Controversy and conversation: Churches and art

Here's the talk I gave at last night's Unveiled event in St Andrew's Wickford:

St Andrew’s has a hidden painting – ‘The Descent from the Cross’ by David Folley – which illustrates some of the issues involved in showing modern art in churches. In this talk I want us to look at Folley’s painting and other controversial art commissioned for churches to see the ways in which they open up conversations about faith for those who wouldn’t ordinarily come to church or consider faith.

David Folley is an English painter based in Plymouth. He paints subjects that range from abstracts, landscapes, seascapes, portraits, and race horses, including a life size painting of the famous British racehorse Frankel. He has completed portrait commissions for Trinity College, Cambridge, and University College Plymouth and has had major commissions from Plymouth City Council and Endemol UK (a production company for Channel 4). He describes himself as “a twenty-first century romantic with a belief in the spiritual and redemptive possibilities of art.” Exploring the spiritual and redemptive possibilities of art is the foundation of his “romantic associations with the aesthetic tradition of Northern Romantic painting.”

Revd Raymond Chudley, a former Team Vicar at St Andrew’s, knew Folley and had supported him in his artistic career. As an act of gratitude, Folley made this painting as a gift for Chudley when he got married, around the time he retired from parish ministry. The painting was too large for Chudley’s home, so was gifted to St Andrew’s and was dedicated by the Bishop of Bradwell in 1996.

Folley’s friend Alan Thompson has described the work well. Thompson writes: “David Folley has painted The Descent from the Cross, the melancholy depth of hopelessness, in a major work of heroic proportions. It is a large canvas painted traditionally to inspire the viewer to contemplate all that had culminated in what seemed at the time to be the final act of a tragedy. The viewer cannot share the utter despair of the participants in the painting because he or she knows what they didn't - that the body will be resurrected.

The way David has painted the body expresses the physical suffering Christ endured, whilst the dripping blood from the wound the soldier inflicted on Him, is shown as a rainbow. The explanation of this is that God told Noah that the rainbow was the sign of the new covenant with the earth. This is just one of many examples of Christian iconography illustrated in this work.

Mary, looking up at her son, is depicted as a modern provincial character in the manner we have associated with Stanley Spencer. Behind Jesus, Joseph of Arimathea, with a moustache, is painted in blue to denote spiritual love, constancy, truth and fidelity.

At the extreme right hand side of the picture, the Revd. Raymond Chudley, who commissioned the painting, is shown in the traditional fifteenth century role of the donor, kneeling in prayer, with his attention fixed upon the body of Christ.

Facing him is the artist. He has included himself, portrayed as holding a broken spear as if to suggest that he had been responsible for the wound in the side of Christ. He is balancing precariously on a skull, a memento mori, signifying the transitory nature of life and also reading across to Calvary, which is derived from Golgotha, which is Hebrew for skull. He is also 'pregnant' with a foetus, which the artist sees as humanity giving birth to the Christ within, and transforming themselves into Sons of God rather than sons of man.

From the bottom of the painting is an outstretched arm, which just fails to touch Christ's hand, because the hand is withdrawn. This is intended to signify man's desire, through science, to explain the laws of the universe and so become almighty. He is almost there but cannot touch. There is a visual tension between God and man.”

Folley says, “I sum up this painting as being made up of a composite of the works of great masters of the past. Not copying them slavishly but developing my own concept of individualism with emphasis on vivid imagery, technical refinement, complex iconography and innovation.” Among the artists referenced are: El Greco, Grunewald, and Donatello.

The painting disturbs some through a mix of its expressionist style, its strong colouration, and its unusual symbolism. As it dominates the space in the church where children’s activities have often taken place it was eventually decided to cover it with a large curtain and banner.

