Leseprobe

129 FIG. 3 Stefano della Bella, Two Horse Cadavers on the Ground, 1640s, pen with brown ink over chalk, sheet h. 8.5 cm, w. 11.4 cm, Hamburger Kunsthalle, Kupferstichkabinett, inv. no. 1967-220 raised, with the index finger pointing towards an outside observer.This personification playing on the image of Death as an archer can be interpreted as a memento mori , referring to the consequences of war. In a completely unique way, this work of art also incorporates the concept of vanitas —the physical appearance of the horseman being reminiscent of comparable images of skeletons representing Death.14 The perception of war and death expressed in this work is closely associated with the contemporary consciousness of the transience of life and indicates people’s awareness of the omnipresence of mortality. A hitherto unheeded drawing by the artist Hermann tom Ring (fig. 5), who was born in Münster, bears eloquent testimony to artists’ engagement with the subject of death. It is dated 1550 and directly reflects the events of the previous decades. Through its immediacy, the depiction challenges the viewer to face up to death: the bow held by the skeleton standing on a heap of corpses is aimed outside the picture, with the arrow ready to shoot directly at the viewer, compa- rable to the pointing gesture of the horseman in New York. In the left background, an hourglass symbolises the limited span of human life. War as the Day of Judgment In contemporary accounts, lamenting the consequences of war always amounts also to contention with one’s God-given fate or destiny. In fact, the consequences of war and its hor- rors were often associated with the ‘Day of Judgment’, which was particularly significant in view of the religious dimen-