Gothic: Virgin and Child and Angels

Virgin & Child & Angels c. 1170

Charles Cathedral , Chartres , France

Gothic Art developed out of Romanesque art, perhaps that’s what explains the similarities in style of the Gothic period. Just like in Romanesque art, the subject matter of art continued to strongly be religious but the difference is that the church wasn’t the only patron of the arts at that time, lay people also started to pay artist to produced religious art that they could be displayed in their houses for their private veneration. Media like painting and fresco started to be more used as well as stain glass. Another significant aspect of the Gothic style, is that human figures started to look more realistic, for example, though still slender bodies were used, the artist and sculptors tried to give the human figure a bit more individuality and emotion, in fact some of the sculptures  have a smile very similar to the archaic smile the early Greeks would portray on their works. Also, figures were put in a more open spaced instead of being secluded and squeezed together as many Romanesque artist did when painting figures in manuscripts or placing sculptures in niches.  One of the most popular religious themes in art of the time was the portrayal of the life of virgin Mary, in fact in the picture of the stained glass above, one can see that the use of the stain glass wasn’t just coincidental but it was selected for its qualities , for when the light goes through it, it illuminates the inside of the church and makes the pictures on the stained glass more bright giving it a heavenly feeling, I'm sure that would have astonished anyone at that time. Again we can see those artists are using selective media and even their environment to create a celestial feeling in the churches, a feeling of being closer to God. It is also interesting to notice that , symbolism used by the early Christians is being used in this work of art, the dove, was used to represent the spirit of God, and is used here again as if I was giving approval to the virtuous life of the virgin Mary , also, notice the size of the Virgin Mary and Christ child compared to the size of the angels and other personages portrayed in the image, they are bigger in size and take greater space than the other figures, the use of this wasn’t exclusive to the Gothic period, in fact portraying the most important figure at a greater scale than the rest to emphasize its importance dates all the way back to the Egyptians and Assyrians.Again we can see that man is really concerned in creating places of worship worthy of not only God but of his saints and Virgin Mary .

Romanesque: The tympanum of the last judgement

The tympanum of the last judgment , 1107

Church of St. Foy, Conques, France.

Highly influenced by Roman and Byzantine art, Romanesque religious art continued to be art inspired on the lives of the saints and Biblical stories that would narrate the life of Christ. During the Romanesque period the used of high relief was brought back and was stronger and vastly used by artist and sculptors of that time. Stained glass, sculpture, ivory carving and illuminated manuscripts continued to used, other media evolved, like metal work and the use of enamel became very popular to use. Much of the metal work of the time was vastly decorated and had religious subject matter, which perhaps had the same intention that previous art styles and civilizations had sought to achieve when creating a religious piece or building, to create something so magnificent and in heavenly that would show the constant intentions of humans to satisfy God. One popular theme to be represented in relief during this time was "The last judgment", the period when Christ will seat on his throne with all his power to judge the people at the last days. Relief like this one would often be located above the main entrance to the cathedral or church, sometimes related images would be carved into the capitals our in the facade of the church. Oddly shaped figures, demons and dragons can also be seen in the art work above and though the figures represented lack depth, are abstract in nature and unrealistic in physical proportions and features, how abstract and different they are might have caused fear on the believers and might have served as a way to cause a deep impression on the person to see it  and make him ponder about his life and the time when he will have to face Christ. Many relieves like this one, were place with the intention to remind the believers to repent of their ways and be redeemed, the fact that this images was placed above the entrance, served, I believe, as way for the believers to practice for the judgment day, because  the imaged served as a reminder for them to repent before the judgment day and before they entered in to the presence of God, if this is the case then Church or cathedral, which was considered so sacred would be the represented as the presence of God and the relief above the entrance the redemption of the believer.

Early Medieval: Christ Enthroned from the book of Kells

Christ Enthroned from the Book of Kells, 800 A.D 
Trinitiy College Library , Dublin

