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Medieval Europe + Byzantine
Course: Medieval Europe + Byzantine > Unit 9
Lesson 5: Romanesque art in Spain- Historiated capitals, Church of Sant Miquel, Camarasa (Noguera)
- Virgin from Ger
- Wise and Foolish Virgins, Sant Quirze de Pedret
- The Painted Apse of Sant Climent, Taüll, with Christ in Majesty
- Camel from San Baudelio de Berlanga
- Conservation: Cast of the Pórtico de la Gloria
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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. Created by Beth Harris and Steven Zucker.
Want to join the conversation?
- Why do the looks of JC and Mary seem to change so much? I hope to see a big timeline, along with a video or image, of how art conveys JC and Mary throughout history, to see at what moment their looks change and if its just one artist, region, or a few pieces of art...(3 votes)
- Jon, why don't you do it? I'd like to see that timeline also. Since these videos are Creative Commons copyrighted, and are available on YouTube, you could do a slideshow mashup using YouTube's editing software. If you do it, please post the link and share!(4 votes)
- Does anyone know who made the Virgin from Gir??(1 vote)
- It is most common to not know the names of artists of the Middle Ages because they usually did not include their names anywhere on the works. Typically, people of the Middle Ages were not concerned with giving or receiving individual credit for artistic feats because they did not think of themselves as individuals in the way that you and I do. One reason for this was their all-consuming belief that they were alive in human form only as a miserable stopover on the way to an eternal and holy afterlife. If you want to know more, you can Google "contemptus mundi," which translates as "contempt of the world."(2 votes)
- This reminds me of several african sculptures I saw in a museum years ago. Most notably the shape of the heads and the colors used. Was there any cultural crossover at this time that may have influenced the original artist?(1 vote)
- Can any one see the face above marys shoulder(1 vote)
- I think i see it atand after... 1:54
heres a link http://aidanstrickland.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/reflection.jpg
I have a feeling it's a reflection on the picture they're panning on...(1 vote)
- Why are their heads so enlarged?(1 vote)
- It was believed that someone's power was housed within the head at that time. So, the more important a person was seen, the bigger their head.(1 vote)
- How much time would it take an artist to complete this statue?(1 vote)
- That would depend on the the level of skill of the sculptor and if the materials were already fully prepared. In any case, quite a while.(1 vote)
Video transcript
SPEAKER 1: 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
have 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
sculpture of this sort, there's the notion that it's
not Mary that's enthroned, so much as Christ is
enthroned by Mary. SPEAKER 2: 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. SPEAKER 1: Now, 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 symbolic
form, and the idea was how does one
marry the relationship between an all-knowing
god and a young child. SPEAKER 2: How do you represent
a baby with the wisdom-- SPEAKER 1: Of all-- SPEAKER 2: --of God himself? This is a 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 delicacy 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 11th and early
12th century of building, of painting the walls
of these new churches during this period,
of decorating them with forms for veneration,
worship like we see here. SPEAKER 1: So this would
have been one object with in a much more
elaborate, decorative program. SPEAKER 2: Perhaps. SPEAKER 1: I think that one
of the characteristics that is important for me when I
look at the Romanesque, a kind of elegance, but also
a kind of massiveness. SPEAKER 2: 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
the way that the coloring of the painting,
of the wood, helps to 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. You come up perhaps to an altar. And this is one figure, perhaps
among many, on the altar, and how real she
would have seemed. SPEAKER 1: You were
mentioning, not only defined carving, but
also the painting. There's a lot of the decorative
painting is still in place. And you can see that the
painting has been built up a little bit of stucco
in certain places. SPEAKER 2: Like around
her collar, here. SPEAKER 1: That's
absolutely right. So there's this beautiful
decorative detail that you were speaking of. But there's also, I think,
a sense of the maternal. 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 a sense of the tragic when we look at the
Virgin and Child because of her knowledge of
Christ's eventual fate. SPEAKER 2: I think
that the artist manages to convey some of the
human relationship between these figures
even within this formula of representing the Madonna
enthroned with Christ.