Virgin from Ger

Virgin from Ger Virgin from Ger, second half of the 12th century, wood, tempera, and stucco, 51.8 x 20.5 x 15.5 cm, From the parish church of Santa Coloma de Ger, Baixa Cerdanya (Museu Nacional d'Art de Cataunya Palau Nacional, Barcelona) Speakers: Dr. Beth Harris and Dr. Steven Zucker

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Virgin from Ger

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We're looking at a small romanesque wooden carving of Madonna and child enthroned.
It's actually very well preserved. It's really only missing, as far as I can see,
the crowns that they would've originally worn. Christ's right hand is up, his two forefingers
are up in a blessing and he's holding a bible for our regard. With romanesque scultpure of this sort there's the notion
that it's not Mary that's enthroned so much as Christ is enthroned by Mary.
They're both very frontal but Mary does become a throne for Christ
who doesn't look at all like a little baby but rather like a small man.
Yeah, there's a very specific reason for that. Of course the artist had seen
many babies and knew that Christ would not have looked like this at this age
but this is a simbolic form and the idea was how does one marry the relathionship
between an all knowing God and a young child.
How do you represent a baby with the wisdom of God himself.
This is remarkably beautiful sculpture. I'm struck not only by the color,
by the painting, and the decorative forms on, for example, her mantle and the clothing that Christ wears
but just the delacacy of the carving, that shawl that goes over his left shoulder
and the ripples that come down at the edges of it and ride up back over his left knee.
This period of romanesque in Spain in the late eleventh and early twelfth century of building, of painting
the walls of these new churches of this period, of decorating them with forms for veneration worship like we see here--
So this would've been one object within a much more elaborate, decorative pro--
Perhaps.
I think one of the characteristics that's important for me is when I look at the Romanesque
is a kind of elegance but also this kind of massiveness.
She has this really elongated face, obviously, that's much too large for her body but that really focuses our
attention on Mary and her importance. And I'm also struck by her coloring, of the painting, of the wood,
helps make the figure much more real and how important that must've been if you're in church and you're
praying. You're surrounded by these murals, these wall paintings, and you come up perhaps to an alter
and this is, you know, one figure perhaps among many on the alter and how real she would've seemed.
You mentioning not only the fine carving but also the painting, there's a lot of the decorative painting
that's still in place. And you can see that the painting is still in place and you can see that
the painting has been built up with a little bit of stucco in certain places
Like around her collar here.
That's absolutely right. So there's this beautiful decorative detail that you were speaking of but there's also, I think,
this kind of a sense of the maternalist. She's very human. There's a great sense of empathy that
I feel when I look at her and of course there's always this sense of the tragic when we look at the virgin
and child because of her knowlege of Christ's eventual fate.
I think that the artist manages to convey some of the human relationship between these figures,
even within this formula of representating the Madonna enthroned with Christ.

Learn more about this work of art in context at smarthistory.khanacademy.org

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Romanesque

Virgin from Ger Virgin from Ger, second half of the 12th century, wood, tempera, and stucco, 51.8 x 20.5 x 15.5 cm, From the parish church of Santa Coloma de Ger, Baixa Cerdanya (Museu Nacional d'Art de Cataunya Palau Nacional, Barcelona) Speakers: Dr. Beth Harris and Dr. Steven Zucker

Virgin from Ger

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