Leseprobe

157 Johann Alexander Thiele created these opulent pendent scenes to commemorate the carnival procession and following races held at the Zwinger in Dresden in 1722. They provide a vivid representation of festival culture during the reign of Augustus the Strong, document the architectural situation, and feature some buildings then only in the planning stages. The participants are costumed as stock types from Italian commedia dell’arte . A detailed description of the same year states the par- ticipants by name. In Procession , King Augustus leads the parade himself, dressed in red and riding a white horse. In Entertainments Thiele presents the tournament, where riders have to strike figures representing the four elements: fire, water, earth, and air. When certain figures are struck, fireworks, birds, or animals are released, or water is sprayed in the air. Thiele captures both views from a raised vantage point – in Procession from the Glockenspielpavillon overlooking the Elbe Valley to the west, with the Kronen- tor gate on the left and the Wallpavillon opposite us. The architectural complex is continued in Entertainments , this time as seen from the Kronentor gate, with the perspective of a two-storey building surrounded by colonnades. This palace exten- sion was planned by Pöppelmann but never realized. For these pictures, Thiele also drew on engravings of entertainments of the French court. Augustus made use of courtly entertainments to project his status and perform both ceremonial and polit- ical functions, and personally arranged events down to the very last detail.  |  re