Such a response to contemporary art in churches is not unusual. During my sabbatical I visited churches linked to three significant controversies over the commissioning of modern art: 

(i) a set of Stations of the Cross and an altarpiece, The Death of St Teresa, commissioned from the Flemish artist Albert Servaes for the church of the Discalced Carmelites in Luithagen, a suburb of Antwerp. This led, in 1921, to a decree from the Holy Office based on Canon 1399.12, which states that images may not be ‘unusual’, resulting in first the Stations and then the altarpiece being removed from the chapel; 

(ii) the rationalist design for Notre-Dame du Bon Conseil in the Swiss Alps by architect Alberto Sartoris (who had strong links to the Futurists) created a scandal in the Swiss press in 1931, the same year that the publication of a 'Manifesto of Futurist Sacred Art' led to a censure from Pope Pius XI in a speech at the inauguration of a new Vatican Art Gallery and; 

(iii) Germaine Richier’s Crucifix was removed from Notre-Dame de Toute Grâce at Assy and a subsequent instruction on sacred art issued by the Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office in 1952, which was the beginning of two year initiative by the Vatican that severely constrained the modernizing programme of the French Dominicans and represented a victory for the traditionalists within the Church.

Many church commissions are controversial because they introduce something different and therefore dissonant into a familiar building, as is the case with David Folley’s painting. That was the case with modern images of the crucifixion by Servaes and Richier and, in the UK, Graham Sutherland at St Matthew’s Northampton and St Aidan’s East Acton. These viewed Christ’s sacrifice as emblematic of human suffering in conflict and persecution. They were controversial as they challenged sentimental images of Christ and deliberately introduced ugliness into beautiful buildings. On my sabbatical I spoke to parishioners in both Northampton and East Acton who stated that they did not like Sutherland’s Crucifixions but who also appreciated why the paintings were as they were and the challenge that they provided as a result.

I was particularly moved to find, on entering Saint Martin’s Kerk in Latem in Belgium, that the baptistery contains a Passion charcoal by Albert Servaes. Servaes and Richier were both affected by decrees from the holy office which led to the removal of their artworks from the churches for which they had been commissioned. Servaes, with his Stations of the Cross and altarpiece for the Carmelite Chapel in Luithagen and Richier, with her crucifix for the church at Assy. Given all that Servaes experienced in the controversy over the Luithagen Stations, including the removal of work which was a genuine expression of his faith by the Church of which he was part, I found it profoundly moving that a work of his, in the same vein as the Luithagen Stations, should be displayed in the church and area where his faith and art first fused. Richier’s crucifix was later returned to its place in the sanctuary at Assy and the church, like many other churches in France with modern art commissions, is now classed by the Government as a national monument and has become a significant tourist location.

It seems, therefore, that scandals of modern art, whether the reception of the works themselves or that of their challenging content, are, with time, resolved as congregations live with the works and learn to value the challenge of what initially seems to be scandalous.

My main personal experience of this kind of situation was when a sculpture by the Street artist Ryan Callanan was moved ahead of a Stations of the Cross exhibition at St Stephen Walbrook. Complaints from several parishioners at the church prompted, after considerable discussion, the rehanging of the exhibition although initially it had seemed as their complaints would result in the work being removed from the exhibition. That possibility attracted press interest which then calmed down after the work was moved to a different position in the church. Controversy of this sort and attempts to ban, remove or censor artworks thought to be in some way blasphemous or challenging, are, as we have seen, part of the story of faith and art in the modern period.

Let’s think for a moment about the reasons why displaying a crucified stormtrooper in a City church might stimulate those viewing it to think about Christ afresh. In the Star Wars films, stormtroopers are the main ground force of the Galactic Empire, under the leadership of Emperor Palpatine and his commanders, most notably Darth Vader. They are on the dark side in that conflict. That the artist Ryan Callanan chose to create a ‘Crucified Stormtrooper,’ provides Christians and others with the possibility of experiencing something of the sense of scandal that Christ’s crucifixion originally generated.

The imagery of the dark side in the Star Wars films can be seen in this context as equating to the Christian belief that we are all sinners. If we use the imagery opened up for us by ‘Crucified Stormtrooper,’ then we are forced to reflect, much as we dislike the thought, that we are all on the dark side. We are all stormtroopers.

