fourteenth century the order of Cîteaux was in decadence, France itself ruined by the Hundred Years War, and foreigners-as in our own times in industrial matters-knew how to assimilate our methods and to create their own types, following out our instruction and our models. Thus there were a Venetian Gothic, a Tuscan Gothic, a Gothic of Aragon, a Portuguese and a German Gothic, and in statuary a Flemish Gothic, where appeared that style, naturalistic and familiar almost to triviality, which remained peculiar to the country. In England originality became apparent during the course of the thirteenth century. A consequence of this movement was that France, exhausted, renewed her art by the infusion of foreign elements. The flamboyant style was created, not, as the first Gothic, out of original elements, but by combining architectural elements, borrowed from England, with Flemish sculpture. At the end of the fifteenth century France, wearying of this art, monotonous in its extreme complexity, began to look in the direction of the opposite frontier; Italy, earlier than France, wearied of the Gothic style which she had never really understood and, returning to her ancient traditions, produced the Renaissance. France abandoned the English and Flemish imitation for the Italian, and the Renaissance, introduced among us at the end of the fifteenth century, triumphed in the sixteenth. In the other European countries, under English, Flemish, and French influences, the flamboyant style was extended, taking various special forms, notably in Germany and in Portugal. In England a new form of Gothic, the perpendicular style, had developed since the end of the fourteenth century, but did not produce a school. The Renaissance was to spread in the other countries as in France, dethroning the styles it met with, but the Gothic was never completely overthrown in Germany or in England. Such is, in broad outline, the history of the art of the Middle Ages, and this exposé is sufficient to demonstrate how necessary it is for its comprehension to regard it from the international point of view. It is in America that instruction from this point of view should encounter the least difficulty. America is not enfeoffed to any European country, and its citizens claim their ancestry in all of Europe. It can not therefore make any mistake in studying the ancient art of all Europe, and it will naturally hold itself aloof from the factions that are met with in the Old World.1 1 To draw only from my personal experience when I demonstrated the Burgundian origin of the Gothic style in Italy, the French origin of certain English Gothic monuments, and the English origin of the flamboyant architecture, I encountered, along with the unanimous assent of independent and enlightened minds, certain contradictions, of little consequence, but all the more tenacious because based upon sentiment rather than upon reason. In the same way, although the proof of the Italian origin of the French Renaissance has long been demonstrated, there still remains at least one person who obstinately contests it. I would arrange as follows a program for instruction in the history of the art of the Middle Ages in American universities: Sixth to eleventh centuries: History of art in the Byzantine Empire and in Italy; notes on the less important and more mutilated monuments of the other countries of Europe. Eleventh and twelfth centuries: A word upon Byzantine art, henceforth stationary, and upon Italian art which will progress no further; study of Germanic and French art and of their exterior influence. Thirteenth and fourteenth centuries: Formation and evolution of Gothic art in France; its spread into the other countries. Fourteenth and fifteenth centuries: Succinct study of the various schools which formed in Europe, especially in England and Flanders; study of the flamboyant style growing out of the art of these two regions; its flourishing in France, Germany, and Spain. Fifteenth and sixteenth centuries: The last phase of the Gothic; the perpendicular style in England; the flamboyant in France, Spain, Portugal, Rhodes, and Germany; the Italian origins of the Renaissance and its diffusion in the various countries of Europe. For the documentation of such a course it would be necessary to accompany it with lantern views and to place at the disposal of the pupils such books, photographs, and casts as should be selected by a commission of competent professors, aided possibly by two or three foreigners. The essential books are already in the libraries of many institutions. They should probably include the following works: Viollet le Duc, Dictionnaire d'Architecture. Dehio and von Bezold, Kirchliche Baukunst des Abendlandes. Ventruri, Storia dell' Arte. Enlart, Manuel d'Archéologie française. Bond, Gothic Architecture in England. As to photographs, a selection made in France from among the negatives of the Monuments Historiques, in Italy from the collection of Alinari, in England from the collections of Frith and Valentine, and in Germany from similar collections would furnish from 1,000 to 1,200 prints of typical monuments. When it comes to casts, I do not hesitate to say that nearly all should come from France, where are to be found most of the fine works of statuary and of ornament of the Middle Ages. Not enough of these are to be found in American museums, and the collections which one sees in the Metropolitan Museum in New York or in the Carnegie Institute of Pittsburg are in part very badly exhibited. While the institutions of learning in America have good libraries, I doubt if they have enough photographs, and their plaster models are inadequate as regards the Middle Ages. In general, they possess beautiful and excellent series of Greek casts and of casts from the Italian Renaissance, but the lack which I pointed out in the French instruction of former days still exists in America and is regrettable. The result of this is evident in modern constructions the ideas of which have been taken from the Middle Ages. The bad proportions of some of these show that the artist was not familiar with the monuments from which he drew his inspiration; in a very large number of others the structure itself is good, but the ornamentation is badly conceived or taken from models not well chosen. At Mount Holyoke College there is a new library, charming in its Gothic architecture and in its Renaissance woodwork, but the sculptured consoles are taken from poor models and have no elegance. The institution has a museum of casts containing fine copies of all the important Greek classics, but only a single Gothic statue, the Christ of Amiens, while there are no models of ornamentation. At Yale there are numerous casts from ancient times and from the Italian Renaissance, but the Gothic is hardly represented. At Harvard it is represented by two fine statues of the twelfth century from the great door of Chartres, but if one wishes to see specimens from later periods one finds only the collection, very rich and beautiful it is true, of casts of German sculpture. Inasmuch as from the twelfth to the sixteenth centuries the finest Germanic works are only more or less fortunate imitations of French statuary the true models are lacking; it is like a museum of ancient art which should contain only Roman works to the exclusion of Greek art. It would appear important, then, that in every university there should be several notable specimens of the best statuary of the Middle Ages, such, for example, as are noted in the following list: Twelfth century: Statues from the western doorways of Chartres; statues of Corbeil at Saint Denis; tympanum of Moissac. Thirteenth century: The Beau Dieu of Amiens; the St. Firmin; bas-reliefs from Notre Dame de Paris; statues from the Cathedral of Rheims. Fourteenth century: Statues from Strasbourg. Examples of the flamboyant style: The well of Moses at Dijon; details from the tombs of the Dukes of Burgundy; the head of St. Maurice of Orleans; the Virgin of Nuremberg. Examples of ornamentation: Twelfth century-models from Avallon, Moissac, Toulouse, Châlons, Laon, Dommartin (museum of Amiens), etc. Thirteenth century-models from Notre Dame de Paris. Fourteenth century-models from Saint Urbain de Troyes, from Rheims, etc. Fifteenth century-models from the Cathedral of Troyes, etc. Finally, a series of architectural models, dismountable reductions in plaster, would certainly be a great aid in instruction. Harvard University has just had such a model made of the Cathedral of Rheims. The Musée du Trocadéro has a series of 10 models which are of the greatest service, but which cost 70,000 francs. It can not be denied 73885°-11 -8 that this sort of apparatus is expensive. I estimate that to secure the educational equipment corresponding to the program that I have outlined it would be necessary to spend, exclusive of transportation charges and customs duties, a minimum amount of 3,000 francs for books and photographs, and for casts of statues and ornamentation about 6,000 francs. The sum of $2,000, then, would assure to a course in the history of medieval art an adequate primary equipment; the addition of architectural models would cost half as much again, or about $3,000. |