The Church of Our Lady in Roermond, the Netherlands

My thanks to a friend, Fr Mark Woodruff, for sharing with us these pictures which he took during a recent visit to the church of Our Lady in Roermond, in the south-eastern Dutch province of Limburg. It was founded as part of a Cistercian women’s monastery in the early 13th century, and is therefore commonly known as simply “the Munsterkerk - the monastery church.” (None of the monastic buildings remain.) It owes its current external appearance to a major restoration done by a local architect named Pierre Cuypers from 1863-90. Cuypers also did a major neo-Gothic renovation of the interior, but much of his work was removed in a subsequent restoration of 1959-64, which aimed to return the building to something more like the sparer original late Romanesque style (or what the restorers imagined to be such.)

At the crossing, underneath the dome, is the tomb of the church’s founders, Gerard III, Count of Flanders (1185 ca. - 1229, and his wife, Margaret of Brabant. (1190 ca. - 1231). 

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Matthew Paris: A Model for the Transformation of American Sacred Art

Advocating for a new American Gothic!

Matthew Paris: Virgin and Child, 13th century. The artist has portrayed himself kneeling before her as was conventional at the time.

The Gothic is an authentic and distinct style of liturgical art that emerged first in the 12th century and lasted until the 16th century in various forms, and re-emerged in the 19th and early 20th centuries as an influential style.

If we are looking for a starting point for the rejuvenation of American sacred art, and more broadly even American culture, I suggest that the gothic could be one starting point. I suggest this because historically, Americans have responded strongly to the gothic style and in the first part of the 20th century in particular created some of the most spectacular works of gothic architecture in churches, civic buildings and universities. I suggest that this is because it was natural for American to do so - they responded to the gothic style because, American culture owes much to the English culture that contributed so much to its founding, and which in turn is a Christian culture which has its origins, as with all Christian culture, in the Middle East. There is no suggestion that this is the only such style, incidentally, that might work in the US. I think that we should be ready to try a number styles that seem right and see what takes off culturally, but this should be one of them.

Historically, the original gothic style of art developed organically from the Romanesque style in the West. The Romanesque artistic style is true to the iconographic prototypes and is as much part of the iconographic tradition as any Greek or Russian icon. As the change was gradual any attempt to date the beginning of the gothic period will necessarily involve some arbitrary choice. Most commentators settle on the mid-12th century, which coincides with the building of what is now considered to be the first gothic church, St Denis in Paris, and which was completed in 1144. The name ‘gothic’ incidentally was coined by commentators from the time of the High Renaissance and was originally intended as a pejorative term. They were suggesting that it was a barbaric style, naming it after the people who overran the Roman empire in the West a thousand years earlier.

It is no accident that one of the most popular American paintings is called American Gothic. It was hated by the critics at the time, but was loved by the public. Painted in the 1930s by Grant Wood, the style is based on the late gothic style of Jan Van Eyck and as such is a rare artistic contribution that is in keeping with the architectural develops in the US in the preceding 50 years.

American Gothic by Grant Wood

Jan Van Eyck, the Arnolfini Portrait, 15th century, Flemish

The impetus for the departure from the faithful adherence to the iconographic prototype of the Romanesque style occurred as a result of a development in the way in which Creation was viewed by Christian. In the gothic period there was an increasing sense of the reliability of human experience and the value of information received through the senses, which led to an increase in curiosity about, and appreciation of, the beauty of the natural world. This in turn led to more intense observation of nature by painters which was reflected in a greater degree of naturalism in their art.

Late Romanesque, German mid-12th century

This viewpoint was not new in essence - Christians had always relied on information from the senses and appreciated the beauty of the cosmos. What was different from the previous age was the degree to which people trusted their senses to give them accurate information about the world around them. When combined with an intense curiosity and a devotion to rational enquiry, this transformed the culture in many ways. One such change was that as a result to this new approach to learning great universities such as Paris and Oxford were founded.

