Reflections on Writing Art and Architecture of the Middle Ages: Exploring a Connected World (original) (raw)

Any work of art or architecture, whether whole or in part, that has survived for numerous centuries can be considered to have “lived a long life.” The existence of such works extends beyond the lifespan of any single designer, patron, or political entity—a point that Marvin Trachtenberg has recently emphasized. Rather than being the product of a single historical moment or style, such works have endured, or perhaps their essence perdures, through the centuries into the present. Even when their original materials have changed, certain works of art and architecture live on. Ironically, the very conditions that have allowed the survival of “original” medieval works have required their transformation through alterations, augmentations, and restorations. In some cases, the original work has been entirely replaced with new material. Yet, the concept of a work’s essence can allow for the perception of its continuity and ongoing life. Inspired by longue durée thinking, The Long Lives of Medieval Art and Architecture provides an extended meditation on the longevity of medieval works and the aspect of time as a factor in shaping our interpretations of them. The metaphor of “lives” is employed as a way to conceptualize and write about works, telling stories about objects that are necessarily entangled with numerous individuals and institutions

A Companion to Medieval Art: Romanesque and Gothic in Northern Europe, Blackwell Companions in Art History, 2nd ed. (Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford, 2019) (a collection of thirty-nine original essays from leading and upcoming scholars in the field, each historiographically analyzing one of a systematic and editorially determined range of subjects in the development of Romanesque and Gothic art history; eleven new essays were added to the revised original thirty essays of the first edition; this includes my introductory essay, "A Sense of Loss: An Overview of the Historiography of Romanesque and Gothic Art"). 1. Introduction A Sense of Loss: An Overview of the Historiography of Romanesque and Gothic Art Conrad Rudolph 2. Artifex and Opifex – The Medieval Artist Beate Fricke 3. Vision Cynthia Hahn 4. Materials, Materia, "Materiality" Aden Kumler 5. Reception of Images by Medieval Viewers Madeline H. Caviness 6. Narrative, Narratology, and Meaning Suzanne Lewis 7. Formalism Linda Seidel 8. Gender and Medieval Art Brigitte Kurmann-Schwarz 9. Gregory the Great and Image Theory in Northern Europe During the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries Herbert L. Kessler 10. Iconography Shirin Fozi 11. Art and Exegesis Christopher G. Hughes 12. Whodunit? Patronage, the Canon, and the Problematics of Agency in Romanesque and Gothic Art Jill Caskey 13. Collecting (and Display) Pierre Alain Mariaux 14. The Concept of Spolia Dale Kinney 15. The Monstrous Thomas E. A. Dale 16. Making Sense of Marginalized Images in Manuscripts and Religious Architecture Laura Kendrick 17. Definitions and Explanations of the Romanesque Style in Architecture from the 1960s to the Present Day Eric Fernie 18. Romanesque Sculpture in Northern Europe Colum Hourihane 19. Modern Origins of Romanesque Sculpture Robert A. Maxwell 20. The Historiography of Romanesque Manuscript Illumination Adam Cohen 21. The Study of Gothic Architecture Stephen Murray 22. France, Germany, and the Historiography of Gothic Sculpture Jacqueline Jung 23. Gothic Manuscript Illustration: The Case of France Anne D. Hedeman 24. “Specially English”: Gothic Illumination c.1190 to the Early Fourteenth Century Kathryn A. Smith 25. From Institutional to Private and from Latin to the Vernacular: German Manuscript Illumination in the Thirteenth Century Michael Curschmann 26. Glazing Medieval Buildings Elizabeth Pastan 27. Toward a Historiography of the Sumptuous Arts Brigitte Buettner 28. Reliquaries Cynthia Hahn 29. East Meets West: The Art and Architecture of the Crusader States Jaroslav Folda 30. Gothic in the Latin East Michalis Olympios 31. Art and Liturgy in the Middle Ages Eric Palazzo 32. Architectural Layout: Design, Structure, and Construction in Northern Europe Marie-Thérèse Zenner 33. Sculptural Programs Bruno Boerner 34. The Art and Architecture of Female Monasticism Jeffrey F. Hamburger 35. Cistercian Architecture Peter Fergusson 36. Art and Pilgrimage: Mapping the Way Paula Gerson 37. "The Scattered Limbs of the Giant": Recollecting Medieval Architectural Revivals Tina Waldeier Bizzarro 38. Medieval Art Collections Janet Marquardt 39. The Modern Medieval Museum Michelle P. Brown

Medieval stained glass. In embarking on this guest editorial, it was salutary to realise that I have been researching post-medieval stained glass for fifty years. Originally my interest centred on stained glass of the eighteenth to twentieth centuries, that is to say the 'long' Gothic Revival. The Gothic Revival is, ineluctably, at the core of this Special Issue. The term 'Gothic' was not used in the Middle Ages (it was a construct of the Italian Renaissance, signifying 'barbaric' as opposed to classical architecture), and the concept of its 'revival' is open to multiple interpretations. In the eighteenth century it was applied to literature and architecture before it was extended to stained glass, but in the present context its principal significance is the connotation that something important was being revived-the art and craft of stained glass as practised in the Middle Ages. The slight shift between the English 'Gothic Revival' and its European variants-néogothique, neo-gotico, neugotisch, nieuwe gothic-partly explains the tendency of English stained glass after 1840 to be gauged on its archaeological accuracy. Self-evidently, in order to comprehend its revival, it was imperative to become acquainted with the corpus of medieval stained glass that had inspired the revival.