Court Culture in Dresden

This is the first cultural history of Baroque Dresden, the capital of Saxony and the most important Protestant territory in the Empire from the mid-16th to the early-18th century. Helen Watanabe-O'Kelly shows how the art patronage of the Electors fits into the intellectual climate of the age and investigates its political and religious context. Lutheran church music and architecture, the influence of Italy, the cabinet of curiosities and the culture of collecting, alchemy, mining and early technology, official image-making and court theatre are among the colorful subjects dealt with during the period 1553 to 1733.

Author Biography: Helen Watanabe-O'Kelly is Professor of German Literature at Oxford, and a Fellow of Exeter College.