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The Harrowing of Hell
The Harrowing of Hell, c. 1440-70, carved painted and gilt alabaster, 58.3 x 31.5 cm (Victoria and Albert Museum) Speakers: Dr. Nancy Ross and Dr. Paul Binski. Created by Beth Harris and Steven Zucker.
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- Why is this work considered part of the Northern Renaissance? Is it just because of the time frame? The subject and the figures seem very medieval to me. I can't find the attention to detail, the naturalistic representation or the symbolism which I've gotten used to seeing in the previous lectures.(9 votes)
- Excellent observation. This sculpture does indeed have one foot in the medieval era and is a great reminder that the tidy categories that historians devise to organize stylistic development through time are artificial and truth is both more complex and more interesting.(8 votes)
- 1:14Bright blue? It looks green to me. If I could see the real thing, would it be the same colour it looks now?(8 votes)
- The colors can fade away, it is around 600 years old(4 votes)
- The Hellmouth has very blunt teeth - perhaps he's an herbivore!(2 votes)
- How exactly do people know that it is Adam and Eve at the front? Unless of course the maker told people that it was. Also did the maker tell people?(1 vote)
- The story of Jesus' descent to Hell is a well-known part of the Christian tradition, especially among the people. People from the Old Testament are dragged out of Hell by Jesus, among them Adam and Eve. They are probably identifiable because they are together as a pair(2 votes)
- What does stassis mean when it is used in the video to describe the piece?(1 vote)
- A stillness to the image. A moment frozen in time.(1 vote)
- I apologize if I missed it, but who is the artist for this work; maybe this work is just like the The Wilton Diptych in the previous video? Also, do we have records about English artists for this time? If not, why so? Thanks!(1 vote)
- Are the people coming out of a some sort of mouth?(0 votes)
- https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Spring_and_Autumn_Pavilions_5,_Kaohsiung,_Dec_06.JPG
Here's a contemporary hellmouth in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. When you enter through this mouth, you go on a tour in which the blessings of the good on the left are contrasted with the sufferings of the damned on the right. It's quite a religious education for people whose orientation to religion is based on Taiwan folk beliefs.(1 vote)
Video transcript
(piano music) Nancy: Okay, we're here at the
Kalamazoo Institute of Art, and we're looking at an English alabaster that is the Harrowing of
Hell from 1440 to 1470. If you look at it, it's
such a dramatic moment in the history of art and the history of Christ's
passion resurrection because it's the story of
Christ's descent into Hell, and how he tugs Adam and Eve out of Hell before he, himself, goes up to Heaven, and it's in a moment of
extraordinary kind of drama. And here, just to give
an idea of what you have, it's quite a highly
colored block of alabaster with an enormous Hellmouth
on the right-hand side, and this is very popular in England. Particularly, it's the idea that
Hell is a sort of gigantic monster with an enormous open mouth with teeth and it's got what looks like
a sort of snout and beady eyes and it's stretched right open, like some immense dinosaur, jaws yanked as far apart as possible, and out of this, this extraordinary mouth, a pouring, these rather
innocent-looking people who are the, so to speak, the people who are being redeemed from the old testament, Nancy: That's right. Paul: And Adam and Eve
are right at the head and to the left-hand side of the image, gripping Adam by his wrist, I suppose, isn't it, really? Is a gigantic figure of Jesus with a bright blue mantel on lined in red, and a great staff, so he's like a sort of
pilgrim on a journey, and he's journeyed all
the way down into Hell. They probably didn't read Dante, Nancy: Probably not. Paul: But he's like a sort
of pilgrim with his scrip, and he's gripping at him and Eve is just behind Adam, and they're stark naked, and Adam is bearded, and they're all coming
out of this enormous mouth and being pulled forward. And there's a funny
mixture of sort of drama and stassis about it. You know, that the figures
aren't sort of jerking around and being very dynamic. It's quite still in a way. Nancy: I think it is one of these tremendously dramatic moments that's really fabulous because it is salvation. Paul: Yes. salvation in action, where we don't really
see salvation in action in quite the same way. We don't really see Christ in other scenes ripping the people out
of the jaws of Hell. Paul: Yes, that's right. Nancy: So he's really in
the act of saving them. Paul: And the interesting
thing about it is that when he does this, he's standing sort of
built upright, really, with a scroll coming out of his mouth. There must have been
something written there that he's speaking, but he's not looking
at Adam and Eve at all. He's looking, actually, out at us as we stand here, looking back at him. He's looking out at us. So the idea is that the action
of pulling Adam and Eve out is addressed sort of to us. "This is what I do for
you," is what he's saying. It's like a gift. But you're right, you
don't normally see that. And then you start to notice
all these other little details like at the top, sitting on
the snout of the Hellmouth is a tiny little demon
with cloven-hoof hands and he seems, is that a horn he's blowing on? Nancy: I think it is a horn, and I can't help but always make
the apocalyptic connections, having been so steeped in
apocalypse iconography. Paul: Is he issuing a warning that Hell's mouth is being breached. It's like a defense. Nancy: It could be. And he seems to be holding up, what is that, a key? Nancy: I think that is a key, yeah. Often, you see devils with staves, Paul: Yeah. Nancy: But this looks
to be more than that, as though there is some
kind of unlocking process that has happened here. Paul: And that's very English because many centuries before this, in some of the great
12th-century representations of finality of Hell, you see a large angel. There's a wonderful
psalter from Winchester. Nancy: Mm-hmm. Yes. Hellmouth sort of being locked up. Nancy: That's right. possessing this enormous key, and it has this kind of finality to it and here it's all wrenched open, and everything is reversed. Everything comes out, and you wonder who the other figures are that are coming out because they're not all stark naked. Adam and Eve are absolutely ... Nancy: No, we have a clothed figure here, and almost textured. Almost as though that's a hair shirt. Paul: It looks a little bit like
a slightly shaggy sort of vest, open at his breast. Nancy: Yes. They've got these terrific
kind of contemporary hairdos, so he'd got a wonderful beard, which is kind of forked into two, and Christ is quite fashionable looking, and he's got his beard carefully done. He's got his crown of thorns on. Nancy: I love this body position. I mean, he's just turned right around. We have this wonderfully elongated figure, and quite emaciated, really. I mean, none of these people seem to have eaten much in their lives. Paul: Yes. Nancy: And he's this
wonderful, very elegant elongated figure, you know. Twisting at the hips and
reaching right back around. Paul: And if you look closely, it's beautifully painted, actually. Nancy: It is. Paul: Because the flesh isn't painted. It's this sort of slightly
gray color that alabaster goes, but the rest of it, there's
this sort of green sword with those little red and white flowers and gold at the top. Quite a lot of gold, actually. I wonder if that's original. Nancy: And I think that strange
quality of the alabaster really comes out as it is just the skin. That strange, creepy,
slightly translucent ... Paul: It's the translucency. You can see through it. It's like ice. You think you
can see just under the surface. Nancy: Yeah. Paul: Which makes it
rather uncanny and fleshy. Nancy: Another thing I want
to point out here is that someone has gauged out
the eyes of the Hellmouth, or it has scored the
eyes of the Hellmouth, and I wonder, also, if this
score across the demon's waist is also an intentional ... Paul: Oh, yes. Good,
you've got very sharp eyes. Nancy: Trying to mar the figure. Paul: Yeah. Paul: Disempower it. Nancy: That's right. but it's all about
disempowering Hell, isn't it? Nancy: Yes. triumphing over death. It's a sort of heroic moment, really, of triumph in this way, which is so essential to
the Christian message, isn't it? Nancy: Yes, absolutely. (piano music)