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Inside the Architectural Box: Space and Relief in the Pergamon-Room SPACE, n1: 1. a.

Without article: Lapse or extent of time between two definite points, events, etc. Chiefly with adjs., as little, long, short, small. RELIEF3: 1. a. In the plastic arts, the elevation or projection of a design, or parts of a design, from a plane surface in order to give a natural and solid appearance; also, the degree of such projection; the part which so projects. (Oxford English Dictionary, Second Edition 1989).

I (Prologue) The conference “Retrospective: Aesthetics and Art in the 20th Century” seems a particularly good occasion to reconsider theories of space and of pictorial representation, and their conflation into a distinctly modern idea of architectural space within the last century. After decades of scrutiny, one claim of architectural modernism remains largely intact today, if not completely unchallenged: the modernist style in architecture is thought to reflect a new “conception of space,” one that is the product of a structural change in human vision. It has been repeatedly argued that architecture of the 20th century had to be different from those of the preceding epochs since a new “man” perceived, experienced and conceived space differently. A number of authors, above all, Siegfried Giedion (1888-1968) diagnosed the revolution in the conception of space around 1910, particularly in Cubist painting.11 In Space, Time and Architecture (1941), Giedion argues that the discovery of perspective in Renaissance epitomized a world-view that remained valid for four centuries, until the first decade of the 20th century. By breaking with Renaissance perspective, and by showing the object from several points of view simultaneously, Cubism inaugurated the modern conception of space. The new conception does not construe space as a three-dimensional static void, but introduces the fourth dimension, which Giedion called “space-time.”22 Unlike the central and static interiors of Renaissance, modern architecture should reflect the dynamic nature and interdependence of space and time. Although Giedion finds Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity and the futurist “research into movement” as the pioneers of the new age alongside Cubism, he offers only a vague idea about how exactly the new concept of time is different from the classical models of temporality.33 Hence Space, Time and Architecture translates a particular interpretation of analytical Cubism into architecture, one that does not see fragmentation of the picture plane as a negation of the totality of composition as such. For Giedion, Cubism does not threaten to fracture homogeneous space. Quite on the contrary, it enables a more truthful presentation of the whole with the superimposition of multiple viewpoints. In his space-time we might detect a Neoplatonic bias against appearance (Giedion dismisses perspective since it is an imitation of appearances), and a quest for the “quiddity of things.”44

1 2 3

1. Siegfried Giedion, Space, Time and Architecture (Cambridge Mass.: The Harvard University Press, 1941), 355-63. 2. Ibid., 357.

3. According to Giedion “previously time had been regarded in one of two ways: either realistically, as something going on and existing without an observer… or subjectively, as something having no existence apart from an observer and present only in sense experience.” He does not specify, however, how the new concept of time will transcend this objective versus subjective dualism except for repeating several times that modern space and modern time are interdependent. His dualism of “realistic” versus “subjective” time seems a very simplified (mis)reading of Henri Bergson’s “durée.” Ibid., 364.
4 4. See the recent critique of Giedion’s “space-time” by Robin Evans, The Projective Cast: Architecture and Its Three Geometries (Cambridge Mass.: The MIT Press, 1995).

it is more equivocally of the world. and if the general revolution in the “space conception” is a fiction of modernist theory. op. Giedion. op. Cf. he notes that architecture offers a case exceptionally different from the visual arts since “substantial yet representational. permit the hovering relations of planes and the kind of ‘overlapping’ which appears in contemporary painting. Can we still determine common aesthetic principles that would explain modernism in art and architecture? What exactly makes the transparent curtain wall and the integration of the inside and the outside in the “plan libre. time and motion transform the architectural box? Questions of that sort can be multiplied. unified and isotropic space in architecture. the Bauhaus in Germany. form 5 6 7 5. It was soon to take root in architecture. The fact that the Pergamon-Room was conceived as a part of a “museum of architecture” certainly complicates the relation between “pictorial” and “real” spaces. cit.”66 Therefore the question is whether a radical reformulation in the pictorial representation of space be directly translated into a new idea of space in the building-art? By equating the transparency of the glass curtain wall of the Bauhaus with the “simultaneity” and “overlap” of viewpoints on Picasso’s canvas. De Stil in the Netherlands. such literal translation of Cubism into architecture is not without consequences. On the other hand. The present essay is a work-in-progress that was originally conceived as a fragment of a longer piece on the question of representation in the 20th century architecture.”55 In The Projective Cast (1995) Robin Evans effectively questions Giedion’s translation of Cubist “transparency” into architecture.” in Rowe. 65. About Gropius’s Bauhaus. idea. and at the same time about the world than any other art form.2 The Cubist discovery of a new space conception. It starts with the preposition that the modernist translation of pictorial to architectural space—Giedion’s “space-time” in particular—can no longer be taken for granted. which eventually became orthodoxy.” the true expression of the modern age? Is there a rationale for “transparency” in modern architecture beyond stylistic preference? Did the early 20th century experiments with space. according to Giedion. 1976).” In an often-quoted comparison of Walter Gropius’s Bauhaus building (1926) to Picasso’s painting L’Arléssienne (1911-12). The extensive transparent areas. The following pages focus on an architectural gallery. The “modern style” in architecture is presented as identical with the modern “conception of space. Instead. One problem in Giedion’s “space-time. 7.. found its expression across fields and artistic genres. 6. through Le Corbusier in France. by dematerializing the corners. an interior that was designed specifically to reproduce the “space conception” of another time and another place. Along the course of the study we shall engage theories of appearance. Colin Rowe and Robert Slutzky’s seminal essay “Transparency: Literal and Phenomenal.” Not surprisingly. Giedion argues that both Cubism and modernist architecture are guided by the principle of transparency.. which Giedion takes as a literal translation of cubist fragmentation of the picture plane. the “transparent” architectural box of the Bauhaus. In contrast to Giedion. the Pergamon-Room of the Berlin Museum (1930).77 Paradoxically.” for example. a series of questions will emerge. (Figures 1. 403. not to forget the achievements of Futurism in Italy and Constructivism in Russia. but a homogeneous. 2). The Mathematics of the Ideal Villa and Other Essays (Cambridge Mass. which were contemporaneous with Cubism in France. This interpretation.: The MIT Press. Giedion wrote: “it is the interior and the exterior of a building that are presented simultaneously. Giedion collapses the difference between pictorial and physical space. locates modern architecture as a consistent and integral part of a general aesthetic modernism. Evans. if the free-flowing and transparent space of modern architecture is not necessarily a direct translation of Cubism. cit. offers not a fragmented. is apparent in his equivocal theory of “transparency. we shall inquire into other ways to engage the representative-content of the architectural box in the 20th century and negotiate its boundaries with the ‘virtual space’ of the picture plane. Nevertheless it is my intention to discuss the Pergamon-Room as a heuristic model of a museum interior where the 20th century aesthetics of space came to the foreground. 2 .

