Bauaufnahmelehre im 19. Jahrhundert (Building Surveying in the 19th Century)
Book presentation from author Hana Tomagová as part of the Wer A… sagt event series of the A…cademy Library in cooperation with the Art Collections of the Academy and the Federal Monuments Office.
featured guests: Christoph Bazil, president of the Federal Monuments Office, Paul Mahringer, head of the Federal Monument Office’s Department of Heritage Inventorying and Research, and René Schober, head of the Graphic Collection of the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna.
The Graphic Collection has holdings of more than 3,700 drawings by Friedrich von Schmidt, the most important neo-Gothic architect of Viennese historicism, and his students at the Vienna Academy. These were created on study trips to Bohemia, Moravia, Hungary and Austria, which Schmidt introduced in his architecture class at the Academy as part of an innovative teaching concept. During those trips, medieval buildings were studied in situ and documented in drawing. These architectural surveys are important evidence of the condition of the buildings in the second half of the 19th century.
Hana Tomagová’s publication Bauaufnahmelehre im 19. Jahrhundert - Studienreisen von Architekten des Ateliers Friedrich von Schmidt/Viktor Luntz durch Böhmen, Mähren und Oberungarn in den Jahren 1862–1896 (Building Surveying in the 19th Century. Study trips of Bohemia, Moravia and Upper Hungary made by architects from the studio of Friedrich von Schmidt/Viktor Luntz in the years 1862–1896) reconstructs Schmidt’s teaching approach—introducing group study trips to the Academy curriculum from 1861—and his views on the teaching of architecture, which included the study of buildings through autopsy in conjunction with detailed measurement and surveying, introduction to the study of Gothic construction plans, and the publication of architectural drawings in the Wiener Bauhütte edition. Schmidt’s concept, launched in the context of the teaching of architectural drawing and surveying at technical schools and academies in Europe, has been integral to laying the foundations of the study of historical architecture until the present day. The second part of the book illustrates the significance of the building surveys from the study trips as a source of documentation and knowledge of the now longer extant medieval structure of buildings in Bohemia, Moravia, and Upper Hungary that were later re-Gothicized.
Hana Tomagová studied theory and history of visual arts at Palacký University in Olomouc, Czech Republic, and has worked as an art historian and cultural heritage conservator at the National Heritage Institute (NPÚ) in Prague since 2007. Her research focuses on the 19th century, particularly its relationship to medieval art, as well as on the history of architectural drawing and surveying from the Renaissance period to the second half of the 19th century.
Hana Tomagová
Bauaufnahmelehre im 19. Jahrhundert
Studienreisen von Architekten des Ateliers Friedrich v. Schmidt/Viktor Luntz durch Böhmen, Mähren und Oberungarn in den Jahren 1861–1896
379 pages, approx. 150 b/w ills., hardcover, Böhlau Verlag Wien, ISBN 978-3-205-21387-1
Following the book presentation, there will be an opportunity to view selected drawings from the school of Friedrich von Schmidt in the study room of the Graphic Collection.