Romanesque Revival Architecture in Transnational Perspective

November 2003 · Historically Speaking29 Romanesque Revival Architecture in Transnational Perspective Kathleen Curran Beginning in the early 1820s, largely under the influence of German Romanticism, a new appreciation for medieval Romanesque architecture occurred in Germany. Opposed to the popular fad for Greek architecture that was sweeping cities like Munich and Berlin, some architects argued that Germany's climate, available building materials, and medieval cultural roots demanded a native architectural style. The clearest statement of this point ofview came from the Karlsruhe architect Heinrich Hübsch, whose 1828 book In welchem Style sollen wir bauen? (In What Style Should We Build?) answered his own question. Hübsch believed that the Rundbogenstil (round arch style) was the appropriate style for modern Germany. The word Rundbogenstil was an early term to describe round-arched architecture spanning the fall of the Roman Empire and die beginning ofthe Gothic age. In modern architectural parlance thatwould include early Christian, Carolingian, Ottonian , and Romanesque architecture, but the Rundbogenstil really centered on the Romanesque or 11th- and 12th-century building. (By the 1840s, as medieval scholarship became more precise, the word Romanesque replaced Rundbogenstil.) German architects in favor of the Rundbogenstil argued that it offered more flexibility than either the Greek or Gothic. Its materials were local, and its large expanses ofwaU allowed for interior mural painting, the revival of which went hand in hand with the Romanesque. Within a fewshortyears enthusiasm for the Rundbogenstil spread throughout Germany and, by the 1840s, as far away as the United States. The two most important centers for the Rundbogenstilin Germanywere Munich and BerUn. Between 1825 and 1848 Bavaria was ruled by the lusty King Ludwig I, who possessed a mania for building shared by few other rulers in history. He elevated the sleepy medieval town of Munich into one of the most visited European capitals of the 19th century (before Paris was Haussmanized in the third quarter of the 19th century). He built a namesake street (the Ludwigstraße) and hired the architect Friedrich von Gärtner to design the buildings, whichincluded a church named after him (the Ludwigskirche); one of the earUestpubUc Ubraries; educational buildings , including a major university; administration buildings; and an institute for the bUnd. They were all in the new Rundbogenstil style. Two of the buildings—the Ludwigskirche and die state Ubrary—were widely copied. Ludwigwas a staunch Catholic and once declared that "religion istdaswichtigste" (religion is the most important thing.) Not surprisingly , most ofhis buildingprojects had to do with churches and related buildings like schools. He subscribed to a vision ofa world Catholicism and even went so far as introducingthe Benedictine orderinto the United States in the 1840s in an effort to educate the huge influx ofGerman Catholic immigrants coming to these shores. He built scores of churches, schools, and monasteries, including St. Vincent'sArchabbeyin Latrobe, Pennsylvania , and St. John's College in CoIlegeville , Minnesota. Letters and visual evidence indicate that Romanesque was the style most often chosen for Ludwig's projects . Ifyou've ever driven to remote places in Missouri, Indiana, or Kansas and have seen churches that look like something out of medieval Germany, theywere probablybuilt by Ludwig's "Mission Society," which operated until World War I. One other aspect of Munich Rundbogenstil that had worldwide ramifications was that it was the center ofthe revival offresco painting on the model ofthe Italian Renaissance. AU ofMunich's Rundbogenstil buildings had elaborate murals, as did the American Benedictine churches. IfMunich laid the artistic foundations for the international Romanesque revival, Berlin laid the theological ones. Prussia was predominately Protestant even after its territories were greatly expanded following the Napoleonic wars. Its kings were either Lutheran or Reformed (Calvinist). Friedrich Wilhelm??, who reigned from 1797 to 1840, favored the Lutheran faith, but his son, Friedrich Wilhelm IV (ruled 1840-1857), veered toward the Reformed. This dreamy, refinedking, whowouldhave much preferred to be an architect than a sovereign, loved the Rundbogenstilas no otherstyle. Buteven more so than his brother-in-law Ludwig I, Friedrich Wilhelm IV wanted architecture and the Rundbogenstilto playa central role in a new vision of church and state in Prussia. With his trusted friend, the diplomat Carl FriedrichJosias von Bunsen, Friedrich WilhelmIVconceived ofa greatProtestantworld church...