Assignment 8 History of design (II)
Gothic
Fig, 1 cloister of cathedral of segovia,(Mela Corral, 2019) [photograph]
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highlights of design ii Gothic art
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index •
4……………………………………….………….. Gothic art
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26…..…………………………………………….References
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gothic art Gothic art is rooted in the powerful architecture of the northern French cathedrals. It is a medieval art movement that has evolved over more than 200 years across Europe. Leaving behind curved Roman forms, the architects began to use flying buttresses and pointed arches to open the cathedrals in the daylight. The Gothic era also saw in times of major economic and social change a new iconography which held the Holy Mary in significant contrast to the terrible narratives of the Dark Early middle ages. Full of rich changes in all art forms (architecture, sculpture, painting, etc.), Gothic art cleared the way for the Italian Renaissance and the international Gothic movement. The term "Gothic architecture" emerged as a despective definition. The architect Giorgio Vasari used the phrase "German Barbarian style" in his "Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects" to portray what is now considered the Gothic style, andIn the introduction of the "Lives", various architectural features are attributed to "goths," (Vasari, G. 1553) who are responsible for the destruction of the old buildings after the conquest of Rome and the construction of new buildings in this style. At the moment when Vasari was writing, Italy had witnessed a decade of Classical Architectural Vocabulary construction resurrected in the Renaissance and seen as evidence of a new Golden Age of study and sophistication. In English, 17th-century usage, "Goth" was the equivalent of "vandal," a wild intruder with a Germanic origin, and so related to the art and architecture of northern Europe before the revival of classical forms of architecture. Fig.2 Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris, Gargouilles et chimères, ca 1890.
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The era was marked by the Black Death, which entered Europe via Genoese ships and murdered a quarter of the European population between 1347 and 1451 (between 25 and 75 million people). According to Horrox, (1994) poor hygienic conditions in the cities allowed the plague to spread. “In London more than 200 bodies were buried every day in the new burial ground made next to Smithfield , and this was in addition to the bodies buried in another churchyards in the cityand it is known that in Florence this catastrophe caused the death of 60 percent of its 100,000 inhabitants in this period. This epidemic has altered daily life by sowing terror, paralyzing trade and production, lack of labour in the countryside, causing a wave of hunger and giving the result of monetary crises that have led to economic depression. Emilio Mitre Fernandez( 1976) describes a terrible demographic scenario in “Introduccion a la Historia de la Alta Edad Media Europea� (pages 293-303) Hunger, economic crisis, war, lack of hygienic conditions and quality of life, caused a very high mortality rate that mainly affected newborns and children. Sick people were abandoned in the streets and survivors were getting ready for the arrival of the World' s end. Fear of death was deeply felt in society and attitudes to it influenced the people' mentality of the time. It caused the over-reliance on religion and faith for some, as a last hope, and for others, discredit and even surrender to pleasures, fostering idleness and vagrancy. Medieval architecture arose in this context, as a refuge and triumphal symbol of the Christian faith, in a threatening daily life. Fig. 3 Brueghel the elder (1562) The Triumph of Death [painting]
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Wikipedia entries about Gothic Architecture and Abbot Suger (2019) say that origins of Gothic architecture can be traced back to a 12th century French clergyman named Suger (1081-1155), who was abbot of Saint Denis and friend and advisor to King Louis VII of France. Saint Denis was a wealthy and important monastery just outside of Paris. It was supported by the kings of France and held the relics of Saint Denis, the patron saint of Paris. Around the year 1140, Abbot Suger decided that the church at Saint Denis wasn’t big and impressive enough for a significant monastery with royal connections. He wanted something more spectacular, and what he came up with created a new architectural style that would eventually spread throughout Europe. “The old abbey church of St. Denis had been completed in 775. By 1137 it was in ruins,” (Suger, Wikipedia Contributors 2019) so Suger decided to restore it and in that year began working on the west end of the church, building a new façade with two towers and three doors. In 1140 the works to build the choir began, finishing the building in 1144. The result was a great milestone in the history of architecture, as a new style was born: Gothic.
Fig.4 Johnson, B. (2012) Deambulatoire de Saint Denis [Photograph].
