Steven Haug

836 14th st Apt A

Santa Monica, CA 90403

A Discussion on Heidegger’s “Über die Sixtina”

(Forthcoming in Philosophy Today, Oct. 2020)

Abstract: In 1955 Raphael’s Sistine Madonna was returned to Germany following its removal

from Dresden in anticipation of the city being bombed. That same year Heidegger wrote a short

paper titled “Über die Sixtina,” likely to commemorate the painting’s return. The goal of this

article is to bring the largely overlooked “Über die Sixtina” into discussions about Heidegger’s

philosophy of art. While brief, Heidegger’s paper makes clear that the Sistine Madonna is an

important work to consider when deliberating about his philosophy of art in general. This article

elaborates on the topics Heidegger discusses in “Über die Sixtina,” particularly the image-being

of the Sistine Madonna, the image as a window painting, and the place of the painting.

Heidegger’s brief paper titled “Über die Sixtina” is only occasionally cited by Heidegger

scholars. The paper lacks the apparent richness and rigor we find in many of Heidegger’s other

writings about art. It is roughly 700 words in length, has yet to be translated into English in its

entirety, and ends with the sentence “I realize all of this remains an insufficient stuttering.”i

With this essay I hope to bring “Über die Sixtina” into the discussions about Heidegger’s

philosophy of art.ii The foremost reason “Über die Sixtina” ought to be attended to is that

Heidegger himself understands the Sistine Madonna to be exceptionally important. If we are to

say anything about Heidegger’s philosophy of art, we ought to note the works Heidegger thinks

are exemplars of great art and examine closely what he has to say about those works. Heidegger

begins “Über die Sixtina” with the sentence: “All of the unresolved questions about art and the

artwork gather around this image [Bild].”iii

Commissioned in 1512 by Pope Julius II, Sistine Madonna was finished by Raphael in

1514 and was the altarpiece for the church of San Sisto in Piacenza. It remained the altarpiece of
this church until 1754 when it was purchased by Augustus III of Poland and relocated to

Dresden. Controversy surrounds its rescue from Dresden during the second World War, but we

do know that the painting ended up in the Pushkin Museum in Moscow.iv In 1955, after the death

of Stalin, the painting was returned to Germany. It is in this year that Heidegger wrote “Über die

Sixtina.”

There is no obvious inherent structure to Heidegger’s paper. While several topics are

broached in the paper, I focus on the image-being of the Sistine Madonna, the image as a

window painting, and the place of the painting. Heidegger dedicates most of “Über die Sixtina”

to these three topics.

Sistine Madonna as image

In the first main paragraph of the paper, Heidegger explains what he means by the word

“image” (Bild). He refers to the Sistine as an image throughout the paper but uses the word in a

particular way, stating: “The word ‘image’ here is only meant to say: a visage [Antlitz] in the

sense of looking toward [something], as arrival.”v The notion that images seem to have one

meaning, and eventually reveal a different meaning, is discussed in detail by Heidegger in his

lecture “Origin of the Work of Art.” In the “Origin” lecture, Heidegger explains the

phenomenological steps involved in experiencing a work of art.vi He looks to Van Gogh’s A Pair

of Shoes in doing so. According to Heidegger, when we first approach the Van Gogh we

experience it as an aesthetic object. That is, we experience it as something there to be sensually

enjoyed by an observer. It is there to be looked at. Most of us, I suspect, move on to the next

painting in the gallery after we have appreciated a work aesthetically. According to Heidegger,

however, if we attend to the tension between the shoes (the foreground) and the nebulous

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background of the painting, we come to recognize that the shoes are, in truth, equipment, and

come to recognize the nature of truth as aletheia (i.e. revealing).vii That is, we come to

understand two things from the artwork, a particular truth — that the shoes are equipment — as

well as the nature of truth as aletheia.

The shoes protrude from and rest upon the background, at the same time as the

background seemingly strives to engulf the shoes. That which allows the shoes to come forth (the

background) is also that which threatens to cover them over. This is the tension between

covering over and uncovering that we find in great works of art, according to Heidegger, and the

reason the essential nature of art is truth as aletheia.viii For Heidegger, art is not important insofar

as it is pretty or expresses something about the artist. Art is profound because of its claim to

truth, and truth happens in art through the tension between uncovering and covering over. The

recognition of the meaning that is contrary to the meaning the painting seemed to have comes

about through attending to the tension in the painting. When we pay attention to the painting and

do not merely appreciate it aesthetically, we notice this other meaning.

