CHAPTER 4 : GOTHIC SCULPTURE

I. The features.

The gradual disappearance of the wall frees the sculpture of the domination of the architecture. and drives it progressively toward the nature. The Gothic age will be in sculpture the age of the equilibrium between the requirements of the architectural surrounding and those of the natural pattern which, in the Renaissance, will be once again (after the antiquity) the only pattern.

1. Frame.

Sculpture is not totaly free. It is framed above and below : dais and base. Sculpture is once again submissive to the architecture.

2. Abutment.

The "statue" emancipates itself a bit of the wall.

Furthermore, it sticks to the wall by the back. But, sticking by the back only, the statue is free on the sides and in front.

3. Faciality.

Neither frontal nor axial, the statue is facial ...

a. Frontality : Frontality is archaic. We can meet it in the Egyptian sculpture, in the Greek Kouros, in the Romanesque Virgin (below right) and  first-ever Gothic (statues-column at Chartres, below left).

The frontal presentation of the Egyptian Pharaoh, of the Greek Kouros, of the Romanic Virgin gave to these figures a hieratic aspect. There are fixed in a symetric posture for the eternity and give, on earth, the idea of divinities come from an another world.

b. Faciality is typical of the classical Gothic.

The Gothic statue, because of its faciality, accesses at a beginning of move which gives it a "life". While the frontal statue could not be seen differently than in a frontal view, so under one perspective only, the facial statue can be looked by all the points of view, except by back (Below : Annunciation, Reims).

c. Axiality : in Greek, Roman and Renaissance sculpture (below : Apollo by Polyclete).

4. Expressivity.

So, quite freed of the architectural confinement, the sculpture stops to be low-relief or high relief and becomes statue. It accesses at a relative autonomy and, by that way, became expressive. That expression is not yet writed on the face but on the bearing (Below : Amiens).

Yet submissive for a part to the architecture, the sulpture shall accept some "deformations". The statues-column of Chartres extend up according to the column on which they are supported. But, in some way, they are freed of the wall and tend to go in front. So they look like more to human people they represent. The equilibrium between sculpture and architecture defines the Gothic sculpture (Below, : Chartres)

The ability to look like a natural being allows to the statue, if not to personify yet an individual (tall or small,  bald or haired), but, at least, the human essence, what is universal, communal at all the individuals : their humanity (Below : Zacharie, Chartres).

5. The symetry between the Old and the New Testament.

a. "Untidiness" : iconography of the romanesque portal.

The cloister of Moissac aligns its capitals in an evident iconographic untidiness. The porch of the same church alludes to some scenes of the New Testament in an almost as important untidiness. Annunciation / Visitation (it still be acceptable), Adoration of the Magi, Presentation in the Temple, Flight into Egypt, Death of Lazarus,  Death of the miser, lust, ...

b. "Chronology" of the Gothic portal (the portal of the Precursors). The Gothic portal runs through the holy Story, from Patriarchs ans the Prophets, to the Holy Gospels, we progress toward the Nativity (depicted by the Virgin Mary.

The Gothic introduces the order : chronological or symbolical ( the symmetries between the Old and the New Testament; See later)

II. The iconography : the form.

1. The new themes.

From the Apocalypse, on the Romanesque tympanum, we pass to the Last Judgment or to the Christ in glory or to the glory of the Virgin, on the Gothic tympanum. God stops to be that terrible being without any report with the human being. He becomes the Father. The one who makes the difference between right and wrong, the one who rewards or punishes. Is that his Son has a Mother, like a human being. God has "humanized" his divinity. However he remains a severe Judge. But the saints and his Mother are able to influence his judgement by their prayers.

2. The Gothic grammar.

a. Signs, not symbols.

The pictures : sculptures and paints are creating together a writing made of signs, not symbols, contrary to we understand usualy. A sign is a difference. A sign doesn't takes its meaning except by its difference compared to the other signs that surround it. The report of the signifier (e.g. the cruciform halo which surrounds the Christ face) to the signified (the Christ) is arbitrary (it would have been possible to associate a no-cruciform halo to the Christ, as we meet for the other saints, but, to distinguish the Christ of the other saints, it would have been necessary to equip the other saints with a cruciform halo, e.g.). Whereas, in the symbol, the report of the signifier (the cross, e.g.) to the signified (the Christians) is "justified" ( in that the Christians can't be depicted by anything other : a scale or a sword which are appropriate to the justice, e.g.). So, that Jesus inherits the cruciform halo, doesn't have another meaning that this one : he is unmistakable with those that inherit of the no-cruciform halo. But the opposite would have been possible.

