The arts flourish in peace, and suffer in war. This is a theme common to both literature and art in many ages: it was frequently expressed by artists and writers alike during the course of the Thirty Years' War. [1] The historical reality of the third through fifth decades of the seventeenth century in Europe, especially in its geographical center, provides a comparatively bleak picture, too. Beside human losses, man's creations, although never perhaps ultimately as important, also then became victims of war. The destruction of Magdeburg, the looting of Heidelberg, the sack of the Prague Hradčany are well known examples of the devastation caused by the Thirty Years' War. [2] The depredations of the epoch are mirrored in the prints of Jacques Callot, some of the most famous images associated with the catastrophes of the period, that vividly depict war in all its unrelieved horror.

Contemporaneous accounts of the period also support the impression that the era of the Thirty Years' War was one in which art declined, above all in Central Europe. Some memorable lines of Joachim von Sandrart, the artist-historian whose earlier career was itself shaped in response to the possiblities offered by hard times, speak to this effect. Sandrart writes in his Teutsche Academie of 1675:

Queen Germania saw her palaces and churches decorated with magnificent pictures go up in flames time and again; whilst her eyes were so blidnded by smoke and tears that she no longer had the power or will to attend to art, from which it appeared to us that she wanted to take refuge in one long, eternal night's sleep. So art was forgotten, and its practitioners were overcome by poverty and contempt, to such an extent...that they were forced to take up alms or the beggar's staff instead of the brush, whilst the gently born could not bring themselves to apprentice their children to such despicable people. [3]

In the face of such vivid accounts, the hard evidence which they reflect, and the judgement of many historians, it may seem something of a paradox to realize that the period of the Thirty Years' War was nevertheless one of the greatest epochs in the history of European art. In many countries of Europe, including those of the major belligerants, many of the most outstanding artists not only in local histories but arguably in the entire history of humankind flourished just at this time. To mention but the plastic [bildende] arts, these include Velázquez and Zurbarán in Spain, Bernini in Rome, where the Frenchman Poussin was also active, Rubens, Van Dyck, and Jordaens in Flanders (and elsewhere), and Rembrandt, Hals, and a host of others in Holland.

Furthermore, lest we think that the most important artists found themselves far from the battlefield, or even deliberately remained far from the fray, it might be remembered, that war was raging, for example, on the borders of Holland and Flanders, both long-standing, vital centers for the arts, at a time when works continued to be produced in abundance. In the south a large number of painters' workshops remained active even after the death of Rubens and Van Dyck well into the 1640's (and beyond), and the Statthalter, the Austrian Habsburg Archduke Leopold Wilhelm could thus establish a large collection; in the north, an art market flourished. [4] The lesson of Lorraine is also particularly instructive here. While Callot, a native of the duchy, depicted horrors of the sort that were all too often visited on his war-ravaged land, and Claude Gelée (Claude Lorrain) went to Rome, Georges de la Tour remained at home, leaving little trace of the conflict in the quiet pictures that he continued to produce throughout the period. [5]

The apparent paradox that the arts might flourish even in times of war may in fact be encountered in many places and eras. In Japan, the period of the feudal barons (often known as Daimyo [6]), as in India that of the Mogul rulers, were eras of armed conflict, but also great ones for the arts. A good comparision might indeed be established between seventeenth-century Japan and Germany. In both lands lords fought each other in fierce struggles for survival, while they also cultivated the arts, employing them for self-expression, for representation. Closer to the area, if not the time in which the Thirty Years' War was fought, twentieth-century Europe has seen great art produced during times of wide-spread destruction, incomparably greater than that ever possibly caused by war in the seventeenth century: one thinks of Picasso, who spent the Second World War working away undisturbed in Paris.

A more nuanced view of the relation between war and peace, art and destruction in seventeenth-century Europe therefore seems in order. A clearer distinction is needed between the myth of decline and the European reality, hard as it was in some places. Not to deny the widespread, devastating effects on population in many areas of Central Europe in particular, the established opinion that the Thirty Years' War was at best a time of artistic decline might in the end even seem to be not simply a matter of historical fact, but also the result of longstanding artistic and literary descriptions, and the historiographic tradition related to them.

Other papers and aspects of this collection and exhibition study the role of arts in the conflicts of the time, the representation of warfare, and the theme of peace. Monuments to war and peace are also elsewhere taken into account. The present paper however takes up the crux of the question of art in regard to the Thirty Years' War, namely the problem of the fate of the arts in Central Europe in the first half of the seventeenth century.