the hall is surrounded with light-colored walls with no window to the outside with the exception of its translucent ceiling. The frieze. are mostly left unoccupied. which actually corresponds to two wings of the altar beside the great stairway. is a rectangular prism of approximately 20m high. Only a small portion of the frieze. The space that the giant prism defines is mostly left empty in the form of a large void. The exhibited objects are arranged alongside the inner walls of the room. (Figure 5). and their descriptions are often brilliant. The flat and mostly unarticulated surfaces of these walls give the impression that the altar is exhibited inside a giant Platonic prism. They also frame the overall composition as seen from the entrance. inspired modern artists and writers alike since Carl Humann shipped its fragments to Berlin during the excavations of Bergama in 1878-1886. and became a familiar image to people. these three walls exhibit a long frieze in sculptural relief. Given its cultural and art historical importance we may assume that the display of the Gigantomachy is the primary concern that shaped the Pergamonsaal of the Berlin Museum. the architecture of display. As sculptural objects in space. Most visitors would also agree that there in the museum we stand in the presence of one of the opera nobile of the history of architecture. what sort of cognate is this monument? Is it a thing? Can it be displaced and replaced? And what about the modern space of the gallery. Yet. these two wings give the impression that the reconstructed altar is a freestanding monument. They raise 20m from the ground and meet the glass ceiling with a simple ornamental moulding. The eye of the observer scans horizontally on the frieze. that is. leaving a permanent impression on the viewer. many of who did not even visit Berlin to see it with their own eyes. The observer enters the room from a gate off the center. the discursive and aesthetic parameters that sustain the authenticity of experience? From a strictly architectural point of view the object of experience is a modern interior. They are not exactly hanged on the wall in the way a picture canvas is displayed in a gallery.3 and representation of space in the German aesthetics. from which the modernist “space-time” seems to have departed. the “Gigantomachy frieze” once decorated the four sides of a freestanding altar in Pergamon. the optical reality-effects. facing the main exhibit with a sharp perspective angle. The Pergamon Hall. is exhibited with its architectural context. Approximately 130 feet in length. Somewhere near their lower edge. those wonderful annunciations of the object as an original work of art. A wide range of photographs. reconstructed on the opposite side of the room. II Let me begin by noting the difficulty to describe the object. This semantic difficulty.” referring to a modern presentation of a lost monument. 4). It represents a scene from the mythic battle of the Olympian gods with the giants. The other three walls. Most of the marble panels of the frieze are exhibited on the walls of the room. Take for example the museum guides. The truth is that we do not know exactly what the object is. or the “Pergamonsaal” as it is called in German. which remain on two sides and at the back of the observer at the moment of entry. 3 . a classicizing cornice. reproduced in all possible forms and in most unlikely places constructed a large field of reception. the collapse of the difference between the referent and the reference. Here in the hall we may observe two different strategies of display. The moment of entrance was no doubt conceived as one of the most important aspects of the Pergamonsaal. 51m wide and 32m deep. Two wings of this façade extend from the rear wall of the Pergamonsaal towards the observer. or what it stands for. daylight gives the room its peculiarly austere character. which depicts the extremely expressive forms of bodies in motion. The visitor’s attention is immediately directed at the façade of an ancient monument from the Hellenistic city of Pergamon. did not trouble many who undertook a description before. The object reached a wide audience. rather are incorporated into the plaster finishing of the modern walls.” others simply the “Great Altar. (Figures 3. and reconsider a theory of “kinesthetic” perception. as incorporated into the reconstructed façade. Filtered through the double layers of the glass roof. independently from the reconstructed altar. although it is placed significantly higher than the eye level. Some earlier accounts call it the “Zeus Altar of Pergamon. On all sides.