It is interesting to notice how much Christian art flourished after it was legalized by Constantine in Rome and made the state religion by Justinian. Early Christians, because of the persecution they faced had only the chance to create their art in the catacombs that hold the bodies of the early Christians martyrs, but after its legalization, Christian art became one of the main influences of religion art in the art of the medieval times and beyond. In fact, most art from the Medieval, Romanesque and Gothic periods is religious in subject matter, and hardly any secular art existed during this time. Early Medieval art borrowed aspects from Byzantine and Early Christian art, the use of relief , mosaics and sculpture continued but other media such as stained glass , metal work and illuminated manuscripts were more used than the media mentioned before them.  The illuminated manuscript consisted of an illustrated text, mostly religious that also was decorated with vibrant and elaborate religious images. The colors used on the manuscripts often served as an attention grabber to the reader and the gold leaf accents on the text, served as a reminder to the reader that this book was special and sacred. Many of the monks that created these manuscripts had the belief that the use of gold in their images would exalt the text above others and would serve as a medium to praise Gold. The use of Gold wasn’t restricted to manuscript only but was also incorporated in mosaics of the period.  This technique of using gold was not exclusive to this time but also continued to be used until the early renaissance. In this manuscript page we can see that Christ is on his throne portrayed as a wise and righteous ruler, very different from early Christian Art, in which he would be portrayed as a young figure and the good shepherd, it is interesting to notice that  even the interpretation of what Christ was has evolved with the art styles, perhaps portraying a more serious and strong leader was necessary during this time in history , where people needed to be reminded he is watching us and that he has the power to judge our actions and the way we live our lives.

Islamic Art : Dome of the Rock

Dome of Rock Temple Mount completed 691 CE ,Jerusalem

The Dome of the Rock is perhaps one of the greatest and more splendid examples of Islamic Art. This sacred building, was built on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, a place considered holy by Jewish and Muslims alike. It is believed by art historians that this was the very site were the temple of Solomon, that sacred temple inspired of God to King David and built under the supervision of his son Solomon, was erected. This temple was later destroyed and in its place was constructed the Dome of the Rock because Muslims believed that the rocks over which the temple was built actually holds the remains of Adam and Abraham. The need for the Muslim people to build their temple in such a sacred place , compares to the Greeks who would build their temples on specially places , high on the mountain tops , were all the citizens could see the temple from every angle of the city . Early Islamic art was mostly expressed on mosaics and textiles, when expressed on as paintings it would rarely if ever portrayed human beings or animals, this was because of the Sharia Law mentioned in the Qur’an which forbidden human beings to be painted or shown in art, instead Muslims used geometric figures in combination with Calligraphy to create magnificent art of works that would decorate the inside of their sacred buildings and shrines. Often the Art of Calligraphy in their shrines would site pages from the Qur’an and mentioned the name of God to remind his followers of his greatness and magnificent power. It is interesting to notice that Muslims didn’t use human imagery in their art for the fear of becoming idolatrous people and sinning against God, but that did not stop them from finding a new art method that would allow them to worship and venerate their God, or Allah ,without the fear of compromising their beliefs and committing a great sin. Islamic art also employed the use of geometrical shapes and calligraphy to decorate the walls of mosques with floral and vegetal themes, which would serve as a reminded to the faithful that after following the teachings of the Qur’an and the prophet paradise would await for them in the next life. The use of the dome provides the same heavenly qualities the Romans and early Christians tried to achieve by adorning their architecture with dome. The use of the dome would mimic the heavens and give the followers the idea of being closer to heaven. Many aspects of Islamic art were borrowed from roman and early Christian and Byzantine and this can be simply seen by how Muslims vastly used mosaics to decorate their places of worship.

Byzantine:Basilica of San Vitale

Basilica of San Vitale begun ca. 527, Ravenna ,Italy

Perhaps one of the most significant examples of Early Byzantine architecture and arts is the Basilica of San Vitale, which was built during the reign of Justinian, one of the major patrons of the arts during the Byzantine period ; it is estimated that during his lifetime he restored and built about 30 churches. Some of the same traditions of Christian art carried over to Byzantine art, the subject matter still was considered more important than the accurate representation of the figures, biblical subjects were still being used and represented in mosaics and reliefs, painting was also started to be used but it wasn’t as popular as the two mentioned before. In less words, Spiritual matters were more important to  represent even though secular subjects were started to be represented in mosaic as ell. One of the differences of Byzantine art is that it is not as simple as previous art, early Christian art was more simplistic and less elaborate but Byzantine art though religious seemed to be more elegant, and a bit more exaggerated and luxurious. It could be very possible that the legalization of Christianity and allowing early Christians to publicly worship , what lead Christianity to expand and to create architecture, relief and mosaics that would reverence god and would celebrate the divinity of Christ. The Icon was another major “invention” in Byzantine art, an Icon is a painting that represents a holy being and is made with the purpose to be used as method of worshiping that holy being, in the basilica of San Vitale many of these icons can still be seen in many of the mosaics within the building. San Vitale’s Basilica itself it’s a great symbol of worshiping, the simplicity of the outside doesn’t do it justice to the magnificently decorated inside of the church, mosaics representing the lives of the apostles, Jesus and biblical stories cover the walls, also the used of the Dome is something pretty significant, one of the first buildings to use a dome was the Pantheon, or the temple to many gods, the Pantheon’s dome, was build to represent the heavens and proximity to God, perhaps that was the reason of why the Christians took this pagan idea and applied it to their temples, so that the worshipers at the moment they stepped into the temple they would know that this place was a different place, set apart from the world , a place so sacred that it had to resemble the heavens in order for it to make the followers of Christ feel closer to him than before. San Vitale’s dome used pendentives to distribute the weight of the dome evenly, and to give it that sense of space and height. When looking at San Vitale one can see the importance of man on creating such a luxurious building for their God, but one can’t  not ignore thinking that such a magnificent structure could have been used for political purposes also, to show their power to other countries.

