Friday, May 29, 2015

Linderhof Palace and the Venus Grotto


     As I was getting my first couple of posts together I was running around Pinterest, where I am always guaranteed to get sidetracked, and came across this picture of The Venus Grotto (top right), and got sucked in to the Rococo magic that is Linderhof Palace and decided to post these instead.


   

     Despite being the smallest of the three palaces built by King Ludwig II of Bavaria and being able to fit into Versailles (where clearly Ludwig drew his inspiration from) probably a billion times, it is certainly not lacking in incredible, elaborate detail. The Venus Grotto is actually entirely artificial and was built for the king as an illustration of the First Act of Wagner’s “Tannhäuser”. There are also 2 identical “Tapestry Chambers” that served absolutely no function, but still had equally as much work put into them (one is pictured bottom right). That bedroom though… I had seen pictures of this amazing creation before on a much smaller scale with filters that really took away from all of the details and then I found these and it took me a while to process all of it. The Rococo artistic movement was something else.

    

     Rococo is a style of architecture and decorative arts that evolved from the Baroque style in the mid-18th century distinguished by its curved asymmetrical forms and elaborate ornamentation. Lots of foliage. very frivolous, very Louis XV, very modish.

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