somewhere in the middle of the Pergamonsaal. which is curiously experienced as distinct from the overall interior of the Pergamonsaal. to the columns. and that this translation occurs in two distinct. It evokes a sense of enclosure and exposure in the face of an imaginary 4 . the observer sees the Pergamon Altar as an “ensemble” at a glance. Even though the observer physically leaves an exhibition hall and enters another.” the eye erases the modern partition wall in the background. which are apparently protected against tactile perception. which runs parallel to the reconstructed façade. which unfold the optical construction of its reality-effect. Here. and through the columns of the peristyle. The large steps. At the moment of entrance. The impression is certainly that of looking at the Pergamonsaal from inside the monument: a view from inside out. the central colonnade looks like the peristyle of an ancient monument. complementary spheres of perception. If we ignore for a moment the two freestanding wings. define the boundary that demarcates the space of the museum in front of the altar. and reaches the broad flight of the great stairway. It does not construe the third dimension out of a two-dimensional picture. In analogy to rhetoric I shall call this communicative strategy an architectural synecdoche. we have observed that the Pergamonsaal consists of carefully chosen visual effects which translates a modern interior into an antique building. we may conclude that the stairway is a part of the original altar. from the space of the altar proper. through a gate. Yet. a masterful treatment of enclosures gives the visitor the impression of entering inside of a Greek temple. base and entablature of the altar. which across a row of Ionic columns leads first to a vestibule overlooking the Pergamonsaal. It is also important to note that this effect is not necessarily a trompe l’oeil in the limited definition of the term. This architectural boundary between the Pergamonsaal and the Telephos Room is perceived as the threshold between the outside and the inside. while the section of the wall immediately above the colonnade is dematerialized. more than a modern architectural element. The gallery. The large void in front of the altar magnifies the effect of depth and compels the observer to read the sculptural relief as the image of a building. More specifically it gives an impression of crossing the boundary between inside and outside. Yet the reconstruction of a representative part—which is technically speaking a combination of freestanding sculptural forms and sculptural relief. At the end of the stairs the viewer reaches a higher platform. Characteristically. In order to give the Pergamon Altar its discernible “façade. they are encouraged to ascend the stairs. the part that stands for the whole. This is in sharp contrast. The first sphere is analogous to the contemplation of a picture. we shall observe a series of complimentary impressions. and the “neutral” surface of the modern museum. however. the experience takes a different form. attributed to antique Pergamon. Secondly. Just like in any other museum. which it physically lacks. From a distant perspective. Hence the modern Pergamonsaal is translated into an impression of the antique Pergamon Altar. This effect that brings the Pergamonaltar in the foreground while defacing the architectural frame. rather walks through the scenery. for example. and just focus on the central colonnade of the Zeus Altar. Particularly the sculptural figures that are kneeled on these very steps powerfully integrate the exhibit with its frame. The aesthetic distance between the observer and the object of perception lends the reconstructed altar an effect of completeness. The viewer no longer contemplates the altar as a tableau from distance. security officers watch the crowd that might feel compelled to actually touch the monument. This room is named after Telephos a separate frieze that narrates the legend of foundation of the city of Pergamon. provides the visitor with a view of the Pergamonsaal from above. Yet the visitors are not only allowed to step on it. (Figure 6). The Telephos Room contitutes an architectural interior. as if it is simply the sky. to a separate exhibition room of the museum. the architectural promenade through the altar gives the visitor the impression of occupying the original space of a Hellenistic building. presenting the sculptural frieze on both sides. and then. yet. conveys the effect of the whole monument. The stairs take the viewer through the altar. these points are located at the very sites where the reconstructed altar meets the museum’s wall. A closer look suggests that the Pergamonsaal consists of critical spots. Judging from its white marble finish.4 As the observer proceeds towards the façade. is the result of a simple contrast between highly articulated façade. we will see that this central section is a sculptural articulation of the modern partition wall between the Pergamonsaal and the Telephos room. as seen both from outside and inside. So far. the aesthetic aspect of this contrast is nevertheless remarkable: The Pergamon Altar is read as a work of art against the background of a non-ground.