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Fig.5 Sailko, (2007) Saint Denis [Photograph]
Fig. 6 Thomas Clouet (2015) Saint Denis [Photograph]
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characteristics of gothic cathedrals Prior to the twentieth century, a Gothic cathedral or abbey was usually the emblematic building of its town which soared over all domestic buildings and was frequently finished by one or more pinnacles and possibly elevated needles These cathedrals were the skyscrapers of the period, and by far the largest buildings Europeans would have ever seen. Most of the Gothic churches, unless they are called chapels, are of a Latin cross (or "cruciform") plan, with a long nave creating the body of the church, a transverse arm called the transept, and, beyond that, an extension that can be called the church, the chancel or the presbytery. There are a number of regional differences in this system.
Fig. 7 G Dehio (1913), [Photograph] A plan of Wells Cathedral in England by G Dehio (died 1932). [Photograph].
Fig. 8 G Dehio (1913), [Photograph] A plan of Lincoln Cathedral in England by G Dehio (died 1932). [Photograph].
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Fig. 9 John Mansbridge, (1967), Gothic plans and elevations [Photograph].
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The Gothic design of the church is characterized by its height, both absolute and relative to its size. Part of a Gothic church's primary body usually indicates the nave is much higher than it is broad. In England, the rate is sometimes greater than 2:1, while in Cologne, the largest proportional difference is 3.6:1. The largest internal vault is 48 m high in the Beauvais Cathedral. “Outside, towers and spires are characteristic of both large and tiny Gothic churches, with the proportion and location being one of Gothic architecture's key factors”(Gotische sprache, Wikipedia Contributors, 2019) In Italy, as in the Cathedral of Florence, the tower, if present, is almost always detached from the building and it is often from an previous building. Two front towers are the standard in France and Spain.This is often the scheme in England, Germany and Scandinavia, but a large tower at the crossing can also solve an English cathedral. Smaller churches usually have only one tower, but this may also be the case with larger buildings, such as the Salisbury Cathedral or the Ulm Minster, as it has the world´s tallest spire slightly larger than even the Lincoln Cathedral, the tallest to be finished in middle ages, at 160 meters (520 ft). , according to Wikipedia data (2019)
Florence Fig.10 Aya Kashman, (2015),Duomo Firenze Duomo [Photograph].
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Burgos Cathedral Fig.11 Zarateman, (2008), Burgos Cathedral [Photograph].
Fig.12 Martin Kraft, (2008), Ulmer Münster Westfassade [Photograph].
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As mentioned by Shah (2009) and Graceanorma (2011) ,archery is fundamental in the verticality of the building, both in its structural and decorative aspects. On the outside, verticality is accentuated by the towers and spirals and to a lesser extent by the vertical buttresses, by the half columns called joined shafts that regularly cross many floors of the building, by the long and slender windows, by the vertical mouldings around the doors and by the figurative sculpture that emphasises the vertical. Roof lines, gable ends, buttresses and the different building parts are topped by small pinnacles, being the urban model of the Cathedral an extreme example of these decorative elements.
Verticality acts as a unifying element that visually integrates all the structural elements of the building.
Fig.13 Ribs by Viollet-le-Duc (1861) [illustration]
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Fig.14 John Mansbridge (1967) England gothic stone vaulting [Illustration]
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As we can read throughout Ruskin & Morris “La Naturaleza del Gótico” (2019) and also in Alegra Carvajal (et al.) book (2002) One of the foremost distinctive characteristics of Gothic is that the expansive space of the windows as at Sainte Chapelle and also the terribly giant size of the many individual windows, as at royalty cathedral, Gloucester Cathedral and Milano Cathedral. the rise in size between windows of the style of architecture and Gothic periods is said to the employment of the vault, and above all, the pointed vault that channeled the burden to a supporting shaft with less outward thrust than a curving vault. Walls didn't ought to be therefore weighty. A further development was the arc-boutant that arched outwardly from the springing of the vault across the roof of the aisle to an oversized buttress pier sticking out well on the far side the road of the external wall. These piers were typically head by a pinnacle or sculpture, any adding to the downward weight, and counteracting the outward thrust of the vault and buttress arch also as stress from wind loading. The façade of an oversized church or cathedral, typically remarked because the West Front, is mostly designed to make a robust impression on the approaching worshipper, demonstrating each the would possibly of God and also the would possibly of the establishment that it represents. Central to the façade is that the main portal, typically flanked by further doors. There is also abundant alternative carving, typically of figures in niches set into the mouldings round the portals, or in sculptural screens extending across the façade. The West Front of a French cathedral and plenty of English, Spanish and German cathedrals usually have 2 towers, which, significantly in France, specific a colossal diversity of kind and decoration. Fig.15 John Mansbridge (1967) Reims and Lincoln Cathedral [Illustration]
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Fig. 16 Pinterest, (1980), Section [Photograph].