The Sistine Madonna is an image in the way A Pair of Shoes is an image. They both

reveal a meaning that, upon arrival, was not evident. In order for someone to come to understand

truth as aletheia through the Van Gogh, they must notice and pay attention to the tension

between the foreground and the background of the painting. With the Sistine, immediately upon

viewing the work we notice Mary carrying the baby Jesus, but there is a tension to be recognized

in this painting as well. Heidegger briefly discusses the tension that ought to be noticed in the

Sistine: “Mary Carries the baby Jesus in such a way that she herself is first brought forth [her-

vor-gebracht] by him into her arrival, which in each case brings along the concealed sheltering

of their provenance.”ix The tension that Heidegger is highlighting with this sentence is the

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tension between Mary holding the baby Jesus — and by so doing, carrying him forth — and the

sense that it is through the baby Jesus’ presence that Mary herself comes forth. Similar to A Pair

of Shoes, this tension is productive rather than destructive. The tension between the bringing

forth of the baby Jesus and the coming forth of Mary allows them both to come into appearance,

in addition to revealing their essential nature (source).

In “Origin of the Work of Art,” Heidegger states — speaking in detail about the tension

in the Van Gogh — that in “the struggle, each opponent carries the other beyond itself,”x and that

this tension also reveals the source of the opponents’ hidden source.xi “Origin of the Work of

Art” is roughly 90-pages long so Heidegger has plenty of room to explain aletheia and tension.

When we read “Über die Sixtina” in light of what Heidegger has already stated about these

topics in “Origin of the Work of Art,” we come away with a much clearer understanding of his

comments about Mary and the baby Jesus in the Sistine.

At the center of the Sistine Madonna we find Mary holding the baby Jesus. He is seen

resting on Mary’s chest and shoulder. It is between these two figures that we find a tension

similar to the tension between the shoes and the background in the Van Gogh. Mary carries the

baby Jesus forward, but it is only through this bringing forth that Mary herself comes forward.

The entanglement of their limbs is similar to what we find in the Van Gogh when we recognize

that the shoes are resting upon the background at the same time as the background appears to be

on the verge of enveloping the shoes. Jesus is revealed, but Mary’s sheltering constantly

threatens to conceal him from view.

The similarity between A Pair of Shoes and the Sistine goes further still. We will recall

that the tension in Van Gogh’s painting revealed the nature of shoes as equipment.xii Likewise,

the tension between Mary and the baby Jesus reveals their essential nature as well, namely God.

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In the passage from “Über die Sixtina” quoted most recently, Heidegger mentions that the source

of Mary and the baby Jesus is brought with them in the concealed sheltering of their provenance.

The two sentences that follow this in “Über die Sixtina” provide more detail.

The bringing, wherein Mary and the baby Jesus hold sway [wesen], gathers its happening

into appearance, in which the essence [Wesen] of both is positioned, out of which it is a

shape. / In the image, as this image, the manifestation of the incarnation of God happens,

that transformation happens, a transformation [Verwandlung] which eventuates [sich

ereignet] on the alter as “the transubstantiation [Wandlung],” as the most proper

occurrence [das Eigenste] of Holy Mass.xiii

God is made present by the relation between the baby Jesus and Mary in the painting. Jesus does

not come forth — in either the painting or the nativity story — without Mary. Likewise, Mary

does not become the mother of Jesus without the child. Each requires the other to be that which

they are, hence the productive tension. The essential nature (source) of both of them, however, is

God.

Let us return to the topic of this section in light of what we have just discussed. A

transformation occurs in the image when we approach it the way Heidegger encourages us to.

The meaning of the image transforms from being a picture of Mary and the baby Jesus, to being

the manifestation of the incarnation of God. This happens when we attend to the tension between

Mary and the baby Jesus. Similar to A Pair of Shoes, the productive tension in the Sistine reveals

the nature of what is observed in the work. The nature, or source, of the shoes is equipment; the

source of Mary and Jesus is God. In the excerpt quoted above, Heidegger calls the

transformation of the image “the transubstantiation” because the change we recognize in Sistine

Madonna is the change that happens during Holy Mass as well. Through the blessing of the

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bread and wine by the priest, God is made incarnate. Likewise, through attending to the work of

art, the manifestation of the incarnation comes about through the tension between Mary and the

baby Jesus.

Sistine Madonna as window painting

Insofar as “Über die Sixtina” is concerned with the image-being of the work of art, the

revelation of God through the tension between Jesus and Mary is what is most important.

