History of painting: 04

(after last publication)

Illuminated manuscripts: 7th - 11th century AD


Irish monks of the 7th and 8th century create illuminated manuscripts which are among the greatest treasures of Celtic and early Christian art. The beautiful calligraphy (the scribes sometimes add complaints in the margin about their difficult working conditions) usually provides the text of the four Gospels. The earliest is the Book of Durrow, from about 650. Others include the Lindisfarne Gospels (c.700) and the Book of Kells (c.800). The glory of these manuscripts (in addition to their wonderfully inventive images of the evangelists) is the intricate decoration, with the famous 'carpet pages' formed of interlacing patterns - reminiscent of the complex linear designs in Celtic metalwork.


In the late 8th century many illuminated manuscripts are commissioned by Charlemagne, who values them both as holy objects and as his own personal art gallery. When the imperial court is on the move (which is most of the time), part of the emperor's baggage train is a wagon full of precious manscripts. Legend adds that after his death Charlemagne is buried in a sitting position, clothed in rich robes and holding a sceptre. On his lap is an illuminated manuscript. The scribes writing the texts of the manuscripts, and the illuminators adding the decorative lettering and the illustrations, do so in the workshops of Europe's monasteries - though probably not all the men employed are monks. The example of Charlemagne's patronage is followed by his immediate successors and by later rulers in medieval Europe, in particular by the emperors of the Ottonian dynasty.

The Carolingian and Ottonian manuscripts are usually gospels or other holy texts, but the secular world intrudes more than previously. A frontispiece often now shows the imperial patron on his throne, in a manner previously reserved for Jesus or one of the evangelists. The early medieval interest in illuminated manuscripts means that the portable art of the period is confined within precious volumes. A single spread of text, with ornament and illustration, is sometimes visible today in museum displays. But for the most part these images are locked away on the rare-book shelves of libraries. This seclusion has preserved them in better condition than other art of the same period, but it has also had the effect of making this a somewhat invisible chapter in the story of European painting. The artists begin to achieve a higher profile, from the 13th century, with fresco painting in Italy.


Buddhist banners and scrolls on silk: from the 9th c. AD



The cave discovered in 1899 at Dunhuang contains many Buddhist paintings on silk. The larger ones (mostly showing Buddha seated in paradise with attendant figures) are designed for hanging out on poles on special occasions. Some are almost two yards in height and more than a yard wide. Narrower vertical images of dramatically painted figures from Buddhist mythology are intended as banners, to be carried in procession with silk streamers attached. Painting on silk remains a central theme of Chinese art.

But this flamboyant public use of images, characteristic of Buddhism, subsequently gives way to the more discreet and private art of the Confucians.


Chinese arts: in the Song dynasty


In the heyday of classical Chinese culture, a civilized gentleman - meaning a Confucian official - should be adept in three different artistic fields. When he settles down before a fresh sheet of paper and dips his brush in the ink (ground from a block of pigment by a servant), no one can be certain whether he is about to pen an impromptu poem, paint a quick impression of a romantic landscape or fashion some traditional phrase in exquisite Chinese characters.

The three skills, all expressed in the beauty of brush strokes, are closely linked. A 'soundless poem' is a conventional Chinese term for a picture. And a typical poem by the Song master Ou-yang Hsiu sounds like a painting.

Poetry and painting in Song China (960-1279) are largely social activities, both in the creation and in the appreciation of the work. On a convivial occasion, with wine flowing, Confucians will compete with each other in writing or painting. In more sober vein, among connoisseurs, a collector will bring the scrolls from their boxes and will unroll them to be admired and discussed. China's past is also now a theme for conoisseurs, in a fashion pioneered by Ou-yang Hsiu (and echoed centuries later in Italy during the Renaissance).

Ou-yang Hsiu clambers 'on precarious cliffs and inaccessible gorges, in wild forests and abandoned tombs' to make rubbings which he publishes, in about 1000 portfolios, as his Collection of Ancient Inscriptions'. Inevitably much of the painting done by enthusiastic amateurs is dull and conventional. This is particularly true during the reign of the emperor Hui Tsung. Himself a talented painter, of a carefully exact kind, he sets up an official academy of painting. Those who want to get on at court are unlikely to disagree with the emperor on matters of artistic style. Others, opting out of the system, come under the influence of Chan or Zen Buddhism with its emphasis on freedom of expression.

The Chan painters of the Song dynasty, using a few quick brushstrokes to capture a fleeting visual moment, provide one of the most brilliant interludes in the story of Chinese art.


European frescoes: 10th - 13th century AD


Although the grandest style of medieval church decoration is mosaic, the classical tradition of painted murals (as at Pompeii or in the catacombs) continues to be used. A surviving example is the 10th-century church of St George at Oberzell, on the island of Reichenau in Lake Constance. The frescoes here, depicting the miracles of Christ, are painted in a strip high above the rows of columns and rounded arches which flank the nave. The rather remote position of the images is exactly that of the Old Testament scenes depicted in mosaic five centuries earlier in the church of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome.



Frescoes are more vulnerable than mosaic, and many more fresco cycles were painted in the Middle Ages than have survived. But the preferred medium for important church interiors continues to be mosaic in the Byzantine style - even as late as the end of the 13th century, when the gilded narrative panels are set into the dome of the baptistery in Florence. But at exactly the same period elsewhere in central Italy, at Assisi, an important new building is being decorated entirely in fresco. It is the convent church of St Francis. Built on a hillside, and consisting of two basilicas one above the other, its construction begins soon after the saint's death in 1226.


Assisi attracts thousands of pilgrims. The frescoes depicting the life of St Francis are for their edification. Instead of being high in the air above the arches of the nave, these images are now close to ground level. Unlike the earlier Romanesque interiors, the pointed Gothic arches reach right up to the vaulting of the roof. The top half of the arch can become the window, while the lower part is closed in to provide a flat wall for the painted images. In this design of church the frescoes are close enough to the onlooker for the painter to be able to tell a detailed story. Work on the Assisi frescoes begins in about 1280, probably under the supervision of Cimabue - considered by his contemporaries the greatest Italian master.


The scenes of the life of St Francis in the upper church are painted with a much greater sense of realism and drama than has been the case with Byzantine mosaics. Some of these scenes are almost certainly the work, during the 1290s, of the first great genius to use the medium of fresco - Giotto. In the next decade Giotto decorates almost entirely with his own hand an entire chapel in Padua.





to be continued………………