Without entering into a full discussion of the relation of war to the arts, in all times and places, or even in all of Europe, it is to be sure easy enough to argue that in comparison with other regions, Central Europe suffered a decline in the arts, as it did in all other aspects of life. No Velázquez nor Zurbarán, no Bernini nor Poussin, and, if for the sake of argument we exclude the Low Countries from Central Europe - although here it should be remembered that the United Provinces of the northern Netherlands were separated from the Empire de jure only as a result of the Westphalian treaties, and that the southern Netherlands remained part of it - no Rubens, Van Dyck, nor Jordaens, nor Rembrandt nor Hals, either, are to be found in Central Europe.

While it may have lacked figures such as these famous painters and sculptors, there are however other ways of understanding the history of the arts of Central Europe. Salient aspects of art in this region are often related to but different from those found in other parts of Europe, just as their fate has also often been different. In introducing the present section, the purpose of this essay is thus to call attention to some other possibilities of interpretation, some other evidence that exists for sites of artistic production, patronage, and to a lesser extent collecting, as well as to point to some areas open for future investigation. [7]

The apparent absence of figures comparable to the contemporaneous giants of European art has not made the task easy. For the focus of art historians on great painters, and to a much lesser degree, sculptors, may have been a factor that has contributed to a general neglect of the arts of Central Europe during this epoch. Nevertheless, it may be that the excellence of the arts in Central Europe is to be sought in other realms of artistic endeavor: fountains, small sculpture, the applied arts, goldsmiths' work, architecture. Whatever the case may be, art historical research has largely so far avoided deep and thorough engagement with many features of Central European art history in the first half of the seventeenth century (except for the first decade or so), especially in Germany, Bohemia, and Austria. As a consequence, only quite recently - really only within the past decade - has there been any real effort to begin to attempt to attain a more balanced view of what actually was produced in the region at this time. An objective assessment of the fate of art in Central Europe at the time of the Thirty Years' War as more than catastrophic thus remains to be accomplished.

In order to try to approach such a balanced evaluation, it is necessary to consider what the actual conditions were in which art was made, what actually was done, and therefore what appropriate measures might be found for what happened after 1618, other than familiar stories of sack and destruction. And this task is also at present hard to accomplish, precisely because, as suggested, with the partial exception of architecture [8], no effort has yet been made even to survey fully the whole range of what was produced during this period. Thus many outstanding accomplishments may remain ignored, or if rediscovered, buried in specialized literature. Furthermore, any attempt to measure the amount of destruction wrought by the war, or to assess the possibility that art declined at the time, must obviously reckon first with what happened in Central Europe prior to 1618. For the thesis that art suffers through war, and that the arts thus declined because of the Thirty Years' War, assumes the postulate that there was a period of creation to be found before the war began that might establish a standard according to which it can be determined that a falling off later occurred.

In fact, the view that the Thirty Years' War set back the arts and other aspects of culture forms only part of a larger interpretation of the decline of German art. This thesis has rested on older assumptions - largely nationalistic and Romantic in inspiration in Germany, but not only there - that have seen a decline in the arts setting in with the Reformation and the death of the Altmeister of the generation of Dürer. It is a longstanding prejudice that German art in particular went downhill after c. 1530. The Thirty Years' War is accordingly said to represent the nadir in this development. [9]

Increasingly, however, aspects of this picture have come to be corrected. No doubt some artists and sculptors may well have felt at a disadvantage in Protestant areas after the Reformation, especially after the shock of iconoclasm, since in order to survive they were forced to meet different demands and thus to perform different sorts of tasks in response to changed circumstances. Demands for traditional kinds of church furnishings and altarpieces clearly diminished in some areas. But, on the other hand, other opportunities remained to be found, and new paths opened up for many other kinds of art. [10] Other genres and media replaced the traditional arts associated with the first generations of the sixteenth century.

Throughout the region, from Augsburg to Gdansk (Danzig), building projects, large-scale and individual, were also carried on right up to the beginning of the Thirty Years' War, and beyond. The architecture of the sixteenth and early seventeenth century is arguably at least as interesting as that produced before, if different, and it is in many ways distinctive and innovative. Churches and cloisters, but also villas, palaces, civic structures, and private residences were all built at this time. [11]

In any event, not only architecture, but production and consumption of art in many media persisted in many centers in the region well on into the seventeenth century, if in different forms than those seen previously. It has been demonstrated that sculpture in various new genres flourished in many forms. And most of the arts came to be ever more inflected in an international symphony, rather than simply local responses: this may be one reason why a more chauvinistic or provincial art history of an earlier era had trouble recognizing their quality.