The almond (or glory) surrounding a body, will indicate that body as the one of God or Mary. Naked feet : God, Jesus, the angels, the Apostles, in order to distinguish them from the Virgin, from the other saints or from ordinary people (without halo and, by this way, distinguished themselves of the Virgin and other saints which have in common the shod feet). Below, two Apostles (naked feet), the Virgin (halo + shod feet), ordinary people (shod feet but not halo).

b. The types.

Some types appear progressively. They will be present until in the works of the 16th, 17th and even 19th centuries. So, there is a Saint Peter type, recognizable : some characteristics of the physiognomy, independent of the keys which are another sign of recognition (that is : distinction). A Saint Paul type, independent of the sword which is also a distinction. A Saint John the Baptist type (less independent, this time, of the sheepskin he wears).

Another figures are unchanging in the Gothic writing. So, the Church (Virgin crowned, carrying in his hand the Holy Grail which has received the Christ blood) opposite to the Synagogue (a woman crowned with a pointed hat, blindfolded eyes (here is something symbolic). The first brings openly the Christ message, message delivered directly by God in the person of his son. The second brings the same message, but deformed, fogged by the prophets, message which has not enabled to recognize in Jesus the son of God.

c. The places hierarchy : high/bottom, right/left.

Depending on the place of the figure, its worth is not the same. Always, in the Tetramorph, e.g., Saint Matthew is in the high place and on the right (of the Christ). Saint Jean is in the high place but on the left. Saint Marc and Saint Luke are below, the first on the left, the second on the right (of the Christ).

(Saint-Loup de Naud)

d. The organization of the detail.

The bases of the statues. They talk about the statue they support. The basilisk, the asp (the death and the sin) are below the Christ's feet who triumph of them. The saints have under them the kings which have persecuted them and of which they also triumph.

(Chartres, Central Portal)

(Chartres)

(Arles)

The places, in the church, have a signification. In the North (night and cold) are placed the Old Testament episodes. In the South, the New Testament episodes. The numbers too, have a signification. There is not a coincidence if the apostles are twelve : "4" is the number of the matter (the four elements) and "3" is the number of the spirit ( the Holy Trinity). So (4 x 3 = 12) the apostles are the ones who import the spirit in the matter, God in the World.

5. The symbols

The Wise Virgins are equivalent to the Five Contemplations, whereas the Foolish Virgins are equivalent to the five senses and to the concupiscence. The lion refers to the resurrection.

The attributes are symbols : the lamb / John the baptist ; serpent of brass and Tables of the Law / Moses ;  a young boy (Isaac) / Abraham ; the Tree of Jesse / Isaiah.

(Chartres, Central Portal : from the right, to the left : Saint Peter. He wears a crown shaped to form a conic tiara as the tiara of the 13th century popes, He carries a key which opens the paradise gates. He stands on a stone which is the one on which Jesus  built his Church. Near Saint Pierre, Saint John the Baptist. He wears a sheepskin coat (or a camel skin coat). He carries a lamb which brandishes the Resurrection flag. Under his feet, a dragon. Then, Simeon, who carries the Christ. Simeon became so old that he could have seen Jesus. Then Jeremy who is the prophet of the Passion carries a crucifom halo which symbolizes the Crucifixion. Under his feet, a curious person listens to the words of the prophet. Finally, Isaïe who was the author of the prophecy regarding Jesse (Jesse who sleeps under the Isiah's feet). He carried a rod symbolizing the famous Jesse Tree, the Family Tree of the Christ).

6. The paint.

The Gothic paint is in the stained-glass. In the books, the illumination is an imitation of the light and of the consistence of the stained-glass.

(Staines-glass                                 Illumination)

II. The iconography : the content.

The cathedral is not only an arch or the Heavenly Jerusalem (the City of God), it is also a book. Not a Bible for illitrate, it is necessary to know how to read, (as we have just seen) to understand the iconography, but, at the contrary, an encyclopedia which recaps and shows the totality of the knowledge (of the age); (See Emile Mâle). The origin is the Speculum majus (The Great Mirror) by Vincent de Beauvais which is split up in "four Mirrors".

1. Mirror of Nature (Speculum naturale).

Nature is nothing but the incarnation of the thought of God. He has designed and created the Nature according to his plans ; so, the nature expresses exactly his thought. The fact remains that it is necessary to know how read it. All the work of the "science" will be to decode that "text". In this way, take a walnut (nothing is more common), the Saint Victor walnut. First there is the green husk. It has two meanings : it is the "humanity" of the Christ or the World. Secondly there is the shell which has also two  meanings, in relation to the meanings of the envelop : it is the Wood of the Cross or the sin. Finally, there is the fruit which is the hidden "divinity" of the Christ or the God's Thought. So, All is in each thing, and God is everywhere.

