History_Of_Culture_And_Art

Europe has, first of all, a geographical meaning and denotes a continent and its natural landscape, but for thousands of years, a cultural landscape has been shaped as well, and it may be seen until today in historic cities and their monuments.

European cultural heritage is extremely complex and elaborate and so-called artistic geography has changed many times over the centuries.

The oldest traces of man's artistic creations date back to tens of thousands of years.

There are simple artefacts associated with the cult of female fertility.

More spectacular in their expression are zoomorphic paintings found in the caves of southern France and Spain.

They are a few thousand years younger andthe cause

of their origin is still debated.

These works of art are referred to prehistoric art.

European culture known from everyday, common experience has its origins in the Middle East, North Africa, and the islands of the Mediterranean Sea. There were sources of Greek and Latin civilizations.

For at least two thousand years it has developed monumental architecture with decorative stone columns - Doric, Ionic and Corinthian.

In so-called Classic and Hellenistic period(between 5th c.

BC and 3rd c. AD) figuralsculptures executed in marble

and in bronze, reached an excellent perfection in its

realism,not achieved later for many centuries.

People of the North - Germanic and Slavic - revealed their artistic creations much later, in the Pre-Romanesque stylistic period, enriching European culture with different traditions and imaginary.

The difference between Mediterranean classical tradition and the "barbarians" was Christianity. Christian Universalism was the essential base of culture and art in the Latin world for more than ten centuries, until the end of the Middle Ages.

The Gothic period, i.e. the last three centuries of

the Middle Ages, and especially the International

Style of the 14th and 15th centuries seemed

to confirm this. However, the ideological tie was not sustained.

At the beginning of the Early Modern era the knowledge of the world was the cause of creating a new identity among the patricians in Italian towns and the rebirth of Roman artistic tradition.

In parallel, the filling of ideological separateness among Germanic nations caused the religious Reformation.

Acceptance of the ancient tradition gradually spread to the whole continent as a revival and continuation of the ancient

culture (the Renaissance), and in subsequent centuries,

as sophisticated interpretationof it

(Mannerism and Baroque).

Early Modern Europe is clearly divided into two areas in terms of religion and art. The most significant differences are visible in the Baroque.

Art in Catholic countries is called "the picturesque Baroque", and in Protestant countries artistic results were more restrained in its expression, and architecture was based there on the designs by Andrea del Palladio (so-called Palladian Baroque).

The paradox is that the visual arts in Catholic countries often evoked motifs of Greek and Roman mythology, which are essentially pagan.

In Protestant countries in turn, architecture was based on the essentially catholic patterns of Italian Mannerism.

Another paradox is that at the beginning of the next,so-called Modern era, artistic differences disappeared,

though in fact, the religious divisions survived till today.

The phenomenon of Modern era, dating from the 1760s, was (and still is) the historical consciousness.

Initially, it was awakened by a fascination with the discoveries at Pompeii, as enthusiastic desire to imitate the Antique past and later the other successive eras and periods of style.

These tendencies were also reinforced by the romanticmood of this era.

The second half of the nineteenth century was a periodofhistorical styles. Monumental buildings were “dressed up”

in styles of different epochs, depending on their functions. This also, in a sense, applies to sculpture and painting.

Works of art and literary associations have becomeclose and complementary to each other.

The first protest against repeating the historical forms was a search for forms yet unknown in the history of art.

This short period of such an exploration had different names in different countries – “Wiener Secession”, “Art Nouveau”

and “JugendStil”.

This was the last formula of a stylein Europeanculture which included all arts disciplines:

architecture, sculpture, painting and even crafts.

However, the real breakthrough, of this time known as an “avant-garde break” was based on formal experiments initiated by Impressionism and Expressionism painting at the end of the 19th c.

In consequence, Cubist painting introduces a new paradigm - the abandonment of depicting of the real world.

Since the first and second decade of the 20th c. century,works of art became autonomous art objects whichabstra-

cted from the surrounding reality and the realism was nolonger a challenge for the artist.

Art of the twentieth century made a variety of complementary, but short-term trends in different fields of art: in architecture, sculpture and painting.

The most important of them will be referred to in the present work.