It has also become established in recent scholarship, and now perhaps for a broader public, that the period continuing into the first decades of the seventeenth century constituted one of the great epochs for the arts for Central Europe. This is signalled by the widespread significance not just for the region, but for the arts in many other geographical areas, of the city of Prague, its most important site at the time. During the reign of Rudolf II (1576-1612), from the 1580's the imperial court was situated in Prague. Artists, artisans, and scientists flocked to Prague from all over Europe, and the impact, example, and samples of art created by Prague court artists radiated out not only throughout the mater urbium, but the world. An ever more abundant literature, and most recently what even "The New York Times" described as the first "Central European Blockbuster" exhibition, have demonstrated to both scholars and the general public many facets of this multicultural milieu. Not without some justice, then, could the 1997 exhibition "Rudolf II and Prague" claim that Rudolfine Prague was the >cultural and spiritual heart of Central Europe'. [12]

While the most important artistic center in Central Europe at its time, Rudolf II's Prague was not unique. Many of Rudolf II's contemporaries throughout the Empire - and in the neighboring lands of Hungary and Poland - shared his interests, from alchemy to the arts. The Habsburg emperor's proclivities have thus increasingly come to seem not merely idiosyncratic, but a mark of the age. From the Marburg and Cassel of Moritz der Gelehrte, to the Dresden of Christian II, to the Munich of Maximilian I of Bavaria, rulers of all confessions to a greater or lesser degree supported the arts. They built, enlarged, or redecorated their residences and churches, laid out gardens, formed collections, and patronized the arts and sciences in general.

One measure of the importance of the arts in Central Europe prior to the Thirty Years' War is indeed the very path of destruction or looting wrought on them by war. Notorious examples of sacks wrought by Swedes directly and indirectly point to the state of affairs. The rich monasteries of Bavaria and Swabia, and the Bavarian capital of Munich, provided a magnet for the Swedish armies of Gustavus Adolfus in their move south c. 1630. Similarly, it was the continuing fame of Prague that in 1648, even after the treaties were being signed in Westphalia. attracted Swedish armies to pillage the treasures of the Prague castle (the Hrad č...any). [13]

If the status and fate of sites that had previously been important be employed as a benchmark, the question might thus be made more precise. How did earlier artistic centers fare during the Thirty Years' War? This question might be posed about artists as well. Here again the question is even more complicated, since not only are older centers to be evaluated, but newer sources of patronage, kinds of art, and artists must be taken into account. The question must also be raised if it was the war alone, or some other factors or combination thereof, that slowed down or brought artistic activities to a close.

The example of Prague demonstrates the difficulty of satisfactorily solving this problem of interpretation. The Thirty Years' War began with the revolt of the Bohemian Estates, and its first major conflict was the Battle of White Mountain in 1620. With the restitution of Habsburg authority, and that of the Roman church, Protestants went into exile, many artists among them, including Wenzel Hollar and Karel Škréta, both of whom may have left for religious reasons (although Škréta later returned). But if Prague ceased to be the most important artistic center in the region, this change had started to occur already some time before the Battle of White Mountain. Many of the imperial court artists died around or before the time of the emperor's demise in 1612, at which date Rudolf's immediate successor Matthias reestablished the imperial residence in Vienna.

While many artists thus disappeared from the local scene, a number of important figures remained active in Prague. Adriaen de Vries, the leading bronze sculptor in Central Europe - and it might be argued, in all of Europe - retained his foundry in Prague until his death in 1626. He continued to purvey works to various potentates, including a monumental fountain for the king of Denmark at Frederiksborg, and Count Ernst of Schaumburg-Lippe, for whom he designed the mausoleum in Stadhagen and the baptismal font and other sculptures in Bückeburg, sculpture on which he continued to work into the 1620's. He also carried out a massive commission for Albrecht von Waldstein (Wallenstein), to be discussed further below. Similarly Aegidius Sadeler retained his workshop in Prague. With the absence of other painters, he is said to have turned increasingly to that art, from the specialization of print-making. In any event, Sadeler's surviving late works in various media and genres represent a significant change in his art, an engagement with tendencies that can be associated with pan-European artists, and he remained a siginficant enough talent to draw artists such as Sandrart himself to his atelier. The landscape painter Peter Stevens established a dynasty of artists in town.

