Among my more recent gems:
[Giangaleazzo] Visconti married twice due to ineptness on the wife's
behalf.
Jean Fouquet's life (1420-1450) came during a rebirth of the history of
France...although [Etienne] Chevalier was a middle-class court official he
took pride and showed his divinity in his manuscript.
A byzantinist colleague contributes the vision of an early Christian
church with a "small doomed aspe" (dedicated perhaps to Cleopatra -- or
St. John the Evangelist?) The Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem,
on the other hand, is a Migratory Basilica. Another famous Early Christian
monument is in Ravenna: the Ecclesia of Archbishop Maximum -- or,
alternatively, Methodosius' throne. On it is depicted "Mary in the Manger
with the Newborn". One certainly cannot accuse the piece of "homo vacui".
while my all-time favorites are the church of Sta.Maria Medaglio d'Oreo,
and Guido Reni's famous ceiling fresco, "The Triumph of Bacchus and
Anathema".
And did you know that "most towns in Europe were non-existing for about
six centuries"? After which, "Because of the expanding population of
medieval cities, problems arose such as starvation and disease, resulting
in illness."
while "This bourgeois built rings of chapels around the
cathedral which ultimately resulted in Gothic architecture"
and there was the student who espoused what one might call "active
Gothic": the columns [of Reims cathedral] vault up into the ceiling, while
also circling around the ambulatory.
and then there is iconography: The Ape has often been associated with
wonton woman, while Christ is seated on a globe as Director of the World
and St.Peter is "Prince of the Apostates".
As a manuscript scholar, I'm also fond of the Vertigo Gospels: a dizzying
prospect...
Elizabeth Parker McLachlan, Art History, Rutgers University
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
|