlüter the Younger from the Jacob Kabrun collection in the National Museum of Gdańsk
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.43437#0169
of course, gives us the basis for the
solar calendar. For the drawing tech-
niques seen in the sketch, we can see
that the rendering of the putto-figure
is more artistically executed, while
the pure geometric form of the in-
strument is precisely drawn in a very
exact, scientifically-accurate manner
as if it had been done with a compass
and ruler. Yet the Schluter drawing of
Astronomy is not simply an image glo-
rifying a remarkable and well-known
astronomical instrument, whose form
traditionally evoked in the minds’ of
contemporary observers the scientific
wisdom of their era,32 (fig. 4) but also
one personification of a more complex
universal concept owing to the inclu-
sion of the small child, clock, thermo-
meter, and clouds.
CUMFVKIDUN OF AN ARMIUAHV SriB «l
byunoctial colure I
Fig. 3. Diagram of an Armillary Sphere, repr. (Kugel,
Spheres..., p. 91)
This symbolic quality applies, like¬
wise, in the case of the Allegory of Time (fig. 2). It shows a female-genius
figure floating aloft or propelled in mid-air holding a winged hour-glass
in her left hand, while clasping folds from her abundant garment with her
right one. Her left leg and thigh are exposed as are her neck and shoulders.
She has turned her head to the side so that her face is mostly hidden being
shown in only a one-quarter view. Her glance seems to draw the viewer’s
attention to the clouds her behind which support a large, spherical globe
with star-constellations depicting cosmological figures in contour-outlines
delineated in pointillist-style dots - perhaps as if it had been copied and
transferred from some published graphic-prototype using a pin-prick
method. The precise configuration of the constellations depicted in the
drawing, which represents the northern skies centered on the ecliptic pole,
is similar (although not identical) to celestial maps like those published
by Peter Apian (1495-1552) in his Astronomicum Coesareum (Ingolstadt
1540),33 Andreas Cellarius (1596-1665) for the Atlas Coelestis seu Harmonia
32 Among such numerous depictions is, for example, the frontispiece to Andreas Cel-
larius’ Atlas Coelestis seu Harmonia Macrocosmica, (Amsterdam 1660) designed and engraved
by Frederik Hendrik van den Hove. See: Robert H. van Gent, Andreas Cellarius’ ‘Harmonia
Marcrocosmica of 1660: The Finest Atlas of the Heavens, Cologne 2006, p. 9-11,24; Stephenson,
Bolt, Friedman, The Universe Unveiled..., p. 43-44; Kugel, Spheres..., p. 120.
33 See: Paul Murdin, Secrets of the Universe: How We Discovered the Cosmos, London
2009, p. 25.
167
solar calendar. For the drawing tech-
niques seen in the sketch, we can see
that the rendering of the putto-figure
is more artistically executed, while
the pure geometric form of the in-
strument is precisely drawn in a very
exact, scientifically-accurate manner
as if it had been done with a compass
and ruler. Yet the Schluter drawing of
Astronomy is not simply an image glo-
rifying a remarkable and well-known
astronomical instrument, whose form
traditionally evoked in the minds’ of
contemporary observers the scientific
wisdom of their era,32 (fig. 4) but also
one personification of a more complex
universal concept owing to the inclu-
sion of the small child, clock, thermo-
meter, and clouds.
CUMFVKIDUN OF AN ARMIUAHV SriB «l
byunoctial colure I
Fig. 3. Diagram of an Armillary Sphere, repr. (Kugel,
Spheres..., p. 91)
This symbolic quality applies, like¬
wise, in the case of the Allegory of Time (fig. 2). It shows a female-genius
figure floating aloft or propelled in mid-air holding a winged hour-glass
in her left hand, while clasping folds from her abundant garment with her
right one. Her left leg and thigh are exposed as are her neck and shoulders.
She has turned her head to the side so that her face is mostly hidden being
shown in only a one-quarter view. Her glance seems to draw the viewer’s
attention to the clouds her behind which support a large, spherical globe
with star-constellations depicting cosmological figures in contour-outlines
delineated in pointillist-style dots - perhaps as if it had been copied and
transferred from some published graphic-prototype using a pin-prick
method. The precise configuration of the constellations depicted in the
drawing, which represents the northern skies centered on the ecliptic pole,
is similar (although not identical) to celestial maps like those published
by Peter Apian (1495-1552) in his Astronomicum Coesareum (Ingolstadt
1540),33 Andreas Cellarius (1596-1665) for the Atlas Coelestis seu Harmonia
32 Among such numerous depictions is, for example, the frontispiece to Andreas Cel-
larius’ Atlas Coelestis seu Harmonia Macrocosmica, (Amsterdam 1660) designed and engraved
by Frederik Hendrik van den Hove. See: Robert H. van Gent, Andreas Cellarius’ ‘Harmonia
Marcrocosmica of 1660: The Finest Atlas of the Heavens, Cologne 2006, p. 9-11,24; Stephenson,
Bolt, Friedman, The Universe Unveiled..., p. 43-44; Kugel, Spheres..., p. 120.
33 See: Paul Murdin, Secrets of the Universe: How We Discovered the Cosmos, London
2009, p. 25.
167