The amazing message of love at the heart of Christianity is that God does something about that situation. God becomes one of us in Christ. He becomes a stormtrooper in order that, through his death, he can take the darkness onto himself and enable us to live in the light. That is the original heartbeat of Christianity, which continues to radically change people's lives on a daily basis around the world when they genuinely acknowledge their own sinfulness. The scandal - the stumbling block - that is the cross, was brought home to us afresh by including this artwork in this exhibition; particularly to any who view their own assets as the basis for their own self-esteem. To show this work in a church enabled that reflection on Christ's love to be seen and shared in a new way and that is why it worthwhile for the Church to show art, especially controversial art, and to explore the questions that it opens up to us.

In the context of the Private View, I was able to talk to people, for whom churchgoing is not necessarily a regular feature of their lives, about the art in relation to the love of Christ. That is both a great privilege and opportunity. Many of those who saw the exhibition described it as 'striking', 'intriguing', 'uplifting' and 'interesting.' It was commended as an extraordinarily broad-minded, human and thought-provoking exhibition in an extraordinary place with others asking that the church reach out to current artists more often. As a result of the controversy, the curator of the exhibition wrote publicly about his own faith.

Additionally, the conversations generated by the exhibition have an ongoing life online at a website documenting Art Below’s Stations of the Cross exhibitions: https://stationsofthecross.co.uk/blog/how-does-a-crucified-stormtrooper-glorify-god and https://stationsofthecross.co.uk/blog/controversial-art-protest-or-engagement.

The reactions from some within the Church to Art Below’s Stations of the Cross exhibitions suggest that we still need to learn that it is far better to engage with art and artists by discussing and debating the questions they raise, instead of seeking to suppress or censor. One example of this being done effectively would the many Da Vinci Code events, bible studies, websites etc. that the Church used to counter the claims made in The Da Vinci Code featured reasoned arguments based on a real understanding of the issues raised which made use of genuine historical findings and opinion to counter those claims. The Church, it seems, still needs to learn that the way to counter criticism is not to try to ban or censor it but to engage with it, understand it and accurately counter it. In other words, to enter into conversation with art and to generate conversations about faith with those who come to visit to see art.

That is what we are seeking to do here with David Folley’s ‘Descent from the Cross’; to make the painting itself and the story of how it came to be hidden talking points that encourage people to explore the ways in which the painting engages with Christ’s Passion and our understandings of it. To put those things in dialogue and encourage people to visit in order to engage in that conversation; a conversation about Christ and the nature of atonement.

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 Bob Dylan - Sign on the Cross.

Sabbatical art pilgrimage: Report - Part 4

I visited churches linked to three significant controversies over the commissioning of modern art: (i) a set of Stations of the Cross and an altarpiece, The Death of St Teresa, commissioned from the Flemish artist Albert Servaes for the church of the Discalced Carmelites in Luithagen, a suburb of Antwerp led, in 1921, to a decree from the Holy Office based on Canon 1399.12, which states that images may not be ‘unusual’, resulting in first the Stations and then the altarpiece being removed from the chapel; (ii) the publication of a 'Manifesto of Futurist Sacred Art' in 1931 led to a censure from Pope Pius XI in a speech given in October 1932 at the inauguration of a new Vatican Art Gallery and the rationalist design by Alberto Sartoris (who had strong links to the Futurists) for Notre-Dame du Bon Conseil in the Swiss Alps at Lourtier also created a scandal in the Swiss press in the same year; (iii) Germaine Richier’s Crucifix was removed from Notre-Dame de Toute Grâce at Assy and a subsequent instruction on sacred art issued by the Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office in 1952 was the beginning of two year iniative by the Vatican which severely constrained the modernizing programme of the French Dominicans and represented a victory for the traditionalists within the Church.

Many church commissions are controversial because they introduce something different and therefore dissonant into a familiar building. Harmonization can, as we have seen, help to minimize this sense of dissonance and difference but with some works their value derives from the sense of dissonance they create.

