The Wocher Panorama, also known as the Thun Panorama, is a panoramic painting depicting the city of Thun. Created by the artist Marquard Wocher in 1814, it was the first panorama in Switzerland. It is on display at Schadau Castle and is owned by the Gottfried Keller Foundation. [1] [2] The painting is about 7.5m tall and 38m wide and is the oldest cyclorama in the world. [3] [4]
Wocher began to publish sketches of Thun and its surroundings in 1804. [5] Using these sketches, he painted the panorama from 1809 to 1814. [6] The painting depicts the city of Thun, the mountain range of Stockhorn, further the Niesen, Blüemlisalp, Jungfrau and a part of Lake Thun. [7] It is believed that Marquard Wocher portraied himself as. a man walking on the main place. [8]
It was initially presented from 1814, but after Wocher’s death, it was sold, inherited and given away. It was rediscovered in the 1950s. The painting was first restored from 1958 to 1959 by Hans Fischer thanks to the Gottfried Keller Foundation. The panorama was installed in a new rotunda designed by Karl Keller and reopened in 1961. [9] The painting was restored again in 2014 because of high humidity. An extension by Graber & Steiger was opened on March 28, 2015. [10]
Panoramic paintings are massive artworks that reveal a wide, all-encompassing view of a particular subject, often a landscape, military battle, or historical event. They became especially popular in the 19th century in Europe and the United States, inciting opposition from some writers of Romantic poetry. A few have survived into the 21st century and are on public display. Typically shown in rotundas for viewing, panoramas were meant to be so lifelike they confused the spectator between what was real and what was image.
Gottfried Keller was a Swiss poet and writer of German literature. Best known for his novel Green Henry and his cycle of novellas called Seldwyla Folks, he became one of the most popular narrators of literary realism in the late 19th century.
A cyclorama is a panoramic image on the inside of a cylindrical platform, designed to give viewers standing in the middle of the cylinder a 360° view, and also a building designed to show a panoramic image. The intended effect is to make viewers, surrounded by the panoramic image, feel as if they were standing in the midst of the place depicted in the image.
Grodziec Castle has a history dating back to 1155 and is located in the Silesia region of Poland.
The Kunstmuseum Basel houses the oldest public art collection in the world and is generally considered to be the most important museum of art in Switzerland. It is listed as a Swiss heritage site of national significance.
Schadau Castle is a castle on the south side of the Aare near Lake Thun in the city of Thun, Canton Bern, Switzerland. It is a Swiss heritage site of national significance.
Karim Noureldin is a Swiss visual artist.
Stefan Haenni is a Swiss painter and a crime novel writer.
Louis-Auguste Veillon was a Swiss painter, noted for his Orientalist works.
Antje (-Maria) von Graevenitz, born Ludwig is a German art historian, art critic, educator and author.
Willibald Sauerländer was a German art historian specializing in Medieval French sculpture. From 1970 to 1989, he was director of the prestigious Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte, Munich.
Gottfried Keller-Stiftung, commonly abbreviated to GKS, is an arts foundation focused on cultural heritage of Switzerland. It was named by its founder Lydia Welti-Escher (1858–1891) after the Swiss national poet Gottfried Keller (1819–1891).
Augustinerkloster was one of the eight monasteries within the medieval city of Zürich in Switzerland. It was founded around 1270 as an Augustinian Order priory on the site of the present Augustinerkirche Zürich on Münzplatz, and was abolished in 1524.
The Solothurn Madonna is an oil-on-panel painting executed in 1522 by the German-Swiss artist Hans Holbein the Younger in Basel. It shows the Virgin Mary and Christ enthroned, flanked by Martin of Tours and Ursus of Solothurn. Holbein used his wife Elsbeth as his model for the Madonna, and the baby "may well have been modelled on Holbein and Elsbeth's baby son Philipp."
Ellen Judith Beer was a Swiss art historian. She focused on Medieval art.
Carl Jungheim was a German landscape painter, associated with the Düsseldorfer Malerschule.
The Portrait of Bonifacius Amerbach is a painting by the German master of the Renaissance Hans Holbein the Younger. It is deposited in the Basler Kunstmuseum as part of the Amerbach Cabinet. It is painted in mixed technique on pine panel and measures 29.9 cm x 28.3 cm.
Carl Gehrts, also Karl Gehrts, complete name Karl Heinrich Julius Gehrts was a German painter, illustrator and academic scholar. As a professor, he taught at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf.
Niklaus Stoecklin was a Swiss painter and graphic artist. He is regarded as a Swiss exponent of New Objectivity and Magic Realism, and at least with his early works numbers among their international co-founders. He was also a poster designer of international renown.
Marquard Wocher was a German painter who spent most of his life in Switzerland. He is known for the Wocher Panorama, a cyclorama of Thun, one of the few still existing cycloramas in the world and the oldest still existing.
