Page - 192 - in Die Repräsentation der Habsburg-Lothringischen Dynastie in Musik, visuellen Medien und Architektur - 1618–1918

192 Sektion II: Herrscher, Staat, Nation Ivan Spreitzer13, stonecutters Feliks Toman14 and Alojzij Vodnik15, housepainter and goldsmith Franc Stare16 and builder Filip Zupančič.17 The wood elements were made by the Imperial-Royal State School of Crafts (Cesarsko-kraljeva državna obrtna šola) under the supervision of Ivan Šubic.18 Already at the time of the renovation, the council members had begun to spread ideas for the pictorial decoration of the walls. But even before that, various painters had petitioned the council and the mayor with requests for any painting commis- sions, among whom Alojzij Šubic (1865–1905) proved to be the most persistent. His offer was declined with the explanation that the mayor desired a painting with a theme that would have not only “an architectural character, but would announce a historic moment for the Slovene nation”.19 In fact, Hribar had already chosen two painters whose fame had exceeded the country’s borders, Josip Germ (1869–1950) and Ivana Kobilca (1861–1926). Both were realists in their formal education, whose knowledge suited the task of the mayor’s commission. The paintings were the first representational oil paintings of this type in Slovene art. What distinguished them from all previous works of art were both their dimen- sions – the canvases were monumental, 155,5 x 273 cm – and their content: at the beginning of the twentieth century, the mayor wanted them to be clearly politically defined. Germ’s The Visit of the Emperor Franz Joseph I20 and Kobilca’s Slovenia Bows to Ljubljana were counterparts, given their position on opposite chamber walls. The fee of 1,000 florins each that the painters received was generously contributed by Josip Gorup (1834–1912), at that time the richest Slovene businessman, and the Croatian politician and bishop of Djakovo, Josip Juraj Strossmayer (1815–1905)21, who was in a very close and friendly relation with mayor Hribar and had common ideals of cultural and political association of the Slavic peoples within the Illyrian movement. Gorup paid the costs for Germ’s painting22, while Strossmayer covered the costs for Kobilca’s – only not until the famous painter had completed the bishop’s portrait in 1901.23 Josip Germ had received his education at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, where he had studied historical painting under Siegmund L’Allemand (1840–1910) and August Eisenmenger (1830–1907). After completing military service, he en- rolled in the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague in the academic year 1894–1895. Dur- ing these studies under Václav Brožík (1851–1901), who was the most influential person on Germ’s choice of painting, Germ was also a member of the ‘Slovenija’ academic society, sang in the ‘Slovansko pevsko društvo’ choir (Slavic choral society) and took part in various literary events entitled ‘Slovanske besede’ (Slavic Words). Germ’s first independent exhibition was in Ljubljana in 1898. In the following years, he participated in numerous group exhibitions in the later Yugoslav region. The most