Ninfa

The medieval town, which arose on this site in the high Middle Ages and was wrested from the marshes, fell desolate from the end of the 14th century. The ruined landscape attracted many artists since the 18th century. In the 20th century, the ruins, overgrown by numerous plants, were transformed into a landscape garden by the owners, the ancient Roman noble family of the Caetani. Maintaining the balance between the remains of historical buildings on the one hand and a diverse fauna and flora on the other is one of the main goals of the garden's management. Christoph Brech, himself trained as a gardener before studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich, documented the gardens of Ninfa photographically over a period of two years. The aim was not only to capture this arguably unique landscape of gardens and ruins as a romantic park in the change of day and seasons, but also to crystallize essential subjects for this place through close observation, such as the juxtaposition of grown and built structures, or to show the plants themselves as ruins in autumn and winter shots. Complementing the photographs, historian and longtime director of the German Historical Institute (DHI) in Rome Michael Matheus describes the genesis and decline of the medieval city, the transformation of the ruins into a garden ensemble, and the perception of the "Pompeii of the Middle Ages" especially by German writers and artists.