The phenomenon of the Modern era, namely the last two hundred and fifty years, is a gradual spread of European art and culture on other continents. Late Baroque churches were built already in Spanish colonies in South America, and in the Philippines and in the Portuguese enclaves of Macau and Goa.

Classicist architecture of French and English designs has become popular in the United States since the end of the 18th c.

Since the end of the 17th c. Paris has been the capitalof world culture and art, however after 1945 European

artisticcentres and many artists "moved" overthe Atlantic Ocean to New York.

For more than half a century, all contemporary artistic trends shaping the European art have their origin in the United States.

Returning to the beginning of our Modern era, it has to be stressed that the modern reflection on the past emerged and developed during

the 19th c.

Since the 1830s the first university chairs of the history of art were established. Initially - only in German-speaking countries.

The Department of the History of Art atthe Jagiellonian University in Krakow wasfounded in 1882 and was one of the firstin this part of Europe.

It must to be said that in German-speaking countries and also in Krakow University it was assumed that the art of Antiquity ought to be dealt with by archaeologists.

Due to this early tradition, Polish historians of art analyze all artistic phenomena since the Middle Ages till the present.

In Italy and France university chairs of history of art were established after World War I, i.e. more than half a century later than in Germany and Austria.

In the United States and England, the history of art became a university course even later, after World War II, and thus over a hundred years later than in Germany.

The reason for these amazing delays werethe controversies about the research methods.

History of art deals with historical methods and also with the interpretation of the language of artistic expression.

In fact, every work of art is actually a text of culture designed for careful reading and for discovering all the hidden meanings.

Where the European culture has its beginnings?

- In thye Middle East, North Africa and the Mediterian sea

Early Christian Art

Early Christian art used the same artistic media as the Late Roman culture: mostly fresco, mosaics, manuscript illumination with rare examples of sculpture on sarcophagi. They followed Roman forms and style e.g. early Christian frescos in the catacombs of Rome. (The earliest comes from the late 2nd to early 4th centuries)

Catacombs of St. Peter and Marcellinus, Rome, 4th c. Dome of heaven over tomb of deceased. Christ as the good shepherd

Early Christians adapted Roman motifs and symbols and gave them new meanings. Among the adopted Roman motifs there were grapevines, and the "good shepherd".

Santa Costanza, Rome, 337-351. Mausoleum, vault mosaics.round building, pagan subjects with Christian meaning, geometric ornament.

Soon early Christians developed their own signs e.g. Jesus was represented by the Lamb of God, which symbolizes Jesus' sacrifice or the fish (pictogram Ichtys = fish), or later by Greek letters Chi Ro (XP = Christos). The fish represents Jesus' last supper as well as the water used to baptize Christians. The Cross, symbolizing Jesus' crucifixion, was not used for a few centuries.

Sarcophagus of JuniusBassus.Rome, 359. A roman consort, converted to catholicism on deathbed. Shows classical influences through body figures.

In 313, Emperor Constantine I issued the Edict of Milan, which allowed for public Christian confession of faith. It also allowed the development of the Early Christian art into really monumental forms.

Therefore, since that time Christians started to build larger edifices for worship than they had been using before.

The scheme of the first temples was the conventionalarchitecture of the public use – the basilicas.

These had an atrium, a nave with one or two aisles at each side and an apse at one end with an altar and the bishop seat. There were also some churches on central plan with an ambulatory.

Galla Placida Mausoleum, Ravenna, Italy, 425. Vault mosaic with four Evangelists. Mark as lion, Luke as ox, Matthew as man, John as eagle

Among the famous temples built in Constantine age (later rebuilt) the most important are:

St Peter’s Basilica in Vatican, San Sebastianofuori le mura, San Lorenzo fuori le mura, San Paolo fuori le mura, , San Giovanni in Laterano, Santa Maria Maggiore and an old basilica dedicated to Santa Agnesefuori le mura with Santa Constanza mausoleum (the only remaining part).

Outside Italy: the Church of the Nativityin Bethlehem and the Churchof the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem.

All of them were decorated with mosaicin their apses and with frescos.

Christian saints depicted on temple walls are represented by symbols or iconic motives, attributes or emblems, in order to identify them. Some symbols were personified e.g. Jonah, whose three days in the belly of the whale pre-figured the three days between the Christ death and resurrection. Some attributes were general, such as the palm branches in martyrs’ hands.