While it can still be argued that the amount of artistic activity dropped off from the 1620's, as might for example be supported by the number of entries recorded in the book of the Prague Small Side (Malá Strana) painters' guild, some caution must also be exercised in talking about a total decline of the arts in Prague. [14] It may thus be somewhat startling to realize that the court continued to patronize art, and that in the year in which the Verneuerte Landesordnung was realigning the basis for property and power relationships in Bohemia, the imperial court was being entertained with theatrical and musical presentations in the imperial palace on the Hrad čany. [15] From 1638 there was renewed construction activity in this palace. Painters and sculptors, some whom had been or were associated with the court, such as Hans Hering, Ernst Jan Heidelberger, and Michael Mayer, also continued to work through the period of the war. Moreover, by at least the early 1640's the leading artist of the next generation, Karel Škréta, was back in Prague, and a new boom in building and decoration was also well underway. [16] The thesis that a radical break occurred in the culture of Bohemia with the Battle of White Mountain has therefore increasingly come under revisionist scrutiny. [17]

The Prague story points to a more general issue in regard to the episodic nature of the war. Everything did not come to a halt with the start of the conflict. Not all areas received the blow of fighting at the same time. Despite the ravages of war, not all patronage and production stopped even in countries touched by fighting. Earlier, courts, great and small, of the Empire had constituted one of the major foyers of the arts. As it had done traditionally, court patronage had thus provided one of the sources for consumption and for patronage. And yet courts both of greater and lesser importance provided foyers for the arts after the start of the war, many until circumstances cut them short, if not beyond.

For example, artistic activity in Dresden, and also elsewhere in electoral Saxony, had been initiated by the electors of the later sixteenth century, continued in emulation of Rudolf II under Christian II, and remained vital until the armies of Gustavus Adolfus and of Wallenstein (Waldstein) carried warfare to Saxony in the early 1630's. Although later constructions and the bombing of the city make it difficult to recover what was actually built at the time, the Riesensaal and other spaces on the upper floors in the Dresden Schloss were built or decorated at this time. [18] The architect and painter Wilhelm Dilich was active here. Several important sculptors retained their workshops in Dresden, including Sebastian Walther, Wolf Ernst Brohn, and Zacharias Hegewald. [19] They and goldsmiths such as Johann and Daniel Kellerthaler and Daniel Sattler, along with stonecutters, continued to work for the court and a variety of other clients well on into the seventeenth century. Numerous painters, now perhaps better known from their drawings, including Christian Schiebling, Kilian Fabritius, Jacob Walter, and many others were also to be found in Dresden. [20] The words of Jakob Böhme may therefore be taken as reflecting the artistic as well as the more general situation until 1632 when he said in 1624 that "Dresden ist jetzt ein Jubelstadt, wie einst Prag war." [21]

Other electoral (or aspiring electoral residences) also carried on as centers for the arts. Heidelberg was to be sure extinguished as a center, but other sites grew up in the Catholic camp. For example the Mainz archbishop, whose predecessor had built the extensive residence at Ascaffaenburg, began extensive work on the court chancellory and Residence in his electoral capital. Similarly in electoral Trier at least at the end of the conflict building were made for the chancellery and for the bishop's residence. Church building went on in Cologne, another electoral bishopric. [22] Among secular rulers, the Bavarian dukes stand out - not only because they gained the electoral dignity through the war. While they were in part responsible for the sack of the electoral seat of Heidelberg, on the other hand until the early 1630's Munich could also provide a rival for the Protestant courts. In Munich as elsewhere in Bavaria the construction and decoration of the residence and the outfitting of churches went on at least until the arrival of the Swedes in the 1630's. This was in part the result of the apatronage of the ambitious duke Maximilian I, who not only sought the electoral dignity, but supported the use of the arts as an arm of confessional conflict, as his predecessor had also done. Like other rulers of the time, Maximilian also increased his collection. [23]