This was the case with those images of the crucifixion by, for example, Servaes, Richier and Graham Sutherland which viewed Christ’s sacrifice as emblematic of human suffering in conflict and persecution. These were often controversial as they challenged sentimental images of Christ and deliberately introduced ugliness into beautiful buildings. I spoke to parishioners in both Northampton and East Acton who stated that they did not like Sutherland’s Crucifixions but who also appreciated why the paintings were as they were and the challenge that they provided as a result.

I was particularly moved to find on entering Sint Martinuskerk in Latem that the baptistery contains a Passion charcoal by Servaes. Servaes and Richier were both affected by decrees from the holy office which led to the removal of their artworks from the churches for which they had been commissioned. Servaes, with his Stations of the Cross and altarpiece for the Carmelite Chapel in Luithagen and Richier, with her crucifix for the church at Assy.

Given all that Servaes experienced in the controversy over the Luithagen Stations, including the removal of work which was a genuine expression of his faith by the Church of which he was part, I found it profoundly moving that a work of his, in the same vein as the Luithagen Stations, should be displayed in the church and area where his faith and art first fused. Richier’s crucifix has been returned to its place in the sanctuary at Assy and the church, like many other art sacré churches, is classed by the Government as a national monument and has become a significant tourist location.

It seems, therefore, that scandals of modern art, whether the reception of the works themselves or that of their challenging content, are, with time, resolved as congregations live with the works and learn to value the challenge of what initially seems to be scandalous. It is my contention, therefore, on the basis of these examples that criticism of the Hussey Memorial Commission would dissipate over time if the work were to be installed. It is a particularly ironic and inappropriate memorial to Walter Hussey that his memorial commission should be the subject of such controversy that it is prevented from being installed.   

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Luigi Russolo - Serenata.

Sabbatical art pilgrimage: Notre-Dame de Toute Grâce du Plateau d'Assy

William S. Rubin writes in ‘Modern Sacred Art and the Church of Assy’ (Columbia University Press, New York & London, 1961) that, 'In August 1950, the Dominican-inspired church of Notre-Damede Toute Grâce at Assy was consecrated amid great jubilation and even greater hope that it represented the commencement of a "Renaissance" of sacred art. The appearance there of religious works which, in power and purity, recalled those of the great ages of faith, certainly seemed symptomatic of a genuine religious revival.’

Yet, as my sabbatical art pilgrimage has been demonstrating, a renaissance of sacred art had been underway from the beginning of the century. The decoration of St. Paul Grange-Canal in Geneva by Maurice Denis, Alexandre Cingria and others in 1913 – 1915 had served as a manifesto for this renaissance and led on to the founding in 1919 of the Ateliers d’Art Sacré by Denis and Georges Desvallières as well the Group of St Luke and St Maurice by François Baud, Cingria, Marcel Feuillat, Marcel Poncet and Georges de Traz. Both groups produced significant work for a significant number of churches in subsequent years.

In 1935 the Group of St Luke secured the decoration of the new church of Notre-Dame-des-Alpes Le Fayet in the French Alps by means a tender process assessed by a panel which included the philosopher Jacques Maritain, the Catholic art critic Maurice Brillant and the director of the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Geneva Adrien Bovy. The process and the resulting work was therefore set up to be a showcase for the renaissance of sacred art in France and Switzerland during the first half of the twentieth century in which Denis, Maritain and Cingria had played key roles. It was this stage of the revival that was challenged by the commissions for Notre-Dame-de-Toute-Grâce.

Rubin continues, ‘For the first time in centuries, great artists had directed their efforts towards church art. Bonnard, Chagall, Léger, Lipchitz, Lurçat, Matisse, and Rouault had all contributed significantly.’ The Dominican Friars Marie-Alain Couturier and Pie-Raymond Régamey had argued in the journal ‘L’Art sacré’ that they edited that ‘each generation must appeal to the masters of living art, and today those masters come first from secular art.’ Couturier worked with the parish priest at Assy, Canon Jean Devémy, to commission those modern masters who contributed work to the church of Assy.

