I did finish looking at my class notes for the second semester of my first year of college a while ago, but haven’t written about it yet. Here’s a bit on one of the courses – Empire and Art.
The last few weeks were not as distinctive as the earlier part of the class. The main thing I took away this time was the move from major items to smaller things, even by the kings, and a decline in I guess the 1100s or so in the overall quality of works produced particularly representive the rulers. Materials and craftsmanship were not quite as good, corresponding with a decline in the fortunes of the kings, emperors such as they were. There were one or two kings who asserted power and consolidated rule, but mostly the figures and dynasties were not as great as in the century or so after Charlemagne.
It looks to me like freshman Jon may have trailed off a bit in his/my ability to assimilate more and more pieces of art as time went on in the course. I feel like my notes are more vague toward the end, like I did better earlier. Though maybe that was the course’s momentum and not mine.
I wrote my final paper on being “in the shadow of greatness”, looking at works from all periods back to the post-Constantine period and forward through the end of the early middle ages. I’m a bit tickled to see that I used that phrase back then; it’s something I picked up again and used for a piece of Torah later on, about the blessing of being “like Ephraim and Menashe.” I have no recollection of making a connection between the two; something like twenty years (?!) separates the two writings!
I do have to say that I’m questioning a bit of this part of the course after having just visited in Paris the Musee Cluny, which is a museum of the middle ages. Granted, most of the works there both architectural and decorative are from the 1300s on, but already in that time it seems like in France there was some of the sophistication I associate with the 1400s and 1500s. There were painted scenes of faces with emotion, and carved pieces also with real human form and facial expression. The museum talked about the economics of parts of France and I think northern Italy, which made better artistic materials available and the excess wealth to put it to use. So I’m not sure how that fits with the stagnation at the level of the Holy Roman Emperors. And of course some of the incredible cathedrals in France come from as far back as the 1200s.
I do think this course was a valuable one for me. When I go to art museums, I have an orientation to centuries of sculpture and representation, when I am in medieval cathedrals I do as well. The history, though in broad strokes, helps me understand some of both general European and Jewish history, in its own time and as a basis for the developments of the 1600s-1700s. I have a bit of additional understanding of at least the politics of the medieval Catholic church. This was I guess the last formal art history course I ever took, and it was done in a way that worked and works for me. As I've mentioned before, I know that I'm limited by my need to link art to concepts and ideas and history, but at least I can do that and Professor Nercessian helped me. So I'm grateful to her for helping me continue to have access to and enjoyment from the kinds of things I saw through this course.