Late Antiquity: The Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus ( early christian art)

Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus c.359 CE Rome, Italy

Towards the end of the third century a new form of art started to emerge from the secretive places early Christians in Rome would gather to practice their so forbidden religion. In a time when Rome’s main religion involved polytheism and paganism early Christians were persecuted and exterminated, it is perhaps why much of the early Christians’ art has been found in tombs and catacombs. Under the control of Constantine, Christianity was legalized and the early Christians were allowed to build their own places of worship which many of them were build on tomb of existing catacombs as a way to express their sympathy and reverence for the early Christians who had been martyrs and had given up their lives for their religion. By the late 4^th century, Christianity had become the main religion under the reign of Theodosius the great. Though Christian art borrowed some aspects of the art that had previously been created by the Greeks and Romans, it didnt not share the same emphasis on movement, realism and accuracy, rather it focused more in the context and the meaning behind the representation of the sculpture, relief or mosaic, which were among the preferred art mediums of early Christian art. Another significant thing to point out is that early Christian art doesn’t focus much on portraying Christ but on portraying histories from the Old Testament that somehow related to the life of Christ, an example of this can be seen on the “Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus” the idea of relief on sarcophagus wasn’t unique to the early Christians, it was a practiced used by Romans  but the Christians also embraced it. On this sarcophagus we can see several biblical stories portrayed, on the bottom left side of the sarcophagus we can see a relief of Adam and Eve, on right bottom side we also see Daniel in the den of lions. Early Christians considered important for them to create relief based on biblical stories because they served as a medium to educate others about these stories and also as a way for them to show reverence and respect to Christ. Truth is that in the book of Exodus, the worshiping of graven images is forbidden but these reliefs weren’t seen as idols but as mean of expression to early Christians. Iconography was also another big aspect of early Christian art, iconography involved the used of symbols to represent Christ and his divinity, among the most popular symbols that were used to represent Christ was the fish, the peacock and the shepherd, very often is Christ portrayed as a shepherd, the good shepherd who has come to save his people and will take care of them. Perhaps, and I don’t know this for a fact, maybe early use of iconography was probably a way to be able to represent their savior in a time in Rome when their religion was not tolerated. 

Roman: The Capitoline Triad

The Capitoline Triad ( Minerva , Jupiter and Juno)

The Romans just like the Greeks share a lot of similarities when it comes to religion, both were monotheistic and had numberless amounts of gods to whom people could pray to depending on what it was that they needed , many of the gods the Romans had were adopted from the Greeks and their names where changed to accommodate their culture and beliefs, and example of this can be seen in the Capitoline Triad, which displays Minerva, Jupiter and Juno, Minerva is the equivalent of Athena the Greek goddess , Jupiter is the same as Zeus and Juno would be to whom the Greeks referred to as Hera. In General Romans were able to worship whoever they decided as long as they didn't neglect the main deities of the republic.

In Rome , one of the main  deities of the country was Juno, known for being the goddess of marriage women and the patron of the Roman people ,would often pray to her and offer sacrifices to keep her content. 

Roman gods and goddess just as those portrayed by late classical Greek art, are portrayed in a  idealistic form and elegant garments , as way to show dedication to their gods, they also erected massive constructions and temples , an example of this is the temple the temple of "the Best, Greatest, Capitoline Jupiter" in Capitoline hill , Rome.

The building of great monuments and statues shows us the importance of religious life in Rome.