Smaller courts also continued to provide centers for artistic creation. While the fate of the arts in these places could no doubt more directly effected by the events of the war, because of what can now be seen as relatively more limited resources and thus lesser resilience, the effect of the war was not always negative, nor always the sole, nor even major, determinant. As in Prague, much may also have depended from the person of the ruler, regardless of other, external circumstances. Thus Schaumburg-Lippe, whither De Vries had earlier sent bronzes for Bückeburg and Stadthagen, paled as a center of the arts with the death of the "kunstsinniger" prince Ernst. [24] Wolfenbüttel, on the other hand, after the reign of Rudolf II's friend Heinrich Julius preserved a small group of court artists, including the painters Christoph Gertner and Sebastian Schütz, and others. The Marienkirche received an important altarpiece, originally made for Prague, and an organ designed by Michael Praetorious, whose Syntagma Musicum was published on the eve of the war. Work on projects in town, as on the Schloss, continued until the war interrupted developments in the c. 1627. A hiatus lasted until the return of Duke August in 1643 did Wolfenbüttel begin to recover. [25]

While Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel became enmeshed in the war, with unfavorable consequences, further north Anton Günther, duke of Oldenburg, knew how to steer his way clear of difficulties, and even profitted from the situation. Aside from the years 1627-1631, when the war was brought directly to northern Germany, Oldenburg's trade in horses helped to make for a small cultural bloom in the region, Thus the palace in Oldenburg could be painted and decorated by Gertner, and the artist Wolfgang Heimbach could thrive in the region. [26] The boom in religious art in Oldenburg (and Delmenhorst) will be mentioned further below. In Hesse the Landgrave Moritz "der Gelehrte" may have been an iconoclast, but he was also an important patron of the arts. Under him the Kassel Kunstkammer established by his predecessors continued to grow. In addition to music, he supported several court artists, collected historical pictures, and commissioned various objects. [27] The situation in Hesse demonstrates that the fate of the arts during the time of the Thirty Years' War can be more complicated than a simple statement about decline would allow. For instance, even though this land was grievously dealt with by war, when after Moritz's abdication his dominions were restored to the evangelical faith, there occurred an incentive for Lutheran art: a prime example is the extensive redecoration of the court church in Marburg. The same might be said for the Thuringian duchies. While Thuringia, like Saxony, was later visited by warring armies, Weimar and Coburg both saw impressive Schlösser going up from the 1620's. In Gotha a monumental residence also went up from c. 1640: while its name Schloß Friedenstein bespeaks a longing for peace, its construction indicates what was possible even in the midst of war. [28]

In other major polities that might be judged to belong to Central Europe, this era also constitutes an acme in art history, despite the ravages of the Thirty Years' War. In Denmark, whose king served as head of the North German Kreis, and which therefore became embroiled in the war, the reign of Christian IV (1598-1648), as detailed within, establishes one of the high-water marks for the arts. His reign saw painting, sculpture, architecture, and goldsmiths' works made in and for Denmark by artists of European stature. Despite the military disasters suffered by the crown, the king continued to patronize major projects throughout his reign: paintings from leading Dutch artists were purveyed to Kronborg until the mid-1640's. [29] The related, if often antagonistic Schleswig court at Gottorf, the subject of recent attention, also thrived under Duke Friedrich III. [30] Although aside from continuing decoration in the form of stuccoed ceilings not much was added to the already completed late Renaissance Schloss, important gardens, garden buildings, and statuary were laid out around it, and the Kunstkammer within was enlarged.

Places ruled by prelates (other than archbishop electors) also reveal various vicissitudes of fortune, rather than any clear and distinct picture of decline. While the sacking of monasteries is a familiar story from the war, ecclesiastical residences beside the electoral bishoprics had varied fates, and could even support the arts for a certain period during the war. For example Salzburg and its environs remained relatively untouched, and began a period of "baroque" glory under its archbishops. In the bishopric of Würzburg [31], and more conspicuously in the Westphalian bishoprics, of interest to visitors of the 1998 exhibition, there is still evidence for at times conspicuous artistic production. In Paderborn the outstanding sculptor Heinrich Gröninger continued to produce epitaphs and altarpieces until his death in 1631. [32] In Münster, another site of the exhibition, his relative Gerhard Gröninger supplied impressive epitaphs for the Cathedral until 1636. [33] But this closing date for his activity in Münster may have had more to do with personal problems than those of the war. Moreover, a walk through the streets of the city of Münster will reveal (admittedly reconstructed) burgher houses of great pretension that bear dates into the mid-1630's, attesting to the survival of prosperity in the region (as evinced in other contemporarneous buildings in Westphalia).

