Portals from the Circle of Benedict Ried I. Portal Architecture in the Towns of the Bohemian Kingdom in the First Half of the 16th Century
Abstract
The works of Benedict Ried counted among the most influential architectural achievements in Central Europe at around 1500. A group of portals created in mostly Utraquist towns in the 1st-half-of-the-16th-century Bohemia used the Italianate shapes introduced into local architecture by B.
Ried as their source of inspiration. The portals in Pardubice, Nymburk, Chrudim, Čáslav, and Český Brod were the first works of architectural decoration in Bohemia to make use of the all'antica shapes outside Prague.
They did so in a very specific way, blending the Italianate with the local, symptomatic of the art created in the period in general. The author analyzes their formal qualities, relations between them while trying to identify other sources of inspiration apart from Ried's works.
Based on detailed documentation, the author furthermore tries to find out the possible reasons why the specific formal features appeared on the portals from the perspective of a 16th century patron and artist. Based on that, she also tries to answer the questions concerning the theoretical understanding and usability of the words frequently used to describe the art of the period (Gothic, Renaissance), and their alternatives (Michstil etc.).