Santa Maria Maggiore. Rome, 423-440. Mosaics, church dedicated to Virgin mother of God. Pictures became accepted everywhere because of Pope Gregory the Great.

The most popular saints, such as Saint Peter, Saint John the Evangelist and Saint Andrew can also be recognised by the type of their faces. The Christ’s face was changed very early from a beardless young man to an older one with a black beard. This iconographical language was invented and established in the turn of the 5th century and has been developed until today.

SantAppolinareNuovo, Ravenna, Italy. 514. Miracle of Loaves and Fishes mosaic. Christ calm, in purple. Cross on his head. Manifestation of Christ's power.

Byzantine art

The term Byzantine art describes the art of the Byzantine Empire from about the 5th century till the Fall of Constantinople in 1453. and the art of Eastern Orthodox countries in the Middle Ages such as Bulgaria, Serbia, KievanRus’, and in some centuries in the Kingdom of Sicily and the Republic of Venice.

The artistic tradition that comes from the ByzantineEmpire, is regarded until present day in icon painting

and church architecture in Eastern Europe(Greece, Serbia, Bulgaria, Romania,Moldova,Russia, Belarus, Ukraine and even in Finland).

The Byzantine Empire, at the very beginning, was actually the political continuation of the Roman Empire. Conversely, Byzantine art does not follow Roman art and developed its own aesthetics.

For a few centuries the Greek and Roman art generally imitate reality as closely as possible in human figures and in floral ornaments. The nature of Byzantine art is more abstract and symbolic.

A few events had a fundamental importance on the beginning of the unique Byzantine culture.

The first one, the abovementioned Edict of Milan, issued by Emperor Constantine the Great in 313, which allowed for public Christian confession of faith.

It also allowed the development of Early Christianartinto really monumental forms.

The second event was the foundation of the new capital by Emperor Constantine (after whom the place was named)

at ancient town of Byzantium in 330.

It soon became the largest city in Europe and great artistic centre of Christian art.

Other important events were the results of Gothand Arab invasions: the downfall of great antiquemetro-

polises in the 5th and 7th centuries - Rome, Alexandriaand Antioch. Constantinople establishedits supremacy

till the catastrophe of the year 1453.

Byzantine art is conventionally divided into three main period:

- the Early period, from the Edict of Milan till Iconoclasm;

- the Middle, or High period, begins with the restorationof the icons in 843 till the downfall and plunder of the town

by Crusaders in 1204;

- the Late period, ended with the Fallof Constantinople in 1453.

Early period: Emperor Constantine and his son, Constantius II, built in their new, capital city the most important great churches of Hagia Sophia (i.e. The Holy Wisdom) and the church of the Holy Apostles. Their forms with central plan and huge, enormous copulas represent the essence of Byzantine architecture and became actually the patterns followed in many various ways in the following centuries.

Hagia Sophia (Holy Wisdom) Constantinople (Istanbul, Turkey), 532-537.

The apogee of the Early period was the reign of Emperor Justinian (527-565). Several great churches were built in the provinces by local bishops as imitations of the Constantinopolitan foundations. They were decorated with frescos and elaborate mosaics. One of the most important is the Basilica of San Vitale in Ravenna (North Italy) with important mosaics showing emperor Justinian, his wife empress, Theodora, Bishop Maximian of Ravenna, soldiers and clerics. Justinian also built a number of castles and churches in the province of his empire e.g. the monastery of St Catherine on the Sinai Peninsula (in today’s Egypt) and the Basilica of St. John in Ephesus (in today’s Turkey).

Ravenna. San Vitale Justinian and Attendants Mosaic

Angel Gabriel, Constantinople, second half of the 13th century

The Age of Justinian was followed by political and religious conflicts. In 754 bishops proscribed the depicting of Christ on icons.

Intense debate over the role of visual art in worship led finally to the period of Iconoclasm lasted about a hundred years until 843.

According to the new ideas there couldbe noticedsporadic a destruction of the portableicons and even removal of some figural scenes in mosaics.

Middle period: After the new bishop council celebrated in 867 under the rules of Emperor Basil I, called “the Macedonian” Iconoclasm period ended. The following period of Byzantine art is called the Macedonian Renaissance. The emperors of the Macedonian a Komnenian dynasties who ruled in the 9-12 centuries, were great patrons of art and architecture. The new architectural church form (the “cross in square”) and a decorative scheme of the interiors were standardised.