However, Heidegger does briefly discuss the Sistine and the distinction between window

painting (Fenstergemälde) and panel painting (Tafelbild), so we will broach the subject here as

well.xiv What follows are all of Heidegger’s statements on the subject in “Über die Sixtina.”

The so-called ‘image’ still lies before the distinction between “window painting” and

“panel painting.” The difference, when it comes to the Sistine, is not merely categorical,

but historical. “Window painting” and “panel painting” are images in different ways.

That the Sistine became a panel painting in a museum is the true history of Western art

since the Renaissance.xv

Regarding the “window-painting,” it would be necessary to ask: what is a window? Its

frame borders the open of translucence, in order to gather it through the border into a

release of appearing [Scheinens zu versammeln]. The window, as entrance of the

approaching light, is the prospect of arrival.

But in the single event [Geschehnis] of this single image, the image does not appear

retrospectively through an already existing window, rather the image itself first forms this

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 window and is therefore no mere altarpiece in the usual sense. It is an alter image in a

much deeper sense.xvi

Posing the distinction between window painting and panel painting serves several purposes in

“Über die Sixtina.” First, it opens the way for Heidegger’s discussion about the window formed

by the painting.xvii Second, the distinction paves the way for a discussion about the place of the

painting, which is the topic of the next section of this paper. The remainder of this section

explains the importance of aletheia and the ways by which the Sistine might be considered a

window painting.

We have examined already the tension between Mary and the baby Jesus in the Sistine.

There is, however, another covering-over and uncovering evident in the painting. This tension is

the covering-over and uncovering by the curtains painted into the image. These curtains are what

allow the image to form the window that Heidegger remarks upon. This tension is much more

easily recognizable than the tension between Mary and Jesus. As was mentioned earlier,

Heidegger understands works of art to reveal a specific truth (equipment, God, etc.) as well as

allowing the observer to come to recognize nature of truth as aletheia. Heidegger is concerned

with teaching this to his readers. Because the Sistine contains this more easily recognizable

covering-over and uncovering, it is a painting which lends itself well to teaching the idea.

The articulation of uncovering that which is covered over (i.e. revealing, aletheia) is an

important project of Heidegger’s in his later writings in general, and window paintings are

helpful to Heidegger when explaining aletheia. The weight of the importance of understanding

aletheia comes across in Heidegger’s essay “The Question Concerning Technology.” In this

essay, Heidegger characterizes the current epoch as a time in which modern technology reveals

the earth as standing reserve. It is demanded of nature that it supply extractable and storable

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energy.xviii Heidegger goes on to explain that human beings are also part of this standing reserve

(hence terms like “human resources”), which he eventually labels enframing [Ge-stell], and

clarifies that enframing is the essence of modern technology.xix Heidegger does not condemn

enframement outright, although many who read Heidegger sense that he has a general disdain for

modernity. Ge-stell is dangerous, but it is dangerous because it is a form of revealing. All

revealing is dangerous, it just so happens that the form of revealing that Heidegger is generally

concerned with in “The Question Concerning Technology” is modern technology. “In whatever

way the destining of revealing may hold sway, the unconcealment in which everything that is

shows itself at any given time harbors the danger that man may misconstrue the unconcealed and

misinterpret it.”xx

In “The Question Concerning Technology,” Heidegger exposes to his readers that the

way the world shows up to us is not the way the world is. There is no way that the world is, only

the way that it is revealed. Heidegger explains this to his readers in his essay “The Question

Concerning Technology,” but with the lecture “Origin of the Work of Art” Heidegger teaches his

readers that truth — understood as aletheia rather than as correctness or correspondence —

happens in the tension between the uncovering and covering over. The world by necessity is not

standing reserve. Nor is it the creation of God. When world shows up to us it does so at the

expense of other modes of revealing. Artworks that feature windows are helpful for teaching this

idea, and the multiple layers of tension in the Sistine make the work particularly suitable for

teaching aletheia.

The Sistine Madonna might be considered a window painting because the main figures

within the work (Christ Child, Madonna, Saint Sixtus, and Saint Barbra) are framed by a green

curtain. The curtains are pulled to either side to reveal a scene in which Mary holds the Christ

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Child, with Saint Sixtus to their right and Saint Barbra to their left. The medium of the work is

oil on canvas, but it is painted as if the viewer and the figures in the image are looking at one

another through a window. As Heidegger points out, there could be a debate about the category

to which the Sistine belongs, the category of window painting or panel painting. Window

painting is a tool used in perspective drawing, and this is one sense in which the Sistine is a

window painting. The curtains in the Sistine provides depth to the image. The viewer and the

image seem to be separated by an open window. We find the same technique used in a different

fashion in DaVinci’s The Last Supper, in which the figure of Christ is framed by a window. The

open window is behind Christ in The Last Supper. This elongates the image behind the Christ

figure, which in turn pushes Christ closer to the viewer.

