Medieval Monasteries and Architectural InventionCulminating in the opus modernum or “Gothic” Architecture in France

“Gothic” – opus modernum (“modern work”) or opus franceginum (“French work”)

Architecture in the Middle Ages (400-1400)

476Fall of Rome

c. 1400Italian

Renaissance begins

Middle Ages

medieval

Late Antique or Early

ChristianCarolingian Romanesque Gothic

EMERGENCE OF EUROPEAN ARCHITECTURE Critiquing the Legacy of Rome

Abbot Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153) Cistercian order

Western monasticism toward the end of the Romanesque era

Benedictine order

“What is the good of displaying all this gold in the church? You display the statue of a saint . . . and you think that the more overloaded with colors it is, the holier it is. And people throng to kiss it – and are urged to leave an offering; they pay homage to the beauty of the object more than to its holiness. . . . Oh vanity! vanity! and folly even greater than the vanity! The church sparkles and gleams on all sides, while its poor huddle in need; its stones are gilded, while its children go unclad; in it the art lovers find enough to satisfy their curiosity, while the poor find nothing there to relieve their misery.”

1.2.

Fontenay Abbey, France, 12th century (1139-47)

I. An alternative Romanesque the non-magnificence of Cistercian monastic architecture➝

The Romanesque Abbey in 12th cen. (Cluny III) Abbey of Cluny

1088-1130 destroyed (mostly) 1789-1823

Cistercian abbey of Fontenay, 1139-47

I. A. What was the typical program of monasteries and how was Cistercian monasticism exceptional?

Benedictine abbey at Cluny (Fr.) 1090-1130

photomontage reconstituting the great basilica Cluny III

4.

Benedictine abbey at Cluny Cistercian abbey of Fontenay

I. A.

cloister(s), refectory, chapter house, dormitory, workroom and forge

I. A. 1. Cloister – why was the cloister the heart of a monastic community?

Cistercian abbey of Fontenay

I. A. 2. How was the cloister of Cluny III (Benedictine) different from that of Fontenay (Cisterician)?

Cistercian abbey of FontenayCluniac abbey at Moissac

Benedictine abbey at Cluny Cistercian abbey of Fontenay

I. B. The aesthetics of Cistercian architectural design compared with typical Romanesque magnificence?

Cistercian abbey church of Fontenay

I. B.

Cluny nave, 95' high

reconstruction

surviving Cluny transept (south arm)

transept of Fontenay

I. B.

dormitory of Fontenay

I. B.

Cistercian abbey church of Fontenay

I. B. 2. Which of these inventions was acceptable to the Cistercian ideology at Fontenay?

Cluny nave, 95' high

reconstruction

pointed barrel vault

and pointed arches

I. B. 2.abbey church of Cluny III

flying buttress

Abbey church at Cluny Fontenay – south flank of church

I. C. How was the theory of Romanesque architecture (Platonic theory) applied with rigor in Cistercian monasteries?

Quadrature: 1 : √2 or other methods based on manipulating the square:Fontenay AbbeyMedieval architect’s sketchbook

by Villard de Honnecourt, 1220s/40s

3.

Cistercian abbey at Fontenay

I. C.

5.

Choir of St.-Denis, Paris, France, b. 1144, Gothic

II. Gothic theory of divine light: emerging Gothic architecture follows mathematical ratio theory and some faith in human senses to appreciate the splendor of the divine

Abbot Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153) Cistercian order

Abbot Suger of St.-Denis (1081-1151) Benedictine order

“What is the good of displaying all this gold in the church? You display the statue of a saint . . . and you think that the more overloaded with colors it is, the holier it is. And people throng to kiss it – and are urged to leave an offering; they pay homage to the beauty of the object more than to its holiness. . . . Oh vanity! vanity! and folly even greater than the vanity! The church sparkles and gleams on all sides, while its poor huddle in need; its stones are gilded, while its children go unclad; in it the art lovers find enough to satisfy their curiosity, while the poor find nothing there to relieve their misery.”

“We maintain that the sacred vessels should be enhanced by outward adornment, and nowhere more than in serving the Holy Sacrifice, where inwardly all should be pure and outwardly all should be noble . . . . If, according to the word of God and the prophet’s command, the gold ves-sels, the gold phials, and the small gold mortars were used to collect the blood of goats, the calves,

II.

and a red heifer, then how much more zealously shall we hold our gold vases, precious stones, and all that we value most highly in creation, in order to collect the blood of Jesus Christ.”

II. A. Abbot Suger on light: “de materialibus ad immaterialia” (“from the material to the immaterial”)

colored light and air in the choir of St.-Denis

II. A.

Neoplatonic purity (Romanesque)

Cistercian abbey church at Fontenay Benedictine abbey church of St.-Denis

Neoplatonic theory + Theology of light that appeals to the senses

(Gothic)

Choir of St.-Denis

III. Structure: What combination of older structural expedients made it possible for Abbot Suger to realize a new sensory-oriented, light-filled religious space?III. A. pointed arch or arc brisé (“broken arch”) = modernist characteristic

III. B. rib vaults = modernist structure

Choir of St.-Denis

Choir of St.-Denis

rib vaults facilitate vaulting irregular bay shapes

III. B.

Romanesque pointed arches and rib vaults

Gothic pointed arches and rib vaults

Cluny III, 1088

Durham Cathedral, 1093

Fontenay Abbey, 1139

St.-Étienne at Caen, 1120

Not brand new technologies at St.-Denis

III. B.

Choir of St.-Denis

III. C. How is Abbot Suger’s choir at St.-Denis, then, a new style of architecture (Gothic)?

New MODERNIST tendencies(anti-classical, forward-moving)

HISTORICIST tendencies(classicizing, legitimized by

precedent)

walls a continuous plane

classical column (pilasters, engaged columns)

standard basilical profile

punched in windows and square-headed doors

rib vaults

skeletal frame

OR elevational system rather thantrue wall

pointed arches (“broken” arches)

horizontal continuous space

wall as a 3-D entity in planes

compound piers

vertical articulation in a bay system

complex, towered profile

walls/doors in recessed archivolts

round arches

structural ponderance

load-bearing vaults

Choir of St.-Denis (Benedictine abbey church)

rib vaults

skeletal frame

OR elevational system rather thantrue wall

pointed arches (“broken” arches)

compound piers

vertical articulation in a bay system

complex, towered profile

III. C.

walls/doors in recessed archivolts