"Dypticho" St. George and Jesus Christ - Byzantine Icon

Late period

Late period: In 1204 Constantinople fell and was plundered by the Venetians and the French knights of the Fourth Crusade.

The destruction and looting lasted for over half a century.

The old Empire was thereafter a small state.However the splendour of Byzantine art stillinfluencedthe culture of Venice, NormanSicily,and the main towns in Italy.

In panel painting, Byzantine tradition was broken in Trecento.

Late period: In 1204 Constantinople fell and was plundered by the Venetians and the French knights of the Fourth Crusade. The destruction and looting lasted for over half a century. The old Empire was thereafter a small state. However the splendour of Byzantine art still influenced the culture of Venice, Norman Sicily, and the main towns in Italy. In panel painting, Byzantine tradition was broken in Trecento.

The Byzantine era came to an end with the tragic fall of Constantinople in 1453.

By this time Byzantine cultural heritage had been widely spread together with the Orthodox Christianity to Balkan countries as Bulgaria, Serbia, Romania, and Moldova and successively to Russia.

Church architecture and icon painting therefollowed and developed Byzantine tradition until nowadays.

Pre – Romanesque Art

The period since the late 8th c. to the beginning of the 11th c., differ from the Romanesque art was called in the middle of the 20th c. as Pre-Romanesque. The basic problem of that time is defined as an absorption of classical art forms of Mediterranean origin, by Germanic peoples, mostly Saxons and Merovingian after the fall of the Roman Empire and so called Migration Period.

It includes Carolingian and Ottonian Art.

Carolingian art and architecture

Carolingian art and architecture In the reign of Charlemagne there was observed a sudden and developed change in the political, economic and demographic aspects in Western Europe. The political stability was the beginning of a period of intellectual and cultural revival of Roman culture and of the imperial idea.

The political result was the coronation of Charlemagne as emperor in Rome in the year 800. The political idea called renovatioimperii was also performed in numerous foundations, monasteries, cathedral churches, residences modelled on the Roman artistic tradition. It formed also a unique development of literature, writing, liturgical and legal reforms. This phenomenon is called by historians the Carolingian Renaissance and defined as the first consistent and consequent revival of the Antique tradition in western culture.

Santa María del Naranco, an example of the Asturian pre-Romanesque style. Spain, 9th c.

Carolingian painting.Saint Marc, from the so-called Ebbo Gospels.ca 800

The Pre-Romanesque St Donat's Church in Zadar (Croatia).ca. 800.

Ottonian art and architecture

Ottonian art and architecture After the decline of the Carolingian dynasty the idea of the European Empire was renewed in the middle of the 10th c. by Saxons. Under the rules of three Saxon emperors Otto I, Otto II and Otto III the Holy Roman Empire was re-established again. Otto I was crowned emperor in 962 in Rome. He ruled between Rhine and Elbe River and also in Lombardy and in the Northern part of Apennine Peninsula.

Political stability and dynastic relations with the Byzantine Empire became the base for the cultural and artistic fervour called the Ottonian Renaissance, which was the second revival of Antique tradition in western culture. The artistic inspirations were modelled on the Late Antique, Byzantine and Carolingian art and architecture.

Ottonian painting. Codex Egbert, a gospel dictionary

made for Archbishop Egbert of Trier, probably in the 980s.

Pre-Romanesque art in Polish lands came together with Christianity, i.e. in the second half of the 10th c. and lasted until about the middle of the eleventh century, and the conventional cut-off date as the year 1040, when prince Casimir the Restorer renewed Polish Kingdom after the Czech invasion.

Architectural monuments in Poland pre-Romanesque art are few and known mainly through archaeological research. These are mainly remains of stone buildings, which document the beginning of masonry technique in Poland. None of the pre-romansque buildings of this period survived in its entirety. Knowledge of them is therefore limited to the plans and we may to try to reconstruct their spatial arrangements.

Pre Romanesque palace chapel in Cieszyn (Poland).

First half of the 11th c.