Interestingly, Couturier himself and the commissions at Assy had begun within the earlier phase of the renaissance of sacred art. On the basis of his work at Le Fayet, Devémy selected Maurice Novarina as architect. Novarina used his regional style at Assy with a chalet-style pitched roof and locally sourced materials. The chalet style is intimate and warm while the wooden carved beams suggest a Nordic hall. The interior is dark, as a result, but this tends to sets off the work well. While appropriate to Alpine setting in terms of aesthetics and practicalities, Novarina was not, at this stage of his career, working in the modernist style first exemplified by Alberto Sartoris’ design for the church at Lourtier and subsequently further developed by Le Corbusier at Ronchamp, La Tourette and Firminiy. Couturier had trained at the Ateliers d’Art Sacré and had worked on schemes of stained glass with artists at the Atelier and others, such as the L’Arche artists. Several of these artists, included Couturier himself, received commissions for the nave windows. Rubin comments that this was Couturier allocating some commissions to the ‘family’ of artists ‘active in modernist circles of Church decoration before the war’ before he then moved on to ‘the more radical aspect of the decorative plan for Assy.’

This ‘radical aspect’ of Couturier’s plan was to prove deeply controversial as commissioning modern ‘masters … from secular art’ meant that ‘Side by side with works of the pious Catholic Rouault one saw those of Jews, atheists, and even Communists - a revolutionary situation that struck the keynote of a new evangelical spirit ...’ As a result: ‘Even before its dedication in 1950, the church had become the center of an increasingly bitter dispute which was to cause a marked rupture between the liberal and conservative wings of the clergy and laity during the following years. The violent polemics on both sides involved not only the French Church, but also the Vatican, usually through the voice of the Congregation of the Holy Office. As its destiny was linked to the fortunes of the entire liberal religious movement in France, the Church at Assy and its decorations were vehemently attacked and defended by an army of critics, most of whom had seen only a few photographs of the works in question.'

The polemic against the Assy commissions was centered on the crucifix created by Germaine Richier but this was used as a focus for a wide-ranging attack by traditionalists on the desire of French Dominicans for a Christianity that was engaged with the secular world. As a result, they argued that priests should not live in ‘Christian ghettos’ but should join with the citizenry ‘to establish a new, spiritually inspired system of social justice’ - the worker-priest movement – and, with artists, to preach a ‘new gospel of sacred art’ that could help these artists come to ‘Christian awareness.’ These initiatives were representative of ‘a new evangelical spirit’ which was concerned with contextualized mission.

Richier’s bronze crucifix resembles ‘craggy and weathered wood’ in its surface and the undefined figure has a cruciform shape, the combination conveying a ‘tortured and sacrificial appearance.’ It is a stunning image of the effect which suffering has on human beings by reducing a person to mere flesh and bone. Couturier related the image to the ‘root out of dry ground’ of Isaiah 53. Richier’s crucifix therefore connects with the strand in modern sacred art, exemplified by Albert Servaes and Graham Sutherland, which viewed Christ’s sacrifice as emblematic of human suffering in conflict and persecution. Works in this vein were often controversial as they challenged sentimental images of Christ and deliberately introduced ugliness into beautiful buildings. The crucifix was described by those who opposed its inclusion in the church as a caricature of a crucifix in which it was no longer possible to ‘recognise the adorable humanity of Christ’ making it ‘an insult to the majesty of God’ and ‘a scandal for the piety of the faithful.’

Servaes and Richier were both affected by decrees from the holy office and saw their artworks removed from the churches for which they had been commissioned. The instruction on sacred art issued by the Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office in 1952 was the beginning of two year iniatiatve by the Vatican which severely constrained the modernizing programme of the French Dominicans and represented a victory for the traditionalists within the Church.

Richier’s crucifix has, though, subsequently been returned to its place in the sanctuary at Assy and the church, like many other art sacré churches, is classed by the French Government as a national monument becoming a significant tourist location – the secular state recognizing the value of sacred commissions. As a similar level of acceptance and understanding has also evolved in relation to other controversial commissions, including those by Servaes and Sutherland, it would seem that scandals of modern church commissions, whether the reception of the works themselves or that of their challenging content, are, with time, resolved as congregations and communities live with the works and learn to value the challenge of what initially seemed to be scandalous.

