Strasbourg – Wrocław – Cracow

O transferze górnoreńskiego stylu architektury sakralnej na Śląsk i do Małopolski w pierwszej połowie XIV w. / On the transfer of the “Upper Rhenish style” of Gothic church architecture to Silesia and Lesser Poland in the first half of the 14th c.

Abstract

JAKUB ADAMSKI (University of Warsaw) / Strasbourg – Wroclaw – Cracow. On the transfer of the “Upper Rhenish Style” of Gothic church architecture to Silesia and Lesser Poland in the first half of the 14th c.
The turn of the 14th c. was a special moment in the history of Gothic architecture. It was during this time that the Upper Rhine region quickly gained artistic importance and became the most advanced architectural centre in Europe. The main focus of the article is to show how new trends in architectural design became apparent in two regions of southern Poland, Silesia and Lesser Poland, as early as around 1280. Monastic churches at Lubiaz and Kamieniec as well as the cathedrals and parish churches of Wroclaw and Cracow exemplify the impact of Upper Rhine models on the stylistic development of Central European Gothic architecture. They bear witness of the artistic maturity that had already been reached in the southern Polish regions in the last decades of the 13th century. The study highlights in a special way the artistic role of Wroclaw, which in the 14th c. can be regarded as an architectural centre of far supra-regional importance. It shows that the patrons and master builders of the time in Wroclaw not only maintained constant and intensive contacts with the leading creative centres in south-west Germany, but also contributed to the transmission of the latest style patterns further afield – including to Cracow.