Tied in with this change is an increased emphasis on the belief that that the world we live in, although fallen and imperfect, is nevertheless good, ordered, and beautiful. So, it was held, while there may be evil and suffering in the world, and it may not be as good and beautiful as it ought to be, it is nevertheless God’s creation and still good and beautiful. This appreciation of the world as it is, as distinct from what it will be when redeemed, is what caused the rise in the correspondence of art to natural appearances, and even the development of natural science.

A number of factors combined to cause this. Around 1000 AD the Latin West increased contact with the Greek East and Islam through trade and warfare (for example the crusades and the Reconquista - the reconquest - of Spain from the Moors (Toledo fell, for example, in 1085). This gave Western Europe access for the first time to many lost works of classical writers, particularly in the form of Arabic transcriptions of Aristotle. For the next hundred years Christian, Jewish, and Muslim scholars collaborated on the translation and interpretation of these texts. It was the friars of the new mendicant orders, Franciscans and Dominicans, who managed to achieve this synthesis of the new learning with the earlier tradition coming from St. Augustine and the Church Fathers. The most significant of these figures is St Thomas Aquinas, the Dominican. It was this synthesis of the ancient Greek philosophy of Aristotle with the Christian understanding of creation that was the intellectual achievement of the age.

This age was not only characterized by the creation of new ideas, but also by the drive to popularize them. The preaching of the Dominicans and appeal of the spirituality of St Francis of Assisi led to a broader appreciation of the good of the natural world as part of God’s creation. This gave rise to cultural movements that were driven by a desire for holiness and by great artists, as much as it was by great thinkers.

Matthew Paris: The martyrdom of Amphibulatus

The New Naturalism 

The greater emphasis in direct observation in art led to an enhanced naturalism, which was fused to a stylistic substrate which was iconographic. So, what began in the Romanesque period as what is best described as a more naturalistic iconographic style (compared with earlier Western iconographic forms), at a certain point became so naturalistic that it broke the boundaries of what constituted an icon (for example, through the introduction of cast shadow, the depiction of people in profile, and eventually the use of perspective). Nevertheless, the gothic always owes something stylistically to the iconographic. It retains, for example, that emotional distance that is maintained in the portrayal of figures. As a result, the observer always feels slightly detached from the scene described. If one looks even at late gothic styles, such as in the Flemish artists Van Eyck or Hieronymus Bosch, we can see how much it owes to the iconographic style in this respect.

If one were to try characterize gothic art theologically, we would say that it is now too naturalistic to be considered a portrayal of man in heaven, that is ‘eschatological’ man (as with the iconographic style) and not naturalistic enough to be considered a portrayal of fallen ‘historical’ man (as with the baroque style). I place it, therefore, in a position that straddles the divide between the two. When man is baptized, confirmed and living the sacramental life he is, even in this life, transfigured partially. We may not see it ourselves but that transformation is real. We are, to use the phrase of St Peter in his letters, ‘partaking of the divine nature’ and are no longer totally fallen. This transformation is complete when we are in full union with God in heaven, as eschatological men and women, but while we are on this pilgrimage to heaven, as part of the mystical body of Christ in this life, we are all gothic men and women.

Matthew Paris: Heraclius taking down the head of Saint Alban

Interestingly the gothic age is characterized as an age of pilgrimages. Many of the great cathedrals were pilgrimage destinations and so it is fitting perhaps for this reason also to characterize gothic art as the art of pilgrimage.

If we wanted a single symbol of this age, it is probably not art, but architecture that gives it so us in the form of dozens of gothic cathedrals and churches built in France and England. The new learning led not only to a new approach in design, again developing gradually from the Romanesque styles that preceded them, but also to the advances in engineering that allowed for the creation of higher, and more complex structures with larger windows. These stained-glass windows then became works of art that manifested the same stylistic elements of gothic paintings and illuminations, except now in the medium of colored glass. The gothic spire itself is a symbol of this age of pilgrimage in that, more than any other feature in architecture before or since, it seems to span the divide between heaven and earth.