There is yet the animals. All are not symbolic. The most important show the Evangelists. They constitute the Tetramorph. It is the Eagle (Saint Jean, but also the Ascent of Christ and, among the virtues, the Contemplation). The Angel or the Man (Saint Matthew, but also the Incarnation and, among the virtues, the Wisdom). The Lion (Saint Marc, but also the Resurrection and, among the virtues, the Courage). The  Bullock (Saint Luke, but also the Crucifixion of Jesus and, among the virtues, the Temperance). The snake (or the dragon) is the devil. The elephant symbolize the Fall. The asp is the sin and the basilisk is the death. And again, all the animals are not symbolic. The Bullocks of the Laon cathedral are only an homage to the work given by those animals during the building of the cathedral. Elsewhere, they show the creative power of God (see, e.g., at the north portal of Chartres, the Creation of the Animals).

(Chartres, North Portal : Left : Human people already present in the thought of God when he creates the animals : fishes and birds (right))

2. The Miror of Doctrine (Speculum doctrinale).

So then, the cathedral is a Mirror of the Nature. It is also a Mirror of the "Science". On its walls, all that the science knows is showed.

a. The practical science.

The work. There are the "Calendars" describing the activities of each month linked to the zodiacal chronology.

(Amiens : from left to right : June (Cancer, mowing) ; July (Lion, hervet) ; August (Virgin, threshing) ;

 September ( Libra, grape-harvest) ; October (Scorpio, pressing of the grapes).

b. The speculative science.

The medieval science is not, as ours, an instrument of domination of the nature (by the science, "become masters and possessors of nature", as programed  by Descartes as soon as the 17th century) ; the science is the interpreter of the Nature. And the science is taught in an exact order. Therefore will be  that organization of the studies : the Trivium (grammar, dialectic, rhetoric) and the Quadrivium (geometry, arithmetic, astronomy, music) ; finally the philosophy (or theology). These subjects will be personified, often by an authentic scientist (Aristote, Pythagore, Boece, etc.)

(Notre-Dame-de-Paris : Geometry and Rethoric)

(Notre-Dame-de-Paris : Philosophy)

c. The exclusion of the idleness.

If the science shows itself in the work, it is necessary to include in its figures that paradoxical figure which shows the idleness. It appears in the form of the Wheel of Fortune. To confide to the happenstance to take care of our subsistence  (that is the idleness, the root of all evil.)

(Herrade de Landsberg. Wheel of Fortune in Hortus Deliciarum, 1159-1175)

3. The Mirror of Moral.(Speculum morale)

The third dimension of the knowledge is the Moral, the science of the behavior.

a. The Romanesque pattern.

There is a Romanesque pattern of the Morale : the Psychomachy, by Prudence : the fight between virtues and vices, which decorate a lot of capitals. It is an inner fight which inspires the Romanesque sculptors. The Gothics are going to search elswhere and not the same patterns depending they are sculptors or illuminators.

b. The Gothic patterns for illumination.

The Tree of Virtues and The Tree of Vices (below) by Hugues of Saint-Victor and The Scale of the Virtues, by Honorius d'Autun.

c. The sculptors.

The sculptors do not use those patterns. They bring into opposition, by couples, the virtues and the vices.

With the theologians of the period, we retain three categories of virtues :

- The theological virtues : Faith (vice : idolatry) ; Hope (vice : despair) ; Charity (vice : avarice). These are the virtues without which no salvation is possible.

- The cardinal virtues : Temperance (vice : intemperance) ; Prudence (or Wisdom, vice : madness) ; Courage (vice : cowardice) ; Justice (or Obedience, vice : rebellion).

- The other virtues like, e.g., Humility (vice : pride), Patience (vice : anger) ; Gentleness (vice : brutality) ; Concord (vice : discord) ; etc.

(Amiens : from left to right : Charity/Avarice ; Temperance/Intemperance ; Concord/Discord).

4. The Mirror of History (Speculum historiale).

Finally, the cathedral will be the Mirror of the History. Not of the profane history which is the place of the nonsense, but the only valuable history : the Holy History, reported in the Old and the New Testaments. The point is to understand this History, that is (because of the Old Testament is the announcement of the New) to find the connections between the two. The saints life on one hand and the Jewish people life on the other hand resonate across all the History. We have to grasp and to make explicit those resonances.

So, the Sacrifice of Isaac prefigures the Crucifixion of the Christ. The water extracted of the stone by Moses prefigures the blood of Jesus, escaped out of the wound made by the Longin's

 lance. Jonas, coming from the stomach of the whale, prefigures the Resurrection of the Christ. And so on. The stained-glasses of the cathedral are a skilled commentary of the Holy Bible.

