27 August 2010

Jesuitenkirche

It seems that the best advice I have gotten has been from locals, in particular, two men - one a canon at a monastery and the other an intern at the U.N..

The canon told me to try Oberlaa cafe for coffee and cake - it is now our favorite cafe and it does, indeed, have the best melange and apflestrudel around.

The U.N. intern told me to find the Jesuit Church and explore the inside, since it is one of the finest gems of the baroque style in Vienna.
So, today after class and lunch, I decided to get lost. I started walking on Kohlmarkt, but instead of heading to the Hofburg, I walked the opposite direction and then southwest down to the Ringstrasse. However, although I knew the general direction of where I was heading, I hadn't yet explored the small streets and alleys in that part of the innerstadt. As i wandered, I came upon a small square that would almost appear as a dead end if not for a small archway under a building leading through the plaza. There were some restaurants, and the building for the old University of Vienna took up the main center of the square. To the left though, there stood a huge church, tucked in between tall buildings so it was almost unnoticed. This style of churches blending into other buildings harks back to Joseph II's Edict of Toleration, where other religions were allowed under the empire but Protestant and Jewish churches and synagogues could not stand out as buildings - they could not look like churches. It turns out that here, I had unknowingly stumbled upon the baroque gem which I was told to seek out.

The history of the Jesuit Church and the presence of Jesuits in Vienna is interesting. After the liberal and Protestant-leaning emperor Maximilian II died, Archduke Charles invited the Jesuits to Vienna to play a role in the Catholic Counter-Reformation. The Jesuits positioned themselves near the Am Hof, where they initially obtained control over university education, thus using public education as a platform for their doctrine. However, they soon moved to the church's current location near the old University of Vienna so as to have more control and influence over education and in fighting Protestantism and to align themselves with the philosophy and theology departments of the school. The church was built between 1623 and 1627, influenced by early baroque styles and motifs. However, the church was rebuilt and refashioned into an even heavier style of baroque under the architect Andrea Pozzo in 1703 (completed in 1705) who was commissioned by Leopold I. The original church had been dedicated to Saint Ignatius Loyola and his co-founder of the Society of Jesus, Francis Xavier, but the remodeled church was rededicated to the Assumption of the Virgin Mary.
Compared to the relatively plain facade (almost reminiscent of a Renaissance courtyard or the like), the inside is the epitome of baroque. Marble twisted columns rise up on each side of the many chapels extending off of the main aisle of the church. The pews are carved with intricate details, the ceiling is covered with four massive frescos, and the gold work on the pulpit, altar, and the ceiling is quite astounding. Pozzo painted frescos of angels, the trinity, and other biblical scenes in the style of quadratura, where architecture, painting, and sculpture are united under illusionary scenes. This combination of styles allows the viewer to see a fresco as three dimensional; the church's ceiling is a sort of trompe l'oeil, playing with perspective and with illusions - the actual ceiling of the church is flat instead of domed as in the ceiling's fresco.

On another note, I watched The Third Man last night, an Orson Welles movie filmed in the 1950's in postwar Vienna. It was neat to go around today while getting "lost" and recognize certain locations within the film. Also, there was a neat connection between the postwar theme of the movie which emphasizes the east meeting the west, and the NYTimes articles I drew upon yesterday when discussing Vienna as a cultural, espionage, and diplomatic center between the east and west. It is intriguing to see the aspects of postwar Vienna which have evolved and those which have been transformed into something different - such as the notion of Vienna as a literal and figurative meeting place between the east and the west which still rings true today, yet the cultural fear of the police and the suspicion nurtured within the people by the occupation of different zones after 1945 is no longer evident within the city.

Today's German Word:
Fußball - 'soccer'

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