The Alte Pinakothek Munich

Előszó

The Alte Pinakothek, which reflects the genealogy of the Wittelsbach rulers
and their love of art, is one of the largest and finest paintings galleries in the
world. This is true both of the pictures themselves and also of the museum
buildings, which are the product of the congenial collaboration between King
Ludwig I and his architect Leo von Klenze.
The first reference to ducal collecting is recorded in Johann Fickler's inventory
of 1598 where he simply lists 3,407 miscellaneous objects of which, however,
778 are paintings. The mos*t important items are two series of historical
paintings which Duke Wilhelm IV (reigned 1508-1550) and his duchess
Jacobea von Baden commissioned from the best known South German painters
between 1528 and 1540 to adorn the walls of their Munich Residenz. These
pictures celebrate manly virtue and bravery and extol the deeds of famous
women, very much in accordance with the humanistic outlook of their
patrons. Fifteen of them have been preserved, including Alexander's battle by
Albrecht Altdorfer (p. 123). This series, which was assembled in one room of
the Alte Pinakothek in 1963, forms the nucleus of the Wittelsbach collection.
Maximilian I, who reigned 1597-1651, as Elector from 1623, was the most
important German prince of his time and the first passionate collector of
European stature among the Wittelsbachs. His favourite was Albrecht Dürer
and he acquired eleven of his works, mostly in keen competition with the other
great Dürer collector of the time, the Emperor Rudolf II. His efforts were
crowned by the purchase of the Four Apostles (p.l 15) which Dürer had presented
to his native town of Nuremberg. This period of the early seventeenth
century, in which the greatest German painter came back into favour, is even
referred to as the 'Dürer Renaissance'. At the same time Maximilian was also
interested in Rubens, his contemporary.
In the person of Elector Max Emanuel (reigned 1679-1726), the paintings
collection gained another outstanding collector. As governor of the Netherlands
and also later as an emigré in France, he was particularly concerned with
Flemish baroque painting and at the same time keenly interested in Italian,
Dutch and French works. The most outstanding acquisition he made for the
collection was his purchase in 1698 of 105 pictures from the Antwerp dealer
Gisbert van Colen for the considerable sum of 90,000 Brabantine guilders.
Among them were twelve paintings by Rubens including major works such as
The honeysuckle bower (p.77), portraits of Hélene Fourment and the Drunken
Silenus (p.79).
No substantial gains accrued to the collection under his successors Carl
Albrecht (reigned 1726-1745) and Max III Joseph (reigned 1745-1777). With the
second of these the Bavarian electoral line of the Wittelsbachs died out and
was followed by the Palatine lines, to which the Bavarian royal house can be
traced back. Among the Palatine Wittelsbachs, Elector Johann Wilhelm von Vissza