the observer is overwhelmed by the vision of an ensemble. The distant perception of the altar as a picture and the subsequent experience of an enclosure do not conflict one another due to. Indeed it was far from it. but the prism functions as a giant optical apparatus that construe Pergamon as a modern spectacle. through this very process. Zentral Archiv. Paradoxically. what me may call. Baudokumentation. In other words. each of which restore an image of the ancient monument in the form of a sculptural relief. In lieu of the Great Altar of Pergamon. and pasting them on the interior walls of the museum. III 8 8. Antiken. Hoffmann and Wille’s abstract-Neoclassicism modernized the space into a cube with citations of Greek architecture. Deutsches und Vorderasiatisches Museum. Just as this strategy depends on the material presence of a work of art in the interior. and space as a representation of bodies in motion. Baudokumentation. maintained this basic idea. we have to acknowledge that the interior designed by Messel in 1907 was not a “prisme pure” to use a modernist term. Project for the State Museum. displaces the work from its original context and induces it to acquire the status of art-for-experience (Erlebniskunst). we have in Berlin four picture-planes. A perspective view of the altar from distance was the initial idea that led the German architect. Even though the wall of the gallery cuts through the altar as a picture plane. and only in the event of experience. or rather. the original Altar became subordinate to its frame of display. The status of the altar as a freestanding tectonic corpus is compromised to achieve the visual effect of an artistic whole.88 It was rather in the subsequent revisions from 1911 to 1928 by the architects Ludwig Hoffmann and Wilhelm Wille that the Pergamon Room lost its distinctive character as a style room. the modern presentation deprived the Great Altar of Pergamon from its buildinghood. Ludwig Hoffman. For an understanding of this experience it may well be useful to survey briefly two theoretical problems that emerged in the aesthetics of the turn of the last century: space as perceived by an observer in motion. The prism. 5 . the impressions of a moving eye restores the third dimension beyond this plane. dating from this period. Despite radical changes in its shape and program. The modern reconstruction created the atmosphere of experiencing the temple not by restoring it to its entire form. prior to examining the reconstructed altar with close-ups in profile. rather by translating its façades into four picture planes. Alfred Messel to design the room in the form of a large. I/BV 496. a scenario of experience.99 (Figure 7). illustrate the Pergamonsaal both from inside and outside. a mnemonic sequence. Hence a total image of the altar is constituted only for an observer in motion. so to speak. To the contrary of the common impression.5 landscape. In striking contrast to the historical altar a freestanding building. but is transformed into a self-contained rhetorical part. this said. It is not that a historic altar is relocated and contained in a modern interior. a synecdoche of antiquity. Zentral Archiv. For the modern viewer the prism of the Pergamonsaal seems to function solely as the frame of aesthetic experience in the Kantian sense of the word. the Pergamonsaal. Alfred Messel. it defaces the architectural frame. 1911 the Pergamon Museum. which floats in an unfamiliar. Yet. the Pergamon Museum. which rounded the corners of the cubical space was to transform the space into a reinterpretation of the Pantheon-type volume with a distinctively Pergamene decoration. its reconstruction in Berlin is reduced into a sculptural relief inside the museum. which defines the Pergamonsaal. New Building (Hoffmann’s revision’s on Messel’s project). unoccupied void in 1907. I/BV 494. The modern museum fulfills its function only when the exhibited object is aesthetically differentiated from its frame. The space of the Pergamon Altar extends in front of the viewer as a virtual space that is perhaps comparable to the 19th century stereoscope. To put it polemically. modern space. the giant prism. an ornament. 9 9. Project for the Museum Island. Berlin 22 August 1907. Two perspective drawings by Messel. The vision proceeds from the general to the particular and constitutes a visual field that restores an architectural continuum. It was through this process that the façade of the Pergamon Altar ceased to be read as an integrated part of the interior. A false ceiling.

