SYRLIN, Jörg the Elder

(b. ~1425 Ulm, d. 1481 Ulm)

German sculptor. He was resident in Ulm from 1449 to 1491; his family were joiners from the nearby town of Söflingen. In 1456 he owned a house in the Ulmer Gasse and by then was probably running a workshop for which a number of sculptors worked on a temporary basis from the end of the 1460s. He himself probably carved only the minor sculptures in his works of joinery. His art-historical status rests mainly on whether or not busts at the ends of the Ulm Minster choir-stalls can be attributed to him. If they can, he was one of the best sculptors of German Late Gothic, but if not, his oeuvre amounts to no more than some pieces of joinery, some large joinery commissions (executed by his collaborators) and possibly some sculptures of average quality.

Choir stalls

In the years preceding his work on the high altar of Ulm’s M�nster, J�rg Syrlin the Elder lined its choir with an elaborate set of wooden stalls. Eighty-nine seats are arranged in two rows on the north and south sides. Beyond the typical drolleries and ornamentation of the chairs, ninety busts of male and female saints, sibyls, Old Testament figures and classical thinkers adorn the benches , the wall revetments and the overhanging canopies. The north side depicts men, while women (plus Sts Luke and Cosmas) occupy the south wall. For such a vast undertaking, Syrlin was aided by a team of sculptors and joiners. At the end of each group of stalls are fully carved busts of sibyls (south) and scholars (north).

The choir stalls embody the collective wisdom and faith of classical, Jewish and Christian people.

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Ptolemy

The picture shows the bust of Ptolemy on the choir stalls. Ptolemy, the second-century Alexandrian mathematician known as the father of cartography, holds a compass and a model of the globe marked with longitude and latitude. His calm demeanour beautifully accents his intellectual insights.

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