Stained glass of the middle ages in England and FranceArnold, Hugh
History
Stained glass of the middle ages in England and France
Arnold, Hugh
Art, Medieval; Glass painting and staining -- England; Glass painting and staining -- France
For the first part of the century, as I have said, the number of
windows produced in France seems to have been few. Such events as the
disaster of Agincourt, the conquest of France by Henry V., and its
deliverance by Joan of Arc can have left little money or thought for
stained-glass windows. The names of the _maîtres verriers_ of the
cathedrals show that all through the time there were men who
carried on the tradition, but their output seems to have been small.
What windows they have left us do not show the same complete change
from the work of the previous century that we find in England; the
style did not as in England crystallize into a definite form, but
remained as a transitional style between that of the fourteenth and
late fifteenth centuries. In its general outlines the design did not
at first differ greatly from that of the fourteenth century, but, as
in England, the white canopy touched with stain took the place of all
others, and there was a general increase in the amount of white in
windows. In detail, however, the canopy altered slowly, and it was
never as in England reduced to an almost flat pattern by the use of
strong line work, but persisted in the attempt to imitate solid
stone-work.
It is not till the second half of the century, when the wars were
over, and France had settled down to quiet reconstruction under Louis
XI., that we find any great revival of the art, and then it is very
different to contemporary work in England.
[Sidenote: Evreux.]
There is a good deal of fifteenth century work still remaining at
Rouen, though there seems to be a gap in the list of _maîtres
verriers_ to the Cathedral from 1386 to 1426. It was during this gap,
however, in the year 1400, that a window, which still remains, was
placed in the clerestory of the Cathedral at Evreux. The general plan
of this window is that of those later fourteenth century windows in
which the whole light was filled with towering canopy work. The canopy
differs only slightly in detail from the late fourteenth century type,
though there is a more decided attempt at perspective in it, but, like
the English work of the time, it is all white, touched with stain, and
the general effect of the window is much whiter than that of earlier
work. The drawing of the figures, which represent the donor, Bishop
Guillaume de Cantier, presented to the Virgin by St. Catherine, does
not show any very great change from late fourteenth century work.
[Sidenote: St. Ouen at Rouen.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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