Citations and page numbers are from the revised English translation published in Mallgrave and Ikonomou. 10 10. Developments in the theory of empathy and psychology particularly inspired a new generation of architectural historians. There is of course nothing innovative in such statement. Hildebrand calls literally “motion-ideas” [“Bewegungsvorstellungen”]. “Prolegomena to a Psychology of Architecture” (1886) and August Schmarsow’s inaugural lecture in Leipzig. L’Évolution créatrice (Paris: Félix Alcan. Das Problem der Form in der Bildenden Kunst. and Space: Problems in German Aesthetics. 1901). That which interested the theorists of these years was no longer the harmonious agreement between the “structural core” and the “artistic dress” of a building. is nothing else than the impressions of an eye registered from successive. Hildebrand was a practicing sculptor who made a name by reviving the classical genre of bas-relief. “The Problem of Form” is his unique contribution to theory.The essential difference between the way this question was posed in the late 19th century. which he calls “surface image” [Flächenbild] that leads to “visual ideas” [“Gesichtsvorstellungen”].” for Hildebrand.”1414 “Motion-ideas. 1994). (1911). and my attempt to revise it. 6 . The problem of architecture was increasingly posed as the sensory effects of architectural form on human mind and body. the new theory of space eventually called the 19th century theory of “tectonics” in architecture into crisis. and already fully “modern.Adolf Hildebrand (1893). form and artistic representation. Despite his idealism. and apparently written under the supervision of Conrad Fiedler (1841-1895). 14 14. Arthur Mitchel. 229.” The author’s use of “motion” or “kinesthetic ideas.6 Highly innovative. Hildebrand nevertheless seeks to employ the findings of perceptual psychology in order to discover the objective and universal laws of artistic representation in the visual arts.1010 Here. cit. (New York: Random House. op. 3rd revised edition (Strasbourg: Heitz & Mündel. as defined in Karl Bötticher’s analysis of the Greek tectonics in the 1850’s. English translation: Creative Evolution. 1907). cit. the author starts with the question of how the third dimensional space is perceived from a single viewpoint. and two dimensional. for it rehearses a well-known preposition of the idealist aesthetics. Hildebrand draws his most striking examples from the representation of the third dimension in the genre of bas-relief. and more as a discursive and historical phenomenon. Besides its far-fetched manifestations in the visual arts.” could in fact be misleading. a synthetic idea. Heinrich Wölfflin’s dissertation. the late 19th century aesthetics made a permanent imprint on the theories of space in modern architecture. “The Essence of Architectural Creation” (1893) are symptomatic of a landslide in architectural theory. transl. The second type of vision is construed by the impressions of the eye in movement: “the mobility of the eye scans three dimensional object and transforms perception into temporal sequence of images. Form. 1873-1898 (Santa Monica: The Getty Center for the History of Art and the Humanities. 12 12.1212 Having posed the question of appearance.”1313 This. 13 13. In his theory Hildebrand does not refer to a continuous flow of movement—like for example in Henri Bergson’s contemporaneous conception of the “durée. Unlike other figures of the German Aesthetics that held university posts. In The Problem of Form. His treatise nevertheless has the virtue of clarity: in searching the laws of perception of pictorial and real space. yet form is a projection of the human mind. 1944).1111 We shall cite only one text among a wide range of Neo-Kantian work: “The Problem of Form in the Visual Arts” by Adolf Hildebrand (1847-1921). written in Germany in 1893. we will start with a question that was of great interest to theoreticians of German aesthetics in the late 19th and early 20th century: how is the appearance [Erscheinung] of an object in space translated into artistic representation [Darstellung]? And what does this translation teach us about the modern concept of space [Raumvorstellung]? Although the 20th century phenomenology made this question largely obsolete in philosophy by gradually freeing the space from the mental eye of the subject. His initial assumption is that a single eye sees the object as flat. Henri Bergson. 11 11. lies in the fact that I see the modern concept of space less as a set of structural rules that explain the essence of artistic creation. physiology and the Neo-Kantian aesthetics in Germany. Hildebrand suggests that nature does not offer forms as such. Empathy. Hildebrand.” a theory of space came into the foreground at the turn of the last century alongside the simultaneous rise of psychology. translated into English as “kinesthetic. op. see Harry Francis Mallgrave and Eleftherios Ikonomou. For a recent anthology of German aesthetics. but nevertheless fixed positions.

Hildebrand seems to use photogrammetry as a methodological postulate of his theory of space. Its outermost points. For the origins of architectural photogrammetry in Germany see Herta Wolf. and by systematizing the third dimension as a series of planar strata. and their exact location vis-à-vis the monument are known.” Camera Austria 51/52. positioned in such a way that the figure’s outermost points touch the glass. 1972). in a planar stratum of uniform depth. Hildebrand’s conception of space sounds.1616 This space. and from slightly different angles. “The Concept of Relief. This technique codifies architectural space as superimposition of transparent contours. First. and the real space as two parallel universes that are governed by the same rules of evoking psychological stimuli. Working on a relief. 17 17. such as the focal length of each camera. continue to lie on a single plane. their distance from one another.1515 Hildebrand’s generalization of the metaphor of bas-relief into a theory of space has two interesting implications. that is to make itself recognizable. the human mind perceives objects in space by reducing them into their most-revealing contours. 82. Secondly.1717 Architectural photogrammetry—just like Hildebrand’s “kinesthetic” images—depends on the register of a building by two different cameras. 16. Instead he redefines the pictorial space. the third dimension of architectural space can be calculated and registered. cit. The figure then occupies and describes a space of uniform depth. If the exposure details of two successive photographs.1818 Having started from the principle of stereoscopic vision. 1995. so to speak. but also goes on to systematize the very idea of space according to the same optical principle. and each form tends to spread out along the surface. touching the panes.” he argues that the genre of sculptural relief offers the best example to demonstrate this point. “The Problems of Form” does not only limit itself to an explanation of how space is perceived. “Das Denkmälerarchiv Fotographie / Photography: An Archive of Monuments. Michael Podro. even if the panes are taken away. Hildebrand. The Manifold in Perception: Theories of Kant from Kant to Hildebrand (Oxford: The Clarendon Press. 251. 18 18. the author visualizes the idea of depth with a series of planes running at right angles to the line of sight. Albrecht Meydenbauer of the Prussian Royal Metric Institute is credited for using photogrammetry for the first time in the 1860’s in order to survey of architectural monuments. as well as by means of a general idea of depth. Hildebrand takes the principle of stereoscopic vision—which was well known since English physicist Charles Wheatstone’s discovery of stereography in 1832—as the basis of his theory of perception: the superimposition of two surface impressions by two eyes. op.7 This actually explains why the superimposition of images registered simultaneously by two human eyes is already a “motion-idea. the sculptor starts to carve the surface on the subsequent stratum. A picture is not an imitation of the exterior appearance of the object. 15 16 15. the sculptor achieves a representation of space by carving surfaces that gradually recesses towards the background. is literally transparent to the extent it is conceptualized as a recession of transparent or imaginary picture planes. quite mechanistic so much so that it reminds the reader of the technique of photogrammetry. As Herta Wolf shows in her recent study. The output of photogrammetry is a two dimensional map that represents depth in function of the recession of the building parts from the picture plane. This provides Hildebrand with a metaphor to explain the rules that govern human perception of the third dimension: One can illustrate this principle by imagining a figure placed between two parallel panes of glass. an optical apparatus that maps third dimensional space based on the principle of stereo-photography. Photogrammetry is primarily used today for survey of territory and production of cartographic maps out of aerial photographs. each of which looking at the same object from a slightly different viewpoint mentally constructs the space as three-dimensional. 7 . within which its component parts are arranged… The figure lives. we may conclude. According to Hildebrand. and reconceptualizes it as a relief.” even though the observer might be at a standstill. Yet. Hildebrand’s theory refuses that mimesis is the basis of artistic representation. at first. As the figures on the foreground are given form. In the 5th chapter of his treatise.