The Sistine Madonna is a window painting in another sense as well. As an altarpiece, the

painting hung on the wall behind the alter in San Sisto, Piacenza. Being 104 inches tall and 77

inches wide, the painting is itself the size of a large window, and when hung on a wall it appears

as if the curtains of a window have been pulled aside and that Mary and the Christ Child are

gazing over the heads of the parishioners to the crucifix that was likely opposite the alter in the

church. The curtains provide perspective, giving depth to the figures, but they also provide the

clearing for the figures to come into the church.xxi

The Place of the Sistine Madonna

In order for the Sistine to disclose God it is required that the work be in its place.

Heidegger’s insistence on the importance of the place of artworks is a particular instance of his

rejection of modern aesthetics, which argues that the location of the art does not much matter

when it comes to one’s experience of the work of art. The idea is that we should consider the

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work over and above any concerns we might have about the where we are viewing the work of

art. Heidegger engages with this very debate in “Über die Sixtina.” This section lays out

Heidegger’s thoughts on the importance of the place of the Sistine Madonna.

Theodor Hetzer, whom I sat on the same bench with at Freiburg Gymnasium, and whom

I remember with reverence, has spoken of the Sistine so inspiringly, that one cannot help

but thank his thoughtful examination. However, I was shocked to hear his remark, which

states that the Sistine is “not bound to a church, that it does not demand a particular

installation.” This thought is aesthetically correct, but lacks actual truth. Wherever this

image is “installed” in the future, it will be out of place [Ort] there. It will be unable to

display its initial essence, that is, to define the place for itself. The image is astray [irrt],

changed in its essence as a work of art, in the foreign [Fremde]. With the museum

presentation, which reserves its particular historical necessity and right, the foreign

remains unfamiliar. The museum presentation levels everything into the uniformity of the

“exhibition.” In this there is only arrangement, no place.xxii

It is Heidegger’s insight that works of art have a claim to truth that ultimately leads him to

disagree with his school friend Theodor Hetzer. Works of art can be aesthetically pleasing

regardless of where they are, and this is why Heidegger concedes that Hertz’s claim was

aesthetically true, but because works of art requires that it be in its place if it is to disclose its

essence (i.e. God), it is not actually true that the Sistine is not bound to a church. When the

painting was removed from the church it became a museum piece, and as a result the art was no

longer able to work the way it once did. When it comes to the Sistine this means it lost its ability

to reveal God.

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 The history of the Sistine tracks what Heidegger sees as the history of western art in

general. He argues that one of the five essential phenomena of modernity is artworks’ moving

into the purview of aesthetics and becoming an object of experience.xxiii The Sistine ceases to be

a window painting and becomes a panel painting when it is removed from its particular church.

Heidegger is not asserting that in order to really appreciate a work of art one ought to

view that work in the place it was originally intended to occupy. Such an assertion only makes

sense when we approach artworks aesthetically because it still assumes the artwork to be an

object of aesthetic experience. Heidegger’s insistence on the importance of the place of the

painting is more profound. The Sistine needs to be in its place within the church of San Sisto in

Piacenza and the church in turn requires the painting because it is through the painting that the

Holy Mass happens.

We will recall that the Sistine brings about the incarnation of God, and Heidegger points

out that this is the change that occurs during the celebration of Holy Mass. In “Über die Sixtina,”

Heidegger makes it clear that he does not understand the painting to merely represent this change

when he states that “the image is not only a symbol of the sacred change. The image is the

appearance of time-play-space [Zeit-Spiel-Raumes] as the place, where Holy Mass is

celebrated.”xxiv It is the image itself which creates the clearing for God to come forth, and for

Holy Mass to be celebrated. Because of this, the image belongs to the church and the church

belongs to the image, as Heidegger makes clear in the following excerpts:

The place is ever the alter of one church. This belongs to the image and vice versa. To the

unique event [Geschehnis] of the image there necessarily corresponds its isolation from

the inconspicuous place of one of the other many churches. This church in turn, and, that

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 is, each one of its kind, calls for the single window of this single image: it founds and

completes the construction of the church.

