Introduction to the Medieval World: Extra Class
Extra Class: Medieval Art and Architecture
Assigned Reading:
I. Introduction
A. Medieval buildings
Rural/Peasant - cottages
Urban/Use of Stone or brick
-Town - town walls/stone
-Noble - Secular - castles, manor houses/stone
Religious
- Cathedrals, Abbeys, smaller churches
- reflect a value system - of how to spend small surplus.
[mention St. John the Divine]
B. Art
Sculpture [Mention graven images]
Painting
Tapestry
Book illumination
Fundamental concept of western art - so obvious you
don't think about it - is that art relates to the
subject it portrays - not the observer - cf. Islamic art.
II. The Cloisters
Medieval Collection of the Metropolitan Museum
Founded by John D. Rockefeller [Value of robber barons]
From a collection he spent the early years of this century
building up.
Centerpiece is its four cloisters
Arranged so as to illustrate Artistic development of the
middle ages - mainly in western Europe - France, Spain,
England. Less so of Italy of Germany
III. Churches
-Religious faith
-More space than necessary
-Chapels
-Altars
-color
-Cathedrals - could take a century to construct
- a sign of the wealth of the high middle ages.
IV. Romanesque
1000 or earlier - Ralph Glaber remarked `the world was putting
on a white mantle' of churches.
-Develops in Lombardy first - but in Italy use of marble gives
a different effect - e.g. Pisa - 1068-1118
-Rounded arch: requires heavy pillars, but allows stone vaulting.
-Heavy and somber - but also fantastic and exuberant
-Beginning of signing art - Gilbertus fecit hoc at Autun
V. Gothic
-Not called gothic at the time - it was a Renaissance insult.
-Reflects a more intense emotionalism
-But also pure engineering development
-a desire to push roofs higher
-led to pointed arches
-need to support thrust of walls a ceilings
Signs of the Gothic in Buildings
-Pointed arches
-Vault ribs
-Buttresses
- allow windows
- stained glass
- light and airy
1140s-early 1300s - Gothic
-Abbot Suger - St. Denis
-Chartres
-Notre Dame
-Westminster Abbey - 435 men worked on it in midsummer 1253
-some fell down - Beauvais
-Greater importance of the mass.
-Decorative schemes - tendency towards naturalism
VI. Late Gothic
Move to elaboration of themes - more and more detail
Seen in paintings as well
Symbolism increases in importance
VII. Monasteries
-Could be as elaborate as great cathedrals.
-For centuries Cluny was second largest Church in the west.
-Others were simple.
St. Benedict's rule provided a model for monastic life.
-In Celtic and Byzantine monasticism, buildings could be all
over the place.
-In Benedictine monasteries, you had to have certain buildings
-a church
-a chapter house
-a refractory
-a dormitory
-led to remarkably similar types of monastic buildings - often
centered around cloisters.
VIII. "Minor" Arts
-Book illumination
-Church furnishing
-Weaving
-Tapestry
-reliquaries
-Monstrances
-censors
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© Paul Halsall, 1996.
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© Site Concept and Design: Paul Halsall created 26 Jan 1996: latest revision 14 April 2025 [CV]
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