As an example of the new gothic art we can consider the work of Matthew Paris who was an English monk who lived in St Albans, a town in southern England in the 13th century. We have many examples of his sketches in pen and ink which are observations of the natural world around him. He also illuminated psalters such as the Westminster Psalter. This one is taken from a manuscript which is the Life of St Alban ‘Heraclius takes down St. Alban's head’. Saint Alban is venerated as the first-recorded British Christian martyr. He was martyred in Verulanium, modern day St Albans in southern England, sometime during the 3rd or 4th century, and his cult has been celebrated there since. Matthew Paris’s art is characteristic of English art at the time, in which the description of form is by line alone. He is masterful in his control of the quill pen to create smooth and rhythmically flowing lines. He controls also the darkness and width of line to draw our eye to the important parts of the composition. The coloration and shading is restrained. This helps to give his images a symbolic quality that is appropriate for sacred art. Many wall paintings of this period can still be found in churches in England (including St Albans Cathedral) and they follow this basic structure.

Matthew Paris: The Coronation of Queen Edith, wife of Edward the Confessor

In many ways the style is reminiscent of modern illustration and animation art which is familiar to so many people today. It has occurred to me therefore, that this could be form that 21st-century artists might take to easily and develop into a form that connects with people today. It is powerful yet simple.

For this reason, I paint in the ‘St Albans’ style myself.

In the modern era we are used to seeing line describing form in illustrations and cartoons, which is of course a different purpose than sacred art. While the subjects are very different, the skills involved in creating the art are similar.

The thought is not that we will see art identical to that of Matthew Paris if this takes off. Rather that it could be the inspiration for artists today, just as the British gothic styles were inspirational for American architects in the past, who then created something distinctly American.

Princeton University Architecture: the Good, the Beautiful and the Ugly

On a recent trip to the northeast, I spent some time at Princeton University; I show here some examples of the buildings in and around the campus. First, the neo-Gothic buildings, which were inspired by those of Oxford and Cambridge, and built in the first part of the 20th century.

Like the other college buildings, the university chapel was built in the Gothic style, complete with large stained glass windows. The beauty and grandeur, it seems, persuaded the Presbyterians to include such images in a building style not normally associated with low Calvinist worship and stripped-down artistic sensibilities.

The neo-Gothic style began in England as a movement to rejuvenate church architecture, make it more obviously Christian, and linked to the liturgy. The architect who led this transformation was AW Pugin, a Catholic convert who, in reaction against the neo-Classical style that dominated at the time, established an architectural company which designed many of the new Catholic cathedrals and churches being built in England. He wrote several books, perhaps the most famous being The True Principles of the Pointed, or Christian, Architecture, which was published in 1841, when he was just 29 years old. This set out the basis for the successful reestablishment of a tradition that quickly spread across much of the globe, due to the great influence that Britain had at the time. I see it not as an imitation of an earlier time, but rather as an authentic re-establishment and development of the original Gothic tradition.

The new style not only worked in harmony with the liturgy being celebrated in the new Catholic churches, but also with that of the Anglican Church, which was reestablishing a traditional approach to the liturgy under the influence of the Oxford Movement, among others. As with all authentic liturgical traditions, its style began gradually to influence the broader culture, and soon grand civic buildings, universities, hotels, and railway stations were being erected in styles derived from this kind of church architecture. The tower that houses Big Ben at the new Houses of Parliament was designed by Pugin, for example.

In the United States, many of the wealthy sought to build in the new style, and attracted the leading architects from England, many of whom trained students to design neo-Gothic buildings. Many churches were built and again, this led in time to other buildings. The universities, especially those of the Ivy League, wished to present themselves as the American equivalents of schools like Oxford and Cambridge, and for several decades, it became fashionable to build neo-Gothic quadrangles with porter’s lodges, chapels, libraries, and dining halls, in emulation of the old Oxbridge colleges.