Furthermore, while it hit hard in some places, the war largely passed by other, free cities. The free cities of northern Germany, Hamburg and Lübeck, remained physically untouched. It could be argued that they were of course effected by a decline in trading and commercial activities, and that the arts in them suffered accordingly, but the continuing activity of goldsmiths', painters' and sculptors' ateliers, many of whom provided works for other areas of northern Germany, and in particular construction of "palace-like" burgher houses in Hamburg at this time would seem to suggest that this opinion needs to be corrected. [34] The more southerly major free cities, Augsburg and Nuremberg, also remained intact, even if war swirled to their very bulwarks, and if in the instance of Nuremberg much tribute had to be paid. The construction and decoration of public buildings in both cities continued unimpaired during the first years of the conflict. Most prominent are the town halls constructed or decorated in both cities during this time. Economic downturn and conflicts of the age certainly affected both centers, but did not end them as major centers for artistic production, as is shown by subsequent recuperation, particularly in Augsburg. It has been said that the number and quality of Augsbrg artists declined, but again this may have been the result of generational change. Painters such as Matthias Gundelach and sculptors such as Georg Petel remained important presences. Objects made for Gustavus Adolfus such as the Upsala Kunstkabinett or bust by Petel attest to its continuing importance; the merchant and traveller Philipp Hainhofer could still order a whole host of objects here speaks for its remaining a center of production. [35] While Nuremberg was hit by war, it still remained a source for art, and certainly for literature, as the presence of the group known as the "Pegnitz Schaefers" attests. [36]

In contrast with the troubles of larger centers, one striking phenomenon of the age is in fact the survival, growth, and flourishing of smaller, local centers. It has been somewhat acknowledged that architecture could flourish widely throughout the region, but the same is true of sculpture. Lively workshops for sculpture could be found throughout the region, from the Alps to the Baltic. These were abundant especially in Bavaria and the Alpine regions. Most familiar is the workshop in Weilheim, where decorators and sculptors from Hans Degler through Hans Spindler, Barthelmä Steinle, and Philip Dirr attest to the production of high quality sculpture in wood throughout the age. But this was just a few out of many centers. In Schwäbisch Hall Leonhard Kern established a workshop that assumed an importance retained beyond the region. The Zurns also left a swath of work throughout the southern reaches of the Germanic area. [37] On the other hand, in Holstein Hans Gudewerdt and others continued to create works of a high European standard. The fate of Gudewerdt's workshop is a sign of what was possible in a time of conflict. Though disrupted by the war, Gudewerdt succeeded in reestablishing and continuing his workshop in Eckernförde, where they produced impressive, large wooden epitaphs and altarpieces. [38]

The cases of architecture and sculpture should cause a reexamination of the fate of painters, a more familiar subject. It is now clear that the travels of painters can be regarded not simply under the guise of the misfortunes of war, but in terms of traditional patterns of activity. [39] Artistic migration is in fact part of a continuing and larger pattern of European artistic activity in the early modern period, and the seventeenth century is not exceptional in this regard. To take some famous examples, a century that saw Germans abroad also saw major contemporary figures such as Poussin from France, Ribera from Spain, and François Duquesnoy from the Low Countries, make major careers for themselves in Italy. Within other countries, not only in Germany, internal migration was also often the rule: one can think of the Sevillian Velázquez in Madrid, or the Neapolitan Bernini in Rome, in addition to their numerous compatriots abroad. German migration abroad contributed similarly to the develpment of the arts in other countries: one can think of Jan Lys in Venice, as earlier of Adam Elsheimer in Rome, or of Govaert Flinck, Nicholas Knupfer and Johannes Lingelbach in the Northern Netherlands. The peregrinations of Sandrart and Johann Schönfeld from and to southern Germany, and of Škréta to and from Bohemia, while related to the war, can in the end not be taken as exemplary. They may be compared to the travels to Italy and England of artists such as Rubens and Van Dyck, where the journeys can also not simply be tied to elements of the war. Lievens similarly moved back and forth from the northern to the southern Netherlands, much as conversely Jacob Jordaens followed commissions that led him to the northern Netherlands. Artists seem to have pursued opportunities as they came availlable to them, and this applied no more to the denizens of Central Europe than it did to artists elsewhere. In northern Germany Juriaen (Jürgen ) Ovens similarly moved back and forth from Holstein to Holland, providing the town of Amsterdam as well as the Schleswig court with historical and allegorical paintings. [40]

