Ceiling Design with the Mystical Wine Press 1750

Editor: So, this is "Ceiling Design with the Mystical Wine Press" by Johann Georg Dieffenbrunner, around 1750. It’s a drawing, presumably for a fresco. It’s...well, intense! It's filled with figures, objects and swirling forms. What strikes you most when you look at it? Curator: It’s funny you say "intense" – I feel like Dieffenbrunner is almost showing us his working. It is kind of magical, don't you think? It has a strange appeal with that sketchy, almost dreamlike quality... We see these figures, this theatrical presentation of religious themes with wine press allegories… But that raw line…It hints at something vulnerable and unsure about grand pronouncements of the Baroque, as though the artist himself is questioning the stories he tells. Editor: That’s interesting. I initially saw the figures, like the angels, as confident. Curator: Ah, but look again! That ink wash feels so tentative, so unlike the bombast usually expected from this era. What are they confident *about*? I see the barest sketch of a structure underneath that detail - the underlying uncertainty laid bare by this very quick medium. I think that ambiguity really invites us to pause and, perhaps, bring our own questions to the piece. What do *we* think it means? And why does that matter to us, now? Editor: So, it's not just about what Dieffenbrunner *meant*, but also what we find in it. The religious and mythological aspect might have carried certain significance at that time that we can rediscover. Curator: Exactly! And those under-markings -- we get to be voyeurs into the artist's thinking, like witnessing a delightful experiment still in progress. The sacred wine press sits rather playfully within it, suspended in this curious world, daring us to unravel its meaning. What a delicious invitation to contemplation, no?