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Pictures of the Newly-Built St Joseph’s Seminary in Charlotte, North Carolina

Thank you to Fr. Matthew Kauth, Rector of St. Joseph College Seminary in the Diocese of Charlotte, North Carolina, for these photographs of the new buildings after the completion of the first phase of construction. The architect’s drawing below shows the first and second phases as originally envisaged.

The need for the seminary has arisen from the growing number of vocations in the diocese. I’ll let the architectural specialists describe the style of the final design precisely, but to me, it has the look of American Neo-Gothic from the turn of the last century, say Ralph Adams Cram. (There were civic buildings designed by him in Nashua, New Hampshire, where I used to live.)

This first phase of construction includes 40 seminarian rooms, a refectory and kitchen, a conference room, classrooms, administrative offices, faculty rooms, guest rooms, a cloister walk, and a temporary chapel. Anticipating future growth in the number of seminarians, Phase II will include additional seminarian rooms and a larger, permanent chapel. When complete, the seminary will be split into three different zones with the chapel and residential wings acting as ‘bookends’ to the academic and administrative building. A capital campaign is currently underway to fund the construction of this project. Here are some photos of the exterior:

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The Divine Is In the Detail

One of the things that characterized the medieval Gothic style was a theologically driven attention to detail. The Gothic mason not only wanted those details that people could see to be beautiful and structurally sound, but also the hidden structural details of the buttresses, for example, would be created according to principles of harmonic proportion. It would not occur to the illuminator or mason not to create even the smallest or hidden aspect beautifully, for to the Gothic artist, beauty had a utility. Beauty is the outward sign that a thing is suited to its purpose, and that that purpose is good. When we behold it, it’s influence is to direct our spirits to God. To create beautiful art elevates the work of the artist to a virtue that benefits the artist, who is content to try to please God with his work, as well as anyone who sees his art, to the degree that it is good and beautiful.

Shrewsbury Catholic Cathedral in Shropshire, England, has been undergoing a renovation under the patronage of Bishop Mark Davies. This is a 19th century, Puginesque English Gothic style; an article on the restoration in process, with comments by Fr Edmund Montgomery, the cathedral administrator, was published here at the end of March.

In the spirit of this Gothic love of detail, a piece of embroidered art in the style of the School of St Albans - that is, 21st-century English Gothic - is to be displayed permanently at Shrewsbury Cathedral. The piece will be framed and hung in the confessional on the priest’s side at the request of Fr Edmund. Stylistically, this is fully in keeping with the overall artistic schema of the cathedral.

The creator of this piece, Alix Murray, lives in Shrewsbury, and tells me that she was inspired by images from St Albans Psalter and the Bury Bible made in Bury St Edmunds in Suffolk, England, both of the 12th century. She is a student of Pontifex University’s Master of Sacred Arts program.

Here is a picture of the interior of the cathedral.

This is the second piece of work to come out of a collaboration of PU students via a student Facebook group. I have had no personal input in this group - the ideas are generated amongst themselves. We showed a similar embroidered image by another PU student, Kathryn Laffrey, was published a few weeks ago, which resulted in her getting a commission for an embroidered chalice pall from an American cathedral.

Alix told me:

Our agreement was to use the materials we had available to us. I used a bedsheet for the canvas and embroidery floss (untangled with tremendous effort) from my daughters’ craft drawer. In the end, I had to order more floss as I was so limited for colours. I was inspired by two 12-century English illuminated manuscripts and the homeschooling group I am a member of is trying to organize a British history curriculum, so I used particularly English Catholic sources as my inspiration.

There is a saying that the devil is in the detail. However, if we care to make it so, the divine can be in the detail too. This is a detail that will be seen by only the priests in confessional. It’s potential for spiritual impact, without the glorification of the artist, is great. The influence of its beauty first on the confessor, and then in turn, indirectly, on the penitent, has the potential to affect many for the good in the diocese. Beauty will save the world!

