auricular style

Standing Cup with Cover[1] (c. 1639) by Dutch silver-smith Johannes Lutma (1584?–1669), whose work is exemplary of the auricular style. This particular work typifies the auricular style in the flowing shapes Lutma has carved into the gilded silver.

Coined with reference to the flowing figures of the style, which sometimes resemble the human ear.

auricular style (uncountable)

1. (art, historical) An ornamental style of the first half of the 17th century, characterized by stylized and softly flowing abstract shapes in relief.

   Synonyms: earshell work, lobate style, Knorpelwerk

   • 1965, Eberhard Hempel, translated by Elisabeth Hempel and Marguerite Kay, Baroque Art and Architecture in Central Europe: Germany/Austria/Switzerland/Hungary/Czechoslovakia/Poland (The Pelican History of Art), volume Z22, Baltimore: Penguin Books, translation of original in German, →OCLC, page 32:

     Later, following the general tendency towards a more 'painterly' taste, came the soft Ohrmuschel or auricular style of about 1620 and after, characterized by forms like parts of conch shells or the gristle of an ear.

   • 1971 January, Hugh MacAndrew, “A Silver Basin Designed by [Bernardo] Strozzi”, in The Burlington Magazine, volume 113, number 814, Burlington Magazine Publications, →JSTOR, page 11:

     The choice and treatment of the motifs which form the inner ornamental border - rams' heads and drapery - suggest a Northern goldsmith familiar with the early auricular style.

   • 1976, J[ohn] F[orrest] Hayward, Virtuoso Goldsmiths and the Triumph of Mannerism, 1540-1620, London: Sotheby Parke Bernet, →OCLC, page 290:

     The auricular style was created by two members of the Utrecht goldsmithing family of van Vianen.

   • 1984, Paul Mitchell, “Italian Picture Frames, 1500—1825: A Brief Survey”, in Furniture History, volume 20, Furniture History Society, →JSTOR, page 26:

     The auricular style appears to have come to Northern Europe via the engravings of Hendrick Goltzius, who may have seen it in Tuscany during his visit to Italy in 1591.

   • 1989, Ronald Lightbown, “Charles I and the art of the goldsmith”, in Arthur MacGregor, editor, The Late King's Goods: Collections, Possessions and Patronage of Charles I in the Light of the Commonwealth Sale Inventories, London: Alistair McAlpine, →ISBN, page 239:

     The subtlety and refinement of the auricular style as practised by the Van Vianens plainly appealed very considerably to Charles [I, King of England], not least because they were so different from the humdrum or conservative Late Mannerist style of English goldsmith's work. For if Christian [van Vianen] was not an innovator, yet he was at his best a most excellent workman in the auricular style.

   • 1995 January, Edward van Voolen, Irene Faber, Annette Weber, “Jewish Ceremonial Silver from Germany in the Jewish Historical Museum, Amsterdam”, in The Leo Baeck Institute Year Book, volume 40, number 1, →DOI, page 268:

     JHM B 96 Basin [...] In the centre section of the oval plate there is an embossed relief showing the judgement of Paris. The broad rim is formed in auricular style with shells and has a scalloped edge.

   • 2009, Evonne Levy, “The Cornaro Chapel”, in Michael Snodin, Nigel Llewellyn, editors, Baroque, 1620-1800: Style in the Age of Magnificence, London: V&A Publishing, →ISBN, page 106:

     An important founding element was a form of late Mannerist ornament now called auricular, named after the fleshy parts of the ear, which it somewhat resembles. The auricular style, which fully emerged in the earliest years of the seventeenth century, sprang from an interest in fleshy forms, shells and scaly shapes, which began in the Low Countries in the 1550s, inspired by a fashion for dripping grottoes inhabited by scaly creatures.