Thus, the image constitutes the place of the uncovering covering over [entbergenden

Bergens]xxv (A-lētheia) .... Its mode of uncovering (its truth-ness)xxvi is the veiling

appearing of the pro-venance of the Godman. xxvii

The Sistine belongs to the one church of Piacenza, not in a historical-antiquarian sense,

but in the sense of its image-being.xxviii

Because the museum presentation of artworks levels all of the artworks into an arrangement

determined by the organization of the exhibit, the artworks lose their ability to work. It is the

Sistine that created the space through which God became present in the church. Heidegger is able

to state that the image founds and completes the church precisely because a church is incomplete

without the presence of God.

With these excerpts, Heidegger asserts not only that Sistine Madonna belongs as the

altarpiece to its particular church, but that each altarpiece belongs to its particular church. From

this it is clear that Heidegger thinks that it is not only this particular work of art that is tied to its

place. Each church of its kind requires its altarpiece to be in place. We can gather from “Über die

Sixtina” that this is the case because of the relationship between the altarpiece and the church.

Churches are the places where God becomes incarnate and for this to happen at the San Sisto in

Piacenza, the Sistine Madonna must create the clearing for God to be present.xxix

Santa Monica

i
Heidegger, “Über die Sixtina,” 121.

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ii
To my knowledge, there are two writings which discuss “Über die Sixtina” in some detail. (1) Wefelmeyer,
“Raphael’s Sistine Madonna: An Icon of German Imagination from Herder to Heidegger,” 117-18. (2) Žižić,
“’Stepping into the World’: Martin Heidegger’s Remarks on the ‘Sistine Madonna,’” 807–19. Also, in a letter he
sent to his mistress Marielene Putscher, Heidegger wrote at least a portion of what is published in “Über die
Sixtina.” Putscher quotes this letter, and it is identical to a page of “Über die Sixtina,” page 121, in GA 13. This can
be found in Raphaels Sixtinische Madonna: Zeugnisse aus zwei Jahrhunderten deutschen Geisteslebens, 160-61. “A
Discussion on Heidegger’s ‘Über die Sixtina’” advances these previous commentaries by explaining the importance
of “Über die Sixtina” and developing the ideas presented in the text by exploring them in light of Heidegger’s more
through writings about works of art.
iii
Heidegger, “Über die Sixtina,” 119.
iv
Akinsha and Kozlov, "Spoils of War."
v
Heidegger, “Über die Sixtina,” 119. In this sentence, the phrase “looking toward something” is translated from
the German, Entgegenblick. This word can also mean “to await something.” It is also worth noting that Ankunft,
translated here as “arrival,” carries with it the sacred sense of advent – the time of expectant waiting and
preparation for the Nativity during Christmas as well as the second coming of Jesus.
vi
Heidegger, “The Origin of the Work of Art,” 15-16.
vii
Heidegger uses the ancient Greek word for truth when appealing to what he calls a more primordial
understanding of truth. Rather than understand truth as correspondence, truth as aletheia is intended to
demarcate the idea that truth is a happening and that it happens in the covering over and uncovering of being.
There is much to be said about aletheia, and more will be said throughout this essay when necessary.
viii
Heidegger, “The Origin of the Work of Art,” 16.
ix
Heidegger, “Über die Sixtina,” 120.
x
Heidegger, “Origin of the Work of Art,” 27.
xi
Heidegger, “Origin of the Work of Art,” 26-7.
xii
Heidegger, “Origin of the Work of Art,” 14-15.
xiii
Heidegger, “Über die Sixtina,” 121.
xiv
Panel paintings were popular altarpieces during the Renaissance and Raphael created some himself. Sistine
Madonna, however, is not a panel painting. The term “panel painting” refers to a work painted on a wood panel
(or panels). The Sistine Madonna is painted on canvas. It is likely that Heidegger had not seen Sistine Madonna in
person. There appears to be no record of Heidegger visiting the painting before the war and in 1955, the year
Heidegger wrote “Über die Sixtina” and the year the painting was returned to Germany, Heidegger was
exceptionally busy. In the Heidegger chronology compiled by Dr. Alfred Denker
(https://www.freewebs.com/m3smg2/HeideggerChronology.html) it is reported that Heidegger visited Meßkirch
as well as several places in France, but there is no report of him making a trip to Dresden where the painting was
displayed.
xv
Heidegger, “Über die Sixtina,” 119.
xvi
Heidegger, “Über die Sixtina,” 120. Two paragraphs after the previous quote.
xvii
Like actual windows, the Sistine creates a space for the arrival and appearing. Immediately following most
recent above quotation, Heidegger begins his discussion about Mary carrying the baby Jesus and details the
transformation of the image.
xviii
Heidegger, “The Question Concerning Technology,” 296-97.
xix
Heidegger, “The Question Concerning Technology,” 301.
xx
Heidegger, “The Question Concerning Technology,” 307.
xxi
A window appears in other works of art that are important to Heidegger’s philosophy of art. For instance, Paul
Klee, who is likely the most important painter with regards to Heidegger’s thoughts on art towards the end of his
life, painted a work titled Saint, From a Window (Heilige, aus einem Fenster) in 1940. We know that this painting
itself was noteworthy to Heidegger because he made a sketch of the painting and below it raised a question about
the “image”-character (“Notizen zu Klee / Notes on Klee,” Note 18). In his book Between Word and Image:
Heidegger, Klee and Gadamer on Gesture and Genesis, Schmidt explains that Klee’s work — both his paintings and
his writings — opened Heidegger’s eyes to the possibly of birth and genesis defining the image in the work of art
(94). Heidegger discovered Klee’s work in 1956, the year after he wrote “Über die Sixtina.”
xxii
Heidegger, “Über die Sixtina,” 119-20.
xxiii
Heidegger, “The Age of the World Picture,” 57.