Here is an original illumination from the Bury Bible created by an artist known as Master Hugo.

Churches Should Be Like Airports, But Not Like This!

I was greatly amused by a recent tweet from Fr Z.

It was attached to the following photograph:

In my opinion, Fr Z is dead on! Terminal 666, depicted here, is typical of the terrible church architecture that ignorant and callous bishops have inflicted upon the long-suffering faithful for decades. But in my opinion, it is even worse than that. This is not just an indictment of churches, it is also an indictment of the shocking state of municipal airport design.

One can imagine the general line of influence that produced this. The starting point is the whim of an architect who designs airports and other municipal and commercial buildings. This whim is removed from divine inspiration, having been cut loose from tradition during his formation at architecture school. Modern schools of architecture consciously reject all design principle that is rooted in a Christian understanding of the beauty of the cosmos and the beauty of God. This atheistic and materialistic secular culture then influences church architecture.

This is all the wrong way around. The way it should work is that the liturgy is the source of its own culture, inspired by an encounter with the person of Christ. The influence of this wellspring of worship works its way into all the liturgical forms: words, music, art, architecture and from there into secular culture. At each stage, it accommodates more and more the influences of the contemporary culture, but only in such a way that it magnifies and illumines what is Christ-like in what is beheld. In this template, all buildings, including municipal buildings, commercial buildings, homes and yes, even airport terminals and aircraft hangers, speak of Christ in a way that is appropriate to their purpose. This way, a beautiful and well-designed airport both maximizes its utility as an airport and its utility as a place where often disgruntled people sit and wait for hours in need of nourishment of the soul.

I can’t think of an airport to illustrate my point, but I can point to railway stations designed in the golden age of rail, in the 19th century. The train of influence, if you’ll forgive the pun, starts with AW Pugin, a British architect and Catholic convert who designed churches in what he called the “pointed” style of architecture in the early part of the century. He was referring to the Gothic cathedrals and churches of England and France. Many, including non-Catholics in England, were attracted to the beauty of his work, and it influenced not only church architecture of its day across the whole world, but also all other types of building.

So here we have the neo-gothic St Pancras station and hotel in London, inside and out, designed by George Gilbert Scott, who also designed many beautiful workhouses in Victorian England that are preserved buildings today. This is the properly ordained terminus of the 8th Day, if not a terminal!

And here is Mumbai Railway Station, completed in 1887 and now listed as a World Heritage site by UNESCO:

I once showed this picture in a talk and someone in the audience suggested that this represented cultural imperialism. My response was that perhaps it does, but that doesn’t mean necessarily that its a bad thing. Certainly, India was part of the British Empire when it was built, and Indians probably didn’t have much say in the design at the time. However, India has been independent since 1947, and the Indians have certainly had the time and the means to replace it if they wanted to. They haven’t done so because it is a beautiful building that fulfills its purpose. Here is an interesting excerpt from the Wikipedia write-up on the station.

The terminus was designed by British architectural engineer Frederick William Stevens in the style of Victorian Italianate Gothic Revival architecture. Its construction began in 1878, in a location south of the old Bori Bunder railway station, and was completed in 1887, the year marking 50 years of Queen Victoria’s rule, the building being named, Victoria Terminus. The station’s name was changed to Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (station code CST) in March 1996 to honor Shivaji, the 17th-century founder of the Maratha Empire, whose name is often preceded by Chhatrapati, a royal title. In 2017, the station was again renamed Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (code CSTM), where Maharaj is also a royal title. However, both the former initials “VT” and the current, “CST” and “CSMT”, are commonly used. 

So, far from pulling it down as a relic of hated and now displaced rulers, it seems they admire the grandeur and universal beauty of it, and, if the names changes are an indicator, have adopted it as their own. If anyone is at fault here, under the modern dictates of political correctness, it is the Indians, who are guilty of cultural appropriation!