Notre-Dame de Toute Grâce was planned as a showcase for the value of contemporary church commissions with Couturier taking on the primary role of curator but, as most of the commissions included were on the basis of his friendships with the artists involved, the decisions he made or did not make illustrate the tricky balance required to succeed in commissioning. Couturier criticized the Ateliers d'Art Sacré for being a 'world closed in on itself, where reciprocal indulgence, or else mutual admiration, quickly becomes the ransom paid to work as a team and maintain friendship.' Yet Couturier's scheme of work at Assy suffers from the opposite problem, as work by individual masters produced in isolation from each other, with work assigned on the basis of what they could with integrity contribute, results in a decorative scheme with no cohesiveness or focus. Couturier, here, fails to be sufficiently decisive as a curator. As Rubin states, 'the subject was almost as often picked for the man as the man for the subject.'

Too much work was commissioned for Assy from too many artists making the resulting iconographic scheme muddled and esoteric. There are inappropriate clashes of style (e.g. the Lipchitz sculpture dominating the Rouault windows or the different styles used in each of the nave windows), inappropriate positioning of some works (e.g. stained glass by Bazaine and reliefs by Chagall which can barely be seen), commissions which do not work in the space (e.g. the intimiste style of Bonnard is not suited to being viewed from a distance) and central commissions with esoteric symbolism (e.g. the Lurçat tapestry). Couturier, presumably to sustain his friendships with the artists involved, seems not to have exercised sufficient control regarding the overall scheme which therefore means that the whole is not greater than the sum of its parts.

The overall lesson of Assy would seem to be that simplicity is of the essence. The most effective works are those which are simplest, clearest and most pared back i.e. the work by Léger, Matisse, Richier and Rouault. The Rouault windows, in particular, are luminous, effective translations of his paintings into stained glass combining beauty and sorrow. The floral windows seem a strange choice initially but function as memento mori. Chagall created a wonderful 'Exodus' mural on ceramic tiles which was an inspired choice for the baptistery. He depicts a crucifixion in the top right hand corner; the act of Exodus for Christians which is symbolised by baptism. Although he was uncertain about undertaking this first commission for a church, his work here shows clearly the suitability of his vision and practice for churches and led to many subsequent commissions.

The Lurçat tapestry, by contrast, seems particularly ineffective both in itself and as a central focus. Its imagery is undeniably personal and esoteric. It provides visual focus through its size but, although intended as an apocalyptic evocation of the conflict between good and evil, fails to convey menace or threat. The beast seems funny and friendly in a way which could suit it to a walk on part in Teletubbies or In the Night Garden, while the female figure that opposes it is a non-entity as a realized, dynamic creation. The work of Adam Kossowski at St Benet Mile End and St Mary Leyland provide much stronger examples of apocalyptic imagery put to devotional rather than esoteric use. That said, Lurçat’s work is by no means fundamentally unsuited to an ecclesiastical context as his vibrant ‘Creation’ tapestry for the Chapel at Bishop Otter College ably demonstrates.

The artists Couturier commissioned were his friends but the work of his friends was not always suited to this particular sacred environment and scheme as some were clearly working outside their comfort zones and were not able to solve the inherent issues either of engaging with the space i.e. Bonnard’s intimiste style lost in the space and Lurçat’s esoteric apocalyptic imagery.

As noted earlier, Couturier and Régamey argued that "each generation must appeal to the masters of living art, and today those masters come first from secular art." However fashions and reputations in the art world (as elsewhere) change considerably with time. In their own day and time Pablo Picasso and Matisse were considered unassailable as the giants of twentieth century art while now, in terms of continuing influence on contemporary artists, Marcel Duchamp is generally considered to be the most influential twentieth century artist. Lurçat’s tapestry provides the central focus for the Church at Assy, where those artists commissioned were considered current masters, but his reputation has not been sustained into the current day, and the same is also true of Lipchitz.