son application aux arts et aux sciences. Having combined a battery of twelve to twenty-four distinct cameras. 1885). French translation of the 2nd revised German edition of 1886 (Paris: Gauthier-Villars et Fils. 1887). time and motion its importance will be clear. for example in the ancient art of bas-relief. Marey believed.8 The parallel between nature and the work of art. When we think of this enterprise in the context of the late 19th century experiments with space. For. 1888). Marey developed a single camera of magazine plates that could record several snapshots. Muybridge’s photographs of the galloping horse arouse some enthusiasm. which he used to photograph the movements of a flying birth in 1882. Such images were previously inaccessible to the human eye due to the speed of the motion. op. a superficial resemblance between the ancient genre of bas-relief that represents figures in movement. Lippincott Co. see also Etienne-Jules Marey. La Photographie Instantanée. and chronophotography that dissects movement at uniform segments of time and registers the appearance of the body in each moment as a linear sequence of images." Encyclopædia Britannica Online. in response to the positivism of Marey. op. On the other hand he intends to codify artistic representation by objective principles. 174-82. The instant photographs did not resemble any of the previous representation of galloping horse. the trot and the gallop of a horse in a series of photographs. This allowed Marey to ignore the difference between scientific appearance and artistic representation of movement. Masson. There is. 20 20. cit. each of which shows a spatial position assumed by the horse at a given segment of time.2121 Marey’s invention of “chronophotography” further developed Muybridge’s idea and applied it to the scientific study of animal-motion. Muybridge cast the images upon a screen successively thanks to a lantern slide-projector. incredulity. according to Marey.2020 When published. (Figure 8).Hildebrand.. Eadweard Muybridge in California. 165. according to Marey. As the shutters of the instant-cameras were released successively. 242. then.1919 Hence. he remedies the lacuna of science by bringing the question of representation into the foreground.. that Hildebrand conceived his chapter “Form as an Expression of Function.. which took place in the San Francisco Art Association in 1880 is well known in the history of cinema as the first presentation of motion-picture. explained the discrepancy between Muybridge’s serial photography and the representation of the galloping horse.2222 The indexical register of the photographic apparatus. Muybridge attained the photographs of the movement. particularly that of the galloping horse. Unlike Muybridge’s installation of multiple cameras. and froze uniform sections of movement. He went as far as claiming that artistic representation of movement in the past. 8 . The “error” of the sculptor. Marey was inspired by the work of English-born photographer. It must be. in fact. is not to be sought in the equality of their actual appearances but rather in the fact that they have the same capacity for evoking an idea of space. Hildebrand intends a general theory of perception that reconciles the physiological theory of perception with psychology of artistic form. a major theme in the history of Western art. cit. The human eye. This. chronophotography demonstrated that a horse does not assume the position depicted on bas-relief at any segment of time. therefore.” He wrote: 19 19. Animal Locomotion: an Electrophotographic Investigation of Consecutive Phases of Animal Movements (Philadelphia: J. was simply erroneous. In order to convince his audience and prove the authenticity of his photographs. could easily be deceived. 21 21. however. Muybridged recorded the successive stages of the walk. It is not because of an illusion that we believe the picture to be a piece of reality—as in a panorama—but because of the power of the stimulus contained in the image. but mostly. Instant photography both gave access to a wider scopic field. which he invented for this purpose. It was French physiologist Étienne Jules Marey (1830-1904) who carried out the better-known experiments on human and animal motion in the late 19th century. "Photography of Movement.Joseph Maria Eder. was caused by the inability of human eye to register fast movement. see also Eadweard Muybridge. Développement de la méthode graphique par l'emploi de la photographie (Paris : G. mapped the human and the animal body in space with a mechanistic precision.B. The performance. On one hand. Eder. 22 22.