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xxiv
Heidegger, “Über die Sixtina,” 121.
xxv
Bergen, the root of what is translated here as “covering over,” has the sense of sheltering, safe harbor, and safe
keeping.
xxvi
Wahr-heit, translated here as “truth-ness” (with wahr being the German word for “true” and “heit” being the
German suffix “ness”), can be traced backed to the German word Wahren, which has the sense of preserving and
safeguarding.
xxvii
Heidegger, “Über die Sixtina,” 121.
xxviii
Heidegger, “Über die Sixtina,” 120.
xxix
Heidegger details the importance of the place of a work of art in “Origin of the Work of Art” when he discusses
the ancient Greek temple. The setting up of the temple is not a mere putting into a location. Rather, the setting up
of the temple is a dedication or a praising. This dedication or praising consecrates the place of the setting up of the
temple which calls forth the god. (Heidegger, “Origin of the Work of Art,” 21-22.) Works like the Sistine and the
temple belong to their place and their place belongs to them because the putting into place of the work opens up
the space for the coming forth of a god. In the setting up of the work, the place becomes a holy place and the
space within which God or a god is present.

Works Cited

Akinsha, Konstantin and Kozlov, Grigorii. "Spoils of War." ARTnews, November 1, 2007
(reprinted from the original April 1991 archived version),
https://www.artnews.com/artnews/news/top-ten-artnews-stories-tracking-the-trophy-brigade-
186/.

Heidegger, Martin. “Notizen zu Klee / Notes on Klee,” Philosophy Today 61(1) (2017): 7-17.
Compiled and translated by María del Rosario Acosta López, Tobias Keiling, Ian Alexander
Moore, and Yuliya Aleksandrovna Tsutserova.

Heidegger, Martin. Qtd. In Raphaels Sixtinische Madonna: Zeugnisse aus zwei Jahrhunderten
deutschen Geisteslebens, edited by Michael Ladwein, 160-61. Stuttgart: Urachhaus, 1993).

Heidegger, Martin. “The Age of the World Picture.” In Off the Beaten Track, edited and
translated by Julian Young and Kenneth Haynes, 57-85. Cambridge UK: Cambridge University
Press, 1998.

Heidegger, Martin. “The Origin of the Work of Art.” In Off the Beaten Track, edited and
translated by Julian Young and Kenneth Haynes, 1-56. Cambridge UK: Cambridge University
Press, 1998.

Heidegger, Martin. “The Question Concerning Technology.” In Martin Heidegger: Basic

Writings, edited by David Farrell Krell, 307-41. San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1977.

Martin Heidegger, “Über die Sixtina.” In Gesamtausgabe, Vol 13: Aus der Erfahrung des
Denkens, 119-21. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 1983.

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Schmidt, Dennis J. Between Word and Image: Heidegger, Klee, and Gadamer on Gesture and
Genesis. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2012.

Wefelmeyer, Fritz. “Raphael’s Sistine Madonna: An Icon of German Imagination from Herder to
Heidegger.” In Text to Image: Image into Text, edited by Jeff Morrison and Florian Krobb, 117-
18. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1997.

Žižić, Ivica. “’Stepping into the World’ Martin Heidegger’s Remarks on the ‘Sistine Madonna.’”
The Heythrop Journal LVII (2016): 807-19.

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