But the fate of the arts in the time of the Thirty Years' War can be seen from more than the perspective of the previous epoch, of what happened to earlier centers, as to artists: the war opened up newer opportunities, as well as continuing older ones. This can be seen not only in negative terms - the booty carried off by armies - but in terms of new opportunities for patronage, and for new sources for commissions. The most prominent example of newer opportunities or stimuli to artistic production comes from the ecclesiastical domain: here the confessional conflicts that came to a head in the Thirty Years' War may actually be seen as actually having stimulated the construction and outfitting of churches. As suggested, it is of course true that this process began before the Thirty Years' War started. And with the onset of hostilities, Church construction and adornment did not stop, as we have seen, especially in the Catholic lands. But a new urgency might set in, especially, but not only, as seen in programs promoted by the newer orders commited to the promulgation of the Catholic faith. The activities of such groups involved in preaching and education, and hence in building structures appropriate for them, most notably the Jesuits, are well known: but in the cities and towns of the Empire that remained Catholic, the older, non-conventual preaching orders - the Franciscans and Dominicans - also played a major role in the arts, as in religious life.

Some of the following essays detail this situation for Moravia, and for Silesia, which became a particular site for confessional conflict. [41] In other areas of Central Europe - Bohemia, Hungary, Austria, Germany - especially the Jesuits, and to a lesser degree other newer orders such as the Carmelites and Servites, were no less active as major promotors of newer artistic projects and designs. After the battle of White Mountain the Jesuits, and other orders, would understandably be involved in the reimposition of the Catholic Faith in Bohemia, the epicenter of the first shock of conflict. And so the capital, Prague, eventually saw three Jesuit colleges and churches established. The first of these, the Salvator Church, had been founded before the revolt of the Estates, but work on its redesign was recommenced in the 1630's, at approximately the same time the foundation stone of the adjacent Jesuit university, the Clementinum was laid. This complex would be completed soon after the peace, and the Salvator Church transformed into a splendid triumphal statement, situated at a key point near the Charles Bridge on the royal coronation way. [42] Elsewhere in Bohemia proper, already during wartime Jesuit churches were commenced or transformed that appear equally impressive in their settings: buildings in the Italianate manner appeared throughout the kingdom, in Březnice, Hradec Kralové, and České Bud'ejovice. [43]

Within Germany the order also continued its support of major projects, as new colleges and churches continued to be built. [44] Structures were begun, or completed with splendid decorations in such places as Düsseldorf, Cologne, and Landshut. On the one hand, these buildings are notable both for the variety of styles they display - in some places, like Cologne, they deliberately evoke the medieval past; in others, as at Düsseldorf, they used newer forms such as the wall-pillar church, already employed on the eve of the war as at the Jesuit church at Dillingen. On the other hand, whether completing towers as at Neuburg an der Donau, or adding stucco as in Dillingen, or a complete series of sculptures and painting in Cologne, these churches also introduce striking and novel church fittings, meant to impress and win over their congregations.

In Austria and Hungary works begun and often completed during the time of the Thirty Years' War by the Jesuits also displayed their adaptability, while introducing various sorts of artistic innovations. [45] In Vienna, the imperial residence, the Jesuits both occupied and transformed a previously existing church ("am Hof"), and also introduced a new form of architecture in their university church. In Innsbruck the Jesuit church rebuilt from 1627 belonged to another local boom in church construction: it varied the type of the Salzburg cathedral, combining it with wall pillar types. This sort of combination of old and new, indigenous and external most evident in Jesuit church in Hungary, at Trnava (now in Slovakia), where the first college in the hungarian lands was founded: here for example the interior combines Italian stucco with a familiar wood altarpiece.

While the Jesuits are the best known of the newer Counter-Reformation orders, other reformed (and reforming) groups also were active in Central Europe, perhaps chief among them - as indeed in the Spanish and Portuguese - speaking world, but also in Flanders and Poland - the Carmelites. Both in their male and female forms, this order put up or in the instance of Prague, took over) churches throughout the area just during the years of the Thirty Years' War. While in Prague they took over the former Lutheran church, in Vienna, in Cologne, and in Regensburg, they created new structures. Because of the connections with Italy, these buildings often incorporate stylisticaly advanced Italianate elements. [46]

