Kurzemes hercoga galma galdnieka Tobiasa Heinca lasampults: Makslinieka pasapzinas veidosanas atspogulojums Latvijas maksla

• Authors: Elita Grosmane

Title variants

EN

THE LECTERN OF TOBIAS HEINTZ, COURT CARPENTER TO THE DUKE OF COURLAND: MANIFESTATION OF THE ARTIST’S SELF-CONFIDENCE IN THE ART OF LATVIA

• Languages of publication: LV

Abstracts

EN

This article attempts to analyse the self-portrait found on the lectern of Jelgava Holy Trinity Church, produced by Tobias Heintz (1589-1653), court carpenter to the Duke of Courland. Recently interest has grown in this slightly forgotten phenomenon, unique in Latvian and Estonian art history. The lectern donated by Tobias Heintz in 1617 was located in the choir of the Holy Trinity Church till the Jelgava Cultural-Historical Exhibition in 1886. After the exhibition it was relocated in the Courland Province Museum (Kurländisches Provinzialmuseum) but during World War II moved to Posen (now Poznań) when it ended up in the collection of the Baltic German cultural heritage. In 1945 the lectern was included in the collection of the Museum of Wielkopolska and exhibited in the Applied Art Department of the National Museum in Poznan. Now it is being returned to Latvia to be exhibited in the reconstructed Holy Trinity Church tower in Jelgava. The article analyses the Jelgava carpenter’s self-portrait in the context of general art history and the art history of Latvia in particular. On the European scale, this work coincides with the spread of Baroque tendencies as well as with the rise of the portrait and self-portrait genres. Considering Heintz’s image in the context of inlay technique, only one self-portrait has been found so far, that of the woodcarver and inlay master Antonio Barili (1502) at work set into the choir bench of Siena Cathedral Baptistery. Ideas of a different epoch predominate in this work, expressing the self-esteem and seriousness of a Renaissance artist with the air of the classical art heritage present. Tobias Heintz’s version had emerged a hundred years later; it is more pretentious with the young master emphasising his youth, health and future success, creating an image of a self-confident individual whose best time is yet to come. In conclusion, one can state that, from the art-historical viewpoint, Tobias Heintz’s self-portrait on the Jelgava Holy Trinity Church lectern is not just an autobiographical document, a message to contemporaries and future generations but also the oldest identified self-image in Latvian art history.

Keywords

EN

TOBIAS HEINTZ; SELF-PORTRAIT; JELGAVA HOLY TRINITY CHURCH; LECTERNS; INLAY TECHNIQUE

• Publisher: Publishing House 'Neputns', Terbatas iela 49/51-8, Riga LV-1011, Latvia; www.neputns.lv
• Journal: Materiali Latvijas makslas vesturei
• Year: 2012
• Volume: 8
• Pages: 45-54

Contributors

author

Elita Grosmane

• Institute of Art History of the Latvian Academy of Art, Akademijas laukums 1-160, Riga LV-1050, Latvia