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https://designdedecoration.ml/wp-content/uploads/ 2019/03/Traceria.jpg
Fig. 17 Pinterest, (1945), English Gothic tracery examples [Photograph].
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Fig. 18 Pinterest, (1977), tracery examples [Photograph].
Fig. 19 Pinterest, (1977), Amiens [Photograph]. A
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Fig. 20 Szasz, I. (1999) Columns and Vaults [Illustration]
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Fig. 21 Szasz, I. (1999) Windows and roses [Illustration]
Fig. 22 Szasz, I. (1999) Elevation Systems [Illustration]
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Fig. 23 Szasz, I. (1999) Main elevations [Illustration]
Fig. 24 Szasz, I. (1999) Towers [Illustration]
Fig. 25 Szasz, I. (1999) Ornaments [Illustration]
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chartres 1260
Fig. 26 Benjamin Blankenbehler, (2017), Chartres [Photograph]
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“I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” John 8:12. Most of what is known about medieval stained-glass making comes from a twelfth-century German monk who called himself Theophilus. An artist and metalworker himself, Theophilus described in his text, On Diverse Arts, how he carefully studied glaziers and glass painters at work in order to provide detailed directions for creating windows of “inestimable beauty”. Undoubtedly, the medieval stained glass, as well as its superb aesthetics, had a didactic nature. During the Middle Ages illiteracy was common tonic, manuscripts and books were only available to a few. So the stained glass windows were like books, hence they have even come to be defined as the Bible of the poor. As in sculpture or mural painting, also in windows extensive iconographic cycles, with themes from the Old and New Testaments were developed. Often these iconographic cycles were grouped in the same window, and they composed multiple scenes. Fig. 27 Stephane Mahot, (2014), Chartres stained windows [Photograph].
Fig. Met Museum (2014) The Virgin Mary and Five 28 Standing Saints above Predella Panels,1440–46
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Fig. 29 Atokoloro, (2014), Pannello con la straziante di Hell, 1340-50 [Photograph]
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sainte chapelle paris, pierre de montreuil, 1242,1248 Fig. 30 Maria Isla, (2015), Sainte Chapelle [Photograph].
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Fig. 31 Mela Corral(2019) Strasbourg Cathedral [Photocollage]
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cathedral of strasbourg
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"Much of the allure of medieval buildings derives from the sculpture that so frequently adorns them. Some of the most inventive art of the Middle Ages appears in the expansive portals of churches, on the rectangular sides of piers, and on the cramped contours of column capitals. While mosaics and wall paintings remained the preferred means of embellishing buildings in the Byzantine East, the Latin West came to rely a great deal upon carved stone. The very fabric of the building served as a field for a range of subjects, from complex theological ideas to biblical tales, from whimsical creatures to purely decorative foliate forms. Sculptural practices from classical antiquity had a large impact on medieval architectural sculpture. For example, the basic forms of the Corinthian capital, decorated with the acanthus motif, are persistently repeated and reinterpreted throughout the Middle Ages. Often the marble itself comes from ancient buildings. At times an ancient slab might be recarved by a medieval sculptor, while at other times a handsome relief was simply refitted as is into a medieval setting. Architectural features not customarily embellished by the Romans and Greeks, such as the shaft of the column, might nonetheless receive ornamentation drawn from a classical repertory " (Holcomb, M., 2000)
The Character of Architectural Sculpture Technical limitations associated to stone were not an unbridgeable barrier for late Middle Ages sculptors. In fact, the particular features of the structural elements were exploited to produce highly expressive forms. The slender, narrow column allowed for elegant figures such as the King of St-Denis of the Old Testament. Thin curtain folds emphasize the long column dimensions. A biblical narrative that was developed over time was possible from the four sides of a column capital that could not be seen at a glance. (See Fig 34 on page 19, Met Museum n.d.)Figures carved in the capitals showed attentive faces that didn't miss a thing that happened around them, emulating its viewers, who moved by the building as if it were a city where in every corner a story happened. Fig. 32 Pinterest, (2015), Cividale, figure di sante in stucco [Photograph].
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Fig. 33 Pinterest, (2015), Naumburg cathedral sculpture [Photograph].