The older orders were also often active in the arts. Thus for example not only new groups such as the Jesuits, the Servites, and the Paulaner settled in Vienna and built their establishments there. The older mendicants also built and decorated new churches in the seventeenth century. While the Franciscans had put up their new church on the eve of the war, during the conflict the Dominicans constructed a church not far from the Jesuits, with a style and and grandeur not inferior to those of the other order. [47] In Prague the outfitting of the Premonstratensian cloister at Strahov received major attention, as the remains of St. Norbert were transferred to it in great ceremony. [48]

In contrast, works made for Protestants have hardly attracted the sort of attention that Catholic art, so often associated with the baroque, has command. Yet especially in some Lutheran areas there was also a great outpouring of a variety of kinds of art. Whole churches were erected, and for them, as well as for older structures, there were made altarpieces, pulpits, baptismal founts, organ prospects, and epitaphs, among other sorts of works. Some of these, such as the extraordinary equestrian monument to chancellor Behr or the stage set tomb for the dukes in the church of Bad Doberan by H. Döterer are quite exceptional individual creations. Other complexes, such as that of the Marburg court church, represent remarkable responses, in this instance of Lutherans to Calvinists. [49] Impressive epitaphs and altarpieces were also added in the cathedral in Schleswig. [50] Throughout Protestant areas many other examples can be found: but in general art made for Protestants in the seventeenth-century Germany remains largely uncharted territory.

One figure who exemplifies the quality (and quantity) of art that Protestants could cultivate at this time is Ludwig Münstermann. The Hamburger Münstermann profited from favorable conditions in Oldenburg and Delmenhort to supply a wide variety of works of the types mentioned above (altarpieces, epitaphs, baptismal founts, pulpits, etc.) until his death in 1637 or 1638. His altarpieces and pulpits often rival those for the Catholics in their opulence, and vivid expression. Yet they also deliver a clear theological message, that differs in its purport and tone from those of their rivals. It seems justified to regard this art as a confessional response to Catholic church creations. [51] And Münstermann was only one of many sculptors at work on Protestant objects during this period: for example, in addition to the Gudewerdts, in Osnabrück, another site of this exhibition, for example, Adam Stenelt retained an important workshop until his death in the 1620's. [52]

The Thirty Years' War also created possibilities for the arts in the secular realm. It was, after all with imperial favor, and wealth and lands gained from the war, that families such as the Liechtensteins and Dietrichsteins began their ascent. And their increased status also found expression in artistic patronage: some of this story, at least as it applies to te situation in Moravia is told within. But even more striking is the opportunity afforded "new men". Most famous of the Central European daimyo, warlords who also promoted the arts. Wallenstein rose to the pinacle of success until he was murdered. He established a large duchy in Bohemia and Silesia, and his palace is still the largest in the Prague Malá Strana [53]. His palace in Prague and garden in Prague, his ideal city in Jičin, discussed, below, form however only part of a larger picture. For the model established by Wallenstein may be said to have been followed by other members of the soldatesca who installed themselves in the Czech lands. These included notably figures such as Romberto Collalto, in Brtnice, Piccolomini, in Nachod, and many others. It might seem that the gargantuan model suggested by Wallenstein may even have stimulated scions of older artistocratic families, such as the imperial general Lobkowitz [54], to plan a similiarly impressive building right after the war in Roudnice.

Finally, the works promoted by this new class of patron point to some of the distinctive characteristics of art in the Thirty Years' War. Forged out of the fire of the time, the works they commissioned were both inspired by older models, and create something new. For instance, in the individual forms used for works for him, even in some of the artists, and in his employment of the arts as a form of representation Wallenstein clearly seems to emulate art in the imperial castle on the Hradčany, at the foot of which his palace lay. But his gigantic establishment converts the subtle language of the late Renaissance into the the gradiosity of what might be associated with the "baroque". And the artists he used not only represented the best of the previous generation - some of the last works by De Vries were to be found in his garden - but ideas of the new. These include the garden layout in Prague, tree-line alley to Valdice, the loggia of his palace, and the transformation of Guercino's and Reni's pictorial inventions in frescoes in his palace. A newer generation had found newer forms and purposes for art.

Much remains for future scholarship to investigate. The role of Wallenstein's rivals and peers, the varieties of Protestant art, the range of small German courts, art in the free cities - these and many other topics would repay investigation. This essay, and catalogue, will have done their job if they suggest that whatever its costs, and however much destruction it wrought, the Thirty Years' War was also not a totally barren time for art. The human spirit is indomitable, and even in times of war, art can be made. Or, as one of many emblems of the time would have put it vires inclinata resumo.

FOOTNOTES