Preussische Gärten / Prussian Gardens

The Prussian gardens in Berlin, Potsdam, andelsewhere in Brandenburg: for the first time, textsand photographs present an overall view of all thegardens and parks created under the Hohenzollernsover a period of more than three centuries.Only the cross-genre collaborative effort of gardendesigners, gardeners, architects, scenographers,sculptors, painters, and creative rulers, themost prominent of whom were Frederick II andFrederick William IV, made it possible 'to turn theenvirons of Berlin and Potsdam [...] step by stepinto a garden', as Frederick William IV put it in1840. Figures such as David Garmatter, FriedrichChristian Glume, Siméon Godeau, Georg Wenzeslausvon Knobelsdorff, Peter Joseph Lenné,Antoine Pesne, Prince Hermann von Pückler-Muskau, Georg Potente, Karl Friedrich Schinkel,the Sello brothers, and Antoine Watteau - pickedfrom a whole cornucopia of names - indicate thespectrum of artistic forces that created the Prussiangarden realm.Impatient with his royal client, who had onceagain cut his funding, Lenné alluded to the highstandard of princely landscape art: 'Your Majestystill does not understand how ingenious my ideais.' The present volume is an attempt to examinethe 'ingeniousness of the idea' specifically inherentin the gardens of the Hohenzollerns inPrussia.Until his retirement, Hillert Ibbeken was professorof geology at the Freie Universität Berlin. Hehas been involved in architecture and landscapephotography throughout his life. His book KarlFriedrich Schinkel. Das architektonische Werkheute / The architectural work today, edited in cooperationwith Elke Blauert, was published byEdition Axel Menges in 2001. Later there followed,in the same format, this time with him as sole editor,his monographs on Ludwig Persius (2005) andFriedrich August Stüler (2006), and, among others,Schlösser der Weserrenaissance / Castles ofthe Weser Renaissance (2008), edited in co-operationwith Michael Bischoff, as well as Das andereItalien / The other Italy. Geschichten und