Look at the stained-glass of Lyon (below). It introduced some connections between the Old Testament, the New Testament and symbols. From the bottom up :

                       

- Isiah (OT), who has prophesied Jesus birth from a Virgin ; the angel (NT) who has informed the Virgin of the Jesus birth ; the unicorn (Symbol) which is a pure animal, that only a Virgin can approach.

- The Burning Bush (OT) which is burning without consuming itself ; the Virgin who gives birth without  "consuming" (NT) ; the Gedeon fleece which is covered by the dew without a natural reason (Symbol).

-Abraham (OT) who is ready to sacrifice his son to obey God ; Jesus (NT) who is sacrified on the cross in order to save the humanity ; the Serpent of brass (Symbol) which is raised by Moses in the desert to save the Jewish people threatened by the burning snakes sended as a punishment.

- Jonas (OT) who is spited out by the whale ; Jesus (NT) who is resurrected the third day ; the lion cubs (Symbol) which seem dead the first three days and seem coming back to life, the third day, under the breath of their father.

The kladrius (Antiquity), a bird which is able to tell if a patient will live or die ; the Ascent of Christ (NT) who will live after death ; the eagle (Symbol) which is the bird which rises more high than the others and which, in order to teach how to fly to its young, loads it on its wings.

( The stained-glass)

 (First detail : Isaïe, Annunciation, Unicorn)

 (Second detail : Burning bush, Nativity, Gedeon fleece)

 (Third detail : Abraham, Crucifixion, Serpent of brass)

 (Fouth detail : Jonas, Resurrection, Lion cubs)

(Fith detail : Kladrius, Ascent, Eagle)

Furthermore, each text includes three meanings : 

- the literal or historical meaning (a fact is related : "Abraham has existed"), 

- a moral or tropological meaning (it is the immediate meaning of this fact : "the Faith". Abraham in spite of the God hesitations who says "kill Isaac ! don't kill him !", obeys and does not doubt that it is God who speaks. He does not know that God is testing  his faith, otherwise there would not be a test,, but he believes.) 

- a mystical or allegorical meaning (The Crucifixion of the Christ is anticipated in the Isaac sacrifice).

But the Christ life (The New Testament) has to be interpreted. The legends, which are not in the Book, bring that interpretation. In this way the legend of the two midwives., Zelemi and Salome. One of them is astonished by the fact that Mary is yet virgin after the delivery, and the other woman is skeptic. When she verifies with his hand, his hand gets dry. It is when she pries the Jesus child for forgiveness that, by an act of faith, his hand is cured. One of the main origins of inspiration, a part from the New Testament, will be the Golden Legend, by Jacobus de Voragine.

5. The evolution of the representations.

We have seen the content of the Gothic sculpture and its origins. We have now to consider, finally, its form. Not the general features already studied, but its particular features. Especially for some figures as, e.g., the Virgin.

a. Romanesque :

The Virgin in Majesty. Frontal, staid, sitted in her throne with the Child on her knees, she is the God's throne. She is neither feminine nor maternal.

b. First Gothic.

It is the beginning of the humanization of the Virgin. In the 13th century, the Virgin becomes "human". The Child slides on one knee and turns his face toward his mother or plays with her.

c. Classical Gothic.

The Virgin mother. She stands up, carries her son on his arm and smiles at him. The Virgin became a mother.

d. Last Gothic.

The woman. On the 15th century, she is the pain's Virgin, the mother who is just lost his child. The woman who suffers. So, as soon as God becomes human, the Virgin also becomes human.

e. The Virgin's life.

The Virgin’s life becomes an essential subjet of the writing on the portals and on the facades of the cathedrals. The most depicted scenes are, obviously, The Annunciation, the Visitation, the Death and the Assumption.

A very frequent subject in the tympanum is the Coronation of the Virgin. That way to consider that thing is, however, questionable. Indeed, the fact, to a man,  to put a crown on the head of a virgin, be equivalent to request to perform a wedding. Therefore that is not his mother who is crowned by the Christ. Furthermore, we remember a woman crowned : the Church, in front of the Synagogue, the blindfolded woman. So, the Coronation of the Virgin would be, in fact, the mystic wedding of God with the Church.

That depiction turns among the time. In the oldest formula, the crown is already on the Virgin's head. Then, an angel will put the crown on the head. Finaly, around 1250, that is the Christ who puts the crown on the Church's head (below, Reims).

The cathedral is not only an arch in which humanity can  find a refuge, it is not only the foreshadowing of the Heavenly Jerusalem, it is a book. An encyclopedia where is reflected all the knowledge of the Middle Ages. When, in Notre Dame de Paris, Victor Hugo titles the chapter where he brings up the invention of the printing and the end of the medieval architecture : Ceci tuera cela (This will kill That), he expresses perfectly the reality of the Gothic sculpture.