In striking contrast to restrained. Ibid. The problem of representation of movement had become a central issue in German aesthetics and art history by 1893 when Hildebrand published his treatise. 25.J.” In other words. whose history of reception since Renaissance is certainly closely related to the history of Western sculpture. J. Yet. the Pergamon frieze offers an intense. the representation of movement in sculpture does not literally replicate the image of the body in space in a given instant. these legs would always be presented as indistinct streaks. We actually see the dog’s legs only as rapidly moving steaks or shadows. cit. If the reproduction were based on capturing one or several composite moments of movement. extreme contrasts of texture created by deep carving of the sculptural surface with resultant areas of highlight and dark shadow. by a group of scholars who were inspired by the Hellenistic figures of the Gigantomachy. Laokoön was established as a late example (or copy) of a distinct style that flourished in the Hellenistic Anatolia. the discovery of the Gigantomachy called into question the Neoclassical scholarship that had ignored Hellenistic art as decadent or imitative of the classical age. and the use of ‘open’ forms which deny boundaries and tectonic balance.” The perception is a linear process composed of a succession of “visual-ideas” and “motion-ideas.Pollitt. 263.”2525 It was not until the first years of the 20th century that the term “Hellenistic Baroque” came to describe the Pergamene architecture and sculpture. Hence “form. especially towards the end of his essay where he shifts from a predominantly physiological explanation of perception to an essentially psychological theory of “form. a history of architecture of the period immediately after Renaissance in Italy. whereas the head and trunk retain a clear form. in fact. We owe this artistic category largely to the influence of German art historian Heinrich Wölfflin (1864-1945). agonized facial expressions. such as the movement a camera shows us—the momentary perceptual image. static and canonical representation of human body in Classical Greek sculpture. rather conveys “a mental image that has to extract from the perception those specific signs that evoke the idea of movement.J. It turns out. he achieves a series of “chance appearances.”2424 We may nevertheless detect a certain contradiction in Hildebrand’s theory.” according to Hildebrand. is not very different from Marey’s understanding of time and motion. Hildebrand. and that it involves a synthetic process. Wölfflin posits “baroque” as the diametrical opposite 23 24 25 23. each of which is associated with one—and only one—“surface image. 111. 1986). Artistic “form” is one that evokes movement in a clear (and physically immobile) image. 9 . and exaggerated way of expressing movement.” His analytic theory of perception. In his Renaissance and Baroque (1889). whose form is vague and indefinite. only after the discovery of the Gigantomachy and other Pergamene sculpture. Furthermore. is a “functional sign. however. Art in the Hellenistic Age ( Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.2323 For Hildebrand. This is something very different from the image of one or more composite instants. Gigantomachy presents formal features that are almost altogether missing from classical Greek art. that we present only the idea and not the perception… Our perceptions of movement are thus first brought into relation with the image of the object that is stored in our imagination. In Art in the Hellenistic Age J. Such a style was long familiar in Europe due to the sculptural group Laocoön (1st century AD) in the Vatican Museum. and cast doubt on Johann Joachim Winckelmann’s (1717-1768) famous dictum on the "noble simplicity and quiet grandeur" of Greek sculpture. Politt identifies some of these characteristics as “undulating surfaces. Some of this discussion was literally formulated in the aftermath of Carl Humann’s discovery of the Pergamon Altar.” but not “form” as such. 24. when Marey cuts movement into uniform sections and determine the position of the body in space in a given instant.” He differs from Marey by acknowledging that the problem of representation is different from that of perception as such. He equally conceives of perception as a succession of retinal impressions.9 The example of a running dog demonstrates how exclusively the presentation of movement depends on capturing that which stimulates the imagination and not on the faithful rendering of the perceived image. and then we form an idea of rest from the body in motion. op.

