Tobias Pock (or Poch, Bock or Pockh) (1609 - 12 June 1683) was an Austrian Baroque painter from Swabian descent, a pioneer of sacral art.
The Baroque is a highly ornate and often extravagant style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th until the mid-18th century. It followed the Renaissance style and preceded the Rococo and Neoclassical styles. It was encouraged by the Catholic Church as a means to counter the simplicity and austerity of Protestant architecture, art and music, though Lutheran Baroque art developed in parts of Europe as well. The Baroque style used contrast, movement, exuberant detail, deep colour, grandeur and surprise to achieve a sense of awe. The style began at the start of the 17th century in Rome, then spread rapidly to France, northern Italy, Spain and Portugal, then to Austria and southern Germany. By the 1730s, it had evolved into an even more flamboyant style, called rocaille or Rococo, which appeared in France and central Europe until the mid to late 18th century.
Swabia is a cultural, historic and linguistic region in southwestern Germany. The name is ultimately derived from the medieval Duchy of Swabia, one of the German stem duchies, representing the territory of Alemannia, whose inhabitants interchangeably were called Alemanni or Suebi.
Pock was born in Konstanz, where his father worked as a master at the Cathedral. Tobias Pock probably was an apprentice painter in Southern Germany. He worked mainly at first in Konstanz. But, after his trip to Italy, he settled around 1640 in Vienna, where he became a leading painter. He painted portraits, history canvases and still lifes, but he is mostly recognized for his many paintings of saints in churches in Vienna, Lower Austria and Steiermark. His style is similar to the contemporary style of Southern Germany (München, Augsburg), but also contains influences from Flanders and Northern Italy. He died in Vienna.
Konstanz is a university city with approximately 83,000 inhabitants located at the western end of Lake Constance in the south of Germany, bordering Switzerland. The city houses the University of Konstanz and was for more than 1200 years residence of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Konstanz.
Lower Austria is the northeasternmost of the nine states of Austria. Since 1986, the capital of Lower Austria has been St. Polten, the most recently designated capital in Austria. Previously, Lower Austria's capital was Vienna, even though Vienna has not officially been part of Lower Austria since 1921. With a land area of 19,186 km2 (7,408 sq mi) and a population of 1.612 million people, Lower Austria is the country's largest state; it is the second most populous after the federal state of Vienna. Other main cities are Amstetten, Krems an der Donau and Wiener Neustadt.
Vienna is the federal capital, largest city and one of nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primate city, with a population of about 1.9 million, and its cultural, economic, and political centre. It is the 7th-largest city by population within city limits in the European Union. Until the beginning of the 20th century, it was the largest German-speaking city in the world, and before the splitting of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in World War I, the city had 2 million inhabitants. Today, it has the second largest number of German speakers after Berlin. Vienna is host to many major international organizations, including the United Nations and OPEC. The city is located in the eastern part of Austria and is close to the borders of the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary. These regions work together in a European Centrope border region. Along with nearby Bratislava, Vienna forms a metropolitan region with 3 million inhabitants. In 2001, the city centre was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. In July 2017 it was moved to the list of World Heritage in Danger.
He left a considerable body of work :
- Stephansdom, Vienna: baroque altar painting "The Stoning of St. Stephen"(1640–47) (his earliest known work).
- Dominican church, Vienna:
- Altar of Saint Dominic: altar painting (1655), depicting the saint adoring the Trinity.
- Chapel of St. Catherine of Alexandria: altar painting
- Schottenkirche, Vienna: altar paintings Martyrdom of Saint Sebastian (1649/1650), Assumption of Mary (1651/1655) and Saint Benedict (1654)
- Michaelerkirche, Vienna: high altar painting (1642)
- Maria Himmelfahrt basilica, Sankt Pölten: high altar painting Assumption (1658)
- Church of the Teutonic Order, Vienna: high altar painting Coronation of Saint Elisabeth of Thüringen by the Virgin Mary and the Christ Child, together with Saint George and Saint Helena (1667)
- Mariazell Basilica: high altar painting
- Decoration of the altar in the Dominikuskapelle at the Imperial Crypt, Vienna
- Cartesian monastery in Brno-Královo Pole: painting (now substituted by a less valuable picture)
- Svatý Kopeček (Saint Hill) near Olomouc, Basilica Minor, St. Pauline, 1681, Altar of the Chapel of St. Pauline
Saint Dominic, also known as Dominic of Osma and Dominic of Caleruega, often called Dominic de Guzmán and Domingo Félix de Guzmán, was a Castilian priest and founder of the Dominican Order. Dominic is the patron saint of astronomers.
Saint Catherine of Alexandria, or Saint Katharine of Alexandria, also known as Saint Catherine of the Wheel and The Great Martyr Saint Catherine, is, according to tradition, a Christian saint and virgin, who was martyred in the early 4th century at the hands of the pagan emperor Maxentius. According to her hagiography, she was both a princess and a noted scholar, who became a Christian around the age of 14, converted hundreds of people to Christianity, and was martyred around the age of 18. More than 1,100 years following her martyrdom, Saint Joan of Arc identified Catherine as one of the saints who appeared to her and counselled her.
The Schottenkirche is a parish church in Vienna attached to the Schottenstift, founded by Hiberno (Irish)-Scots Benedictine monks in the 12th century. In 1418, the Duke Albert V of Austria transferred it to the German-speaking Benedictine monks from the Melk Abbey during the Melker Reform initiated after the Council of Constance. The church was elevated to the rank of Basilica Minor in 1958.