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Capital with the Presentation of Christ in the Temple (from Saint-Guilhem Cloister)
Fig. 34 Met Museum (n.d.) Capital with the Presentation of Christ in the Temple (from Saint-Guilhem Cloister)
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Saint Denis Holding his head.
Fig. 35
Pinterest, (2009), Saint Denis holding his head [Photograph]
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Fig 36 mela corral (2017) Gargoyles from magdeburg cathedral
Fig. 37 interest, (2009), Gargoyles from Notre Dame, Amiens and Magdeburg [Photograph].
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gar goy les 20
The Church Portal As the face of a building to the outside world, the doorways had always been the target of sculpture in the Middle Ages, but a great explosion of sculpture on church portals appeared in the mid-eighth century, extending over time to include entire facades. In many regions of medieval Europe, the semi-circular tympanum, or the space made between the lintel and the arch just above doorway, became the site of stunning medieval sculpture. (Corral, M. 2016, See Fig, 38) “The Last Judgment, which showed events from the end of time, was a particularly favoured theme”. (Alegre Carvajal, E. et al. 2002)Depicting the destiny of the righteous and the wicked as they appear before Christ as the judge, the door served as a strong reminder of the supreme power of God and the power of the Christian church.
Fig. 38
Mela Corral (2016) Passion of Christ, Notre Dame de Strasbourg [Photograph]
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Segovia Cloister
photo: Mela Corral
The Monastic Cloister
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Fig. 1
Mela Corral (2019) Segovia Cloister, Segovia, Spain
With its rhythmic disposition of columns and piers, the confined space of the monastic cloister offered an ideal opportunity for an extended program of sculptural decoration. Sculptural embellishment might display a fascinating array of foliate forms. Other cloisters show a multitude of curious beasts, the sort of decoration that Bernard of Clairvaux, a twelfth-century monastic reformer, decried as “ignoble fancies.� Still others depict stories of saints and biblical heroes, tales no doubt meant to edify the monks 22 who roamed these monastic courtyards.
Thanks to the fact that Gothic architecture introduced new concepts of space through the use of pointed arches, stained glass windows and other innovations, in the fourteenth century these characteristics of style began to appear in the decoration of furniture. “ The most characteristic furniture of the Gothic style was the chest,� (European Furniture Styles Contributors, 2014) which is later transformed into a wardrobe by placing legs and changing its shape, which was increasing. Another derivation of the chest was the sideboard, furniture that appears at this time, which had a space for the exhibition, to place the dishes so that they were seen without having to open the doors.
Fig. 40
Fig. 43 Pinterest, (2009), chest [Photograph].
1stdibs, (2019), Spanish gothic chest [Photograph]
Fig. 45 Pinterest, (2012), Cabinet [Photograph]
Fig. 44 Pinterest, (2013), Coronation chair from Westminster abbey [Photograph].
Fig. 41 Pinterest, (2009), Medieval table [Photograph].
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Fig. 42
Pinterest, (2009), Canopy gothic chair [Photograph].
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Fig. 46 Absolom Stumne, 1499, Annunciation [Painting].
Fig. 47 Tractatus de Herbis, 1458 [Photograph].
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tapestry
Fig. 48 Museu Nacional d¨art de Catalunya, (2019), Retablo de San Esteban [Photograph].
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Tapestry, woven decorative fabric, the design of which is built up in the course of weaving. Broadly, the name has been used for almost any heavy material, handwoven, machine woven, or even embroidered, used to cover furniture, walls, or floors or for the decoration of clothing. (Pag 24, see Fig. 48, see also Fig 49 on the left) According to Campbell (2002) In the middle Ages, tapestries had a purely utilitarian function. They were originally designed to protect medieval rooms from damp and cold weather, to cover austere walls of big castles, or to insulate big rooms into more comfortable quarters. They were found everywhere in the castles and churches of the late medieval and Renaissance eras. Because tapestries are made of pliable fiber, they can be rolled up and are thus far more easily transportable than framed paintings. This flexibility permitted royalty, nobility, church dignitaries, and other wealthy tapestry owners to bring pieces with them on their travels. Tapestries carried in this manner included relatively small hangings with biblical images that were used as votive images for daily prayer and moments of personal reflection. In contrast, larger tapestries were hung in castles, abbeys, and mansions for decoration and to line drafty halls and rooms in an era before central heating. For major state and religious ceremonies, tapestries were also hung on the outside of buildings, suspended from balconies or attached directly to exterior walls, lining the streets.
Fig. 49 Met Museum, (2017), The Triumph of Fame [Painting].
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