RAUMWUNDER Frankfurter Maler entdecken das Kircheninterieur (1750-1850)

Light-flooded rooms with high windows, sublime columns and magnificent frescoes: the church interiors in the paintings by Johann Ludwig Morgenstern (1738-1819) and Christian Stöcklin (1741-1795) are architectural masterpieces, most of which only existed in their imagination. Together with other painters, they followed in the footsteps of the Dutch masters of the 17th century and led this genre to a new heyday in Frankfurt: in their rediscovery of church interiors, they experimented with architectural styles and architectural features, but also with light and perspective. Between 1770 and 1820, two to three hundred fantasy churches and dozens of portraits of real Frankfurt churches were created in art-loving Frankfurt, which were soon traded throughout Europe.
The virtuoso paintings are on display in the exhibition "RAUMWUNDER. Frankfurt painters discover church interiors (1750-1850)" at the Dommuseum Frankfurt, which was created in cooperation with and with numerous loans from the Historisches Museum Frankfurt. It is the brainchild of Wolfgang Cilleßen, curator of the Historisches Museum's painting collection, who has dedicated himself to researching the paintings together with restorer Anja Damaschke in recent years.