” The waxworks are “popular art” because of their makebelieve. as “realist. (Figure 9). and obey the same universal laws. Ibid.” post-classical examples. In other words. especially since this text attempts to explain “the problem of form” in the entire visual arts exclusively with the example of sculptural relief. which relies entirely on the effects of moving masses. the baroque is essentially an “illusion of movement. the other would be the representation of the animated.”2626 Hence in baroque “all tectonic structural elements fell victim to a wild desire for movement. But overlapping forms result in something intangible and are therefore stimulus to movement.” Having argued that space in nature and the pictorial space are constructed in human mind through the same objective process. classical architecture is epitomized by central plan. the baroque is “painterly. the works that fail to discriminate the space of representation from the space of reality. baroque architecture imitates the effects of another art-form: painting. and. contrasts it with the classical Parthenon marbles: Whereas one could imagine the Pantheon frieze with a gold ground. and for which a gold ground would only create a wild and completely inappropriate confusion of color. Wölflin’s generalization of “baroque” into a circular. According to the author “The strict tectonic mode [of classical art] had demanded clear forms which were whole and therefore calm. world-historical phenomenon owes to the similarity he perceived between the Italian baroque and the Hellenistic art of Pergamon. 26 27 26. “The Problems of Form” both collapses the boundary between “real” and “pictorial space” and in some other way seeks to preserve a clear distinction between them. for Wölfflin remains a predominantly architectural category. The art historical “principle” that is embedded in baroque is the concept of “painterly” [“Das Malerische”]. 28 28. for example. “Painterly” art for Wölfflin has two major characteristics: If one were the collapse of the boundary between pictorial and architectural space. then. He cites waxworks. Yet. Finally Hildebrand criticizes a popular type of sculpture that uses architecture as its actual decor. the conspicuous absence of any mention of the Pergamene frieze in Hildebrand’s text is rather remarkable. they cannot be discerned from their model. and finally.” and therefore “low art. Renaissance and Baroque. when it comes to dismiss some works—like Panoramas—as “low art.” Baroque. 10 .10 of the classical idea in architecture. panoramas. the difference between truth and illusion is only a difference of degree. Therefore Wölfflin defines baroque in terms of a series of oppositions: Unlike the tectonic forms of classical architecture. To the extent both physical and pictorial space are construed synthetically in the human mind. In Renaissance and Baroque the author points at Gigantomachy as an example of “painterly” sculpture. classical architecture is static and motionless. this would not be possible with a more painterly relief like the Pergamene Gigantomachia. 63. unlike clear contours and “linear” forms of the classical. Baroque. and sculptural groups that use architecture as a backdrop. Wöllflin. Heinrich Wölfflin. This omission is perhaps due to Hildebrand’s belief in the stylistic superiority of archaic and classical bas-relief upon “baroque. besides referring to a specific historical style in 17th century Italy. baroque architecture is only concerned with the psychological effect of form. pediments piled up and were thrust outwards. baroque space is limitless and illusionistic. Collins. 36. and his distaste for the “painterly.” Hildebrand seeks to restore a strict boundary between the picture plane and architectural space. 1964).2828 Given the actuality of the Gigantomachy by 1893. is a general tendency that periodically surfaced in Western art. Kathrin Simon (London. 59. hence collapsing the difference between virtuality and reality of the work. trans. so that. which might form an effective foil to the beautiful contours of the figures. Similarly the panoramas combine the pictorial trompel’oeil with the effect of a real interior.”2727 Not surprisingly. and usually as a reaction against a classical epoch.” classical architecture depends on a harmonious system of proportions. 27. Hildebrand nevertheless warned against the contemporary practice of “realism” that is.

List of Figures: Figure 1: Full-page illustration from Siegfried Giedion’s Space. Time and Architecture (1941). perspective drawing of the Pergamonsaal. Time and Architecture. The extensive transparent areas.” Figure 2: Full-page illustration from Space. Pergamonsaal offers an effigy of the Pergamon-Altar. In this case it is the interior and the exterior of a building which are presented simultaneously. it does not differentiate between pictorial illusion and spatial experience. The modern observer of Pergamon is one that both partakes the space of the object and sees it from outside. L’Arlésienne. Berlin State Museum. which. and emphasizes the “transparency of overlapping planes” in Picasso’s painting. by dematerializing the corners. the observer of the Pergamon Museum is no longer outside the pictorial space. permit the hovering relations of planes and the kind of ‘overlapping’ which appears in contemporary painting. The experience of the Pergamon-Room depends on the transgression of the boundary between the space of reality and the space of pictorial illusion. Figure 7: Alfred Messel. rather total dissolution of the boundary between the pictorial and architectural space. oil on canvas. the modern walls of the museum provides a décor to the sculptural frieze. The guiding principle of this space is not so much stereoscopic overlap of viewpoints. The Bauhaus.11 Therefore. Nor does the object of perception—the Pergamon Altar—preservers its corporeal integrity and visual opacity. 1908.M. Just like the 19th century panoramas. Hence. Walking into the West façade and towards the peristyle feels like walking into the space of mirror. Figure 9: Antonio Canova. Figure 6: The West façade of the Great Altar of Pergamon in relief. and through the synthesis of multiple viewpoints. against the background of the museum wall. Eder. Corner of the Workshop Wing. In the caption Giedion explains Cubist “simultaneity” as the technique of showing multiple aspects of a single object at the same time. Funerary Monument to Maria Cristina of Austria. 1911-12. Unlike Hildebrand’s theory of bas-relief and his assumption of a detached viewer. and finally. The caption reads: “Walter Gropius. just as the presentation of the Gigantomachy in the Pergamonsaal would be in agreement with Wölfflin’s principle of “the painterly.” it would fail Hildebrand’s criteria of high art on all three accounts. Dessau. La Photographie Instantanée (1888). Figure 4: The Pergamonsaal (Pergamon-Room) in Berlin State Museum. Figure 5: “Two Groups” from the northern frieze of the Gigantomachy. chronophotography and analysis of the movement of a walking man. Figure 3: Reconstruction of the Great Altar of Pergamon (1928-30) in Berlin State Museum (The Pergamon Museum). 11 . 1926. Yet the similarity ends there. Hildebrand criticizes Canova’s work since the sculptor collapsed the boundary between architectural space and pictorial space and used architecture as the backdrop of sculptural composition. 1798-1805. cannot be discerned from its historic original. Hildebrand’s theory of “kinesthetic” perception explains the Pergamonsaal only to a certain extent. in the final analysis. The Pergamonsaal literally construes a stereoscopic space out of a sculptural relief. Illustrated in J. Figure 8: Étienne-Jules Marey. Picasso.