When India becomes Christian at some point in the future, I would wager that this building will have played an important, if an unsung part in the nation’s conversion. It doesn’t draw people to Christ by imposing values on them, but rather, by revealing to them that He is what they wanted all the time. This is a building, therefore, that increases human freedom through its beauty, it is not a symbol of the oppression at all. 

Contrary to what is commonly supposed, modern municipal airports through their banal ugliness, are not derived from freedom, but speak of the bondage of self-centredness and are symbols of oppression. 

I look forward to the day when both airports and, heaven help us, churches once again become symbols of cosmic beauty and human freedom!

If you want to know more about the mathematics of beauty, then my book The Way of Beauty has a section devoted to the subject; and for the most detailed exploration, there is a course, entitled The Mathematics of Beauty, a two-credit course offered as part of the Master of Sacred Arts offered by Pontifex.University

The Sculpture of Lee Lawrie, 1877-1963

I was recently delighted to hear from a reader, Gregory Paul Harm, who brought to my notice the work of Lee Lawrie, a sculptor who died in 1963, a pioneer of the art deco style in the US. This style, which I imagine many will be familiar with, is a 20th-century incarnation of neoclassical sculpture, also influenced by Egyptian art. In this sense, it similar in inspiration to the Beuronese art of the 19th century. I can find no direct connection between the two styles, but wonder if the painting in some way inspired the later sculptors. The article Mr Harm refers to about the architect Ralph Adams Cram is here. (Lee Lawrie, incidentally, should not be confused with the writer of Cider With Rosie, Laurie Lee!)

Lawrie seems to have been able to create works in a more conventional neo-classical style, as well as work for neo-Gothic Episcopalian churches. Here, for example, is his reredos at St Thomas Church in Manhattan, also designed by Cram.

Mr Harm writes: I read an older post you had on the Nashua, New Hampshire, Library done by Cram. Cram was partners with Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue and another architect named Ferguson.

A German-American immigrant named Hugo Belling was raised in Chicago, and eventually changed his name to Lee Lawrie, sometime in his youth.

Lawrie worked with Goodhue from 1895 until 1924, when Goodhue died suddenly of heart failure at age 54. Lawrie went on working as an architectural sculptor for other architects and independently, up until his death at age 85, in 1963.

Lawrie created a great deal of sacred art. He created at least 2 angels at St John the Divine, in which Cram was involved, but also all of Goodhue’s churches in New York City and across the nation. They worked on more than a hundred buildings together, including many opulent homes and many commercial and military buildings. These include buildings at West Point, and in Manhattan, Goodhue built St Bart’s, St Thomas Episcopal on Fifth Avenue, St Vincent Ferrer, Grace Church (of whose location I’m not sure,) the Church of the Intercession, in which he was interred in a tomb designed by Lawrie, dedicated in 1929.

I’ve written a book about Lawrie’s work at the Nebraska Capitol, which turns out to have been the largest sculptural commission in his seven-plus-decades long career as a sculptor.

By and large, Lawrie’s work served to honor God and Country. He created many war memorials, in addition to his secular work.

He taught sculpture at Yale from 1908-18, and I theorize that this influenced a major swing in his career, away from the mostly secular, to becoming one of the nation’s chief pioneers and practitioners of Moderne-styling, which we now know as Art Deco. Lawrie created the mighty Atlas at Rockefeller Center and sculpted the highly dramatic facade of 30 Rockefeller Plaza, as well as about a dozen or so more works in that area.

I have added numerous examples of Lawrie’s work to the Smithsonian Institute’s Catalog of American Painting and Sculpture, of which the Institute had no previous knowledge. (Courtesy of Gregory Paul Harm, M.A and LeeLawrie.com.)

Here are some more photos of the reredos above and then as a selection of his art deco work from the Nebraska Capitol.