The first group of buildings from this period are rotundas serving as chapels and associated with adhering to them palatiaof the rectangular plan. They were erected within the royal and bishop residences. These teams have clear common features and their origin is believed to be in the Carolingian and Ottonian art. The second group consists of cathedral churches - in Poznan, Gniezno, Krakow and Wroclaw. Probably three of them were planned as three-aisled basilicas, applicable in the entire Latin Church.

There are no monuments of Pre-romanesque panel painting, or wall painting in Poland, but thanks to the information from archaeological and written sources, historians conclude that there were some. More is known about illuminated books, which were imported into monasteries.

Romanesque Art

"Romanesque" literally means "descended from Romans". The term begun to be used in the 19th c. for works of art dated from approximately 1000 AD to the 12th century. It was the first style which spread across the whole Latin Europe, from Portugal to Poland and from Scandinavia to Sicily. Romanesque style in England is traditionally called as “Norman”.

Romanesque architecture followed the Antique building technique in stone and brick. The walls are often double shells, filled with rubble. The general impression given by Romanesque churches and castles, is solidity and strength of thick walls with few and small openings. The main motifs there were: round arches, sturdy piers, barrel and groin vaults, massive towers and decorative arcading. The style can be identified right across Europe, despite regional characteristics and different materials.

Maria Laach Abbey, Germany. 11-12^th

LessayAbbaye. France

The architecture of Abbey and cathedral churches followed in plans the scheme of the Latin cross, with a chancel sometimes surrounded by an ambulatory. In Italy the T plan was common with a semicircular apse on the east end. Some churches in western France had been modelled on the Greek cross plan with five domes. In German-speaking countries and in Poland there were often two main apses, added at both east and west ends.

Cathedral Church in Pisa. Italy. 12th c.

Collegiate Church in Tum. Poland. 12th c

Church facades had a large west (or south) portal, significant due to its mouldings or porch. Smaller churches usually had a single tower at the western end. The arches of different openings such as doorways and windows, and also vaults arcades were mostly semi-circular and often surmounted by decorative semi-circular carved profiles. A common decorative feature was “blind” which arcading occurred in storeys or stages.

Columns with bases and capitals, as the supporting elements, as well as the decorative colonnettes, were the important structural features of Romanesque architecture.

Saint Madelaine abbey Church in Vezelay

France. 12^th

Vaults were made of stone or brick in different forms. The most popular simple type is the “barrel vault” with an arched surface which extends from wall to wall. It required a solid support of massive walls. The “groin vaults” were constructed of two barrel vaults intersecting at right angles. In “ribbed vaults”, the ribs were spanning the vaulted area transversely and diagonally in each bay.

As opposed to the architecture, Romanesque sculpture and painting was expressive and colourful. After a few centuries of decline the figurative sculpture flourished again during the 11th and 12th centuries. Large wooden crucifixes and free standing figures of the enthroned Madonna with a Child became a common decoration of church interiors.

The tympanums of church portals were carved with monumental scenes of the Last Judgment or Christ in Majesty with the symbols of the Four Evangelists. Figures were varied in size in relation to the architectural details and to their importance. This was a unique invention of Romanesque period and had no precedent or model in Early Christian or Byzantine art. Carved tympanums occurred in Burgundy and spread out to many European Countries and were continued also in the Gothic period.

Cathedral Church in Autun

France Tympanum. 12^th

Saint Trophime Church in Arles

France. Tympanum. 12^th

The other carved architectural elements were capitals. Antique forms provided the inspiration for many Romanesque capitals, particularly figurative ones, decorated with beasts and monsters, Biblical scenes and scenes from the legends of local patron saints.

Sculpted capitals in Moissac

Abbey, France. 12^th

Apostles. Santiago de Compostella

Cathedral Church. Spain.12^th

Christ in Majesty.

Saint Climent de Tahull Church. France. 12^th

Large surfaces of walls and vaults in Romanesque churches and castles were covered with wall painting and sometimes with mosaics. Many of them were destroyed, but they are mentioned in written sources and some relics were preserved. The wall paining and panel painting were mostly influenced by Byzantine art.

As opposed to manuscripts decorated in monastery scriptoria, there is some evident influence of so-called Insular art following anti-classical early Irish and Scottish tradition.

Scene of Ascension. York Psalter

England.12th

Date: 2015-02-28; view: 1244