The reputations of many of those who were commissioned by the Church in the twentieth century (e.g. Bazaine, Denis, Gleizes, Lurcat, Manessier, Sutherland, Piper, Rouault, Severini) have declined following their deaths. The same is likely to be so for those receiving contemporary commissions (i.e. Clarke, Cox, Emin, Le Brun, Wisniewski). The pace with which modern art moved from one movement to next in the twentieth century quickly and, often unfairly, condemned as passé what had previously been avant garde.

The Church cannot, and probably should not, seek to keep up with the fickle nature of fashion and instead should value both those artists with significant mainstream reputations wishing to receive occasional commissions and artists with less significant mainstream reputations who receive commissions which form a more significant part of their practice. In practice, that combination is what we find at Assy and it also there in the contrast between the commissioning practices at Assy and Le Fayet.

As a result, in my view, setting up dichotomies between artists with significant mainstream reputations versus those without and between secular artists and artists who are Christians represents an unnecessary division often advocated on the basis of subjective quality criteria. The reality is that both have happened simultaneously in the story of modern and contemporary church commissions and both have resulted in successes and failures. What is warranted and rewarded is sustained and prayerful attention to each and every artwork in order to discern what is good and of God in and through it.

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Young Disciples - As We Come To Be.

Sabbatical art pilgrimage: Chapelle Sainte-Thérèse-de-l'Enfant-Jésus et de la Sainte-Face, Hem

I began the European leg of my sabbatical art pilgrimage with a mixture of excitement and trepidation. Excitement because, as Edward Knippers said of my plans, this is the start of a wonderful adventure. Trepidation because I am unsure as to whether my itinerary and the practical arrangements which I need to make as I travel will work out.

My journey does not have an auspicious start as, on the approach to Lille, I become part of one of the longest tailbacks it has been my misfortune to encounter. We are, however, mostly moving throughout many kilometres, albeit at a snail’s pace, and eventually reach the cause of the delay – a convoy of tractors filling the lanes and accompanied by the emergency and highways services. Why it was necessary for such a large group of tractors to be moving together I have no idea but the delay certainly increased my initial anxieties about the possible difficulties of keeping to my planned itinerary.

Eventually I arrive at Hem for my first visit not knowing for sure whether this first church, or those that I planned to visit subsequently, would be open. As the Chapelle Sainte-Thérèse-de-l'Enfant-Jésus et de la Sainte-Face has external sculptures and a mosaic over its entrance, I reasoned that the journey would not be completely wasted were the church to be locked. It is not and, as I travel on, it is only when I return to Calais that I find churches which are not regularly open.

The Chapelle Sainte-Thérèse-de-l'Enfant-Jésus et de la Sainte-Face was built in 1956 - 1958 with mosaics and windows by Alfred Manessier, sculptures by Eugène Dodeigne and Jean Roulland, and a tapestry of the Sainte-Face based on a painting by Georges Rouault which was made by the Plasse Le Caisne workshop. The architect was Hermann Bauer and the church has been described as “a fine example of art sacré after World War II.”

I had come to see the work by Manessier and did not realise prior to arrival that I would also see an image by Rouault, who is a favourite artist of mine. To enter the evocative space of this chapel and see not only Manessier’s amazing walls of stained glass but also the Rouault image was confirmation that, despite my anxieties about the unknowns in this great adventure, I was on the right path.

The combination of Rouault and Manessier is particularly appropriate as Manessier has been described, by Werner Schmalenbach, as 'after Georges Rouault the only great painter of Christian art in our age.' In 1947, Manessier received a visit from Rouault who advised him to take up stained-glass design. From 1948 to 1950 he worked on six windows for Sainte-Agathe des Bréseux (which I would see later on my pilgrimage) before promoting "the modern concept of stained glass architecture,” as found here, “rather than isolated stained glass windows."

Despite this the differences between them exceed the similarities. Rouault was a figurative expressionist who loved to paint circus players, prostitutes and judicial figures, as well as the iconic sainte face (holy face) of Christ. These were painted “as penetrating types of the misery of human existence” but with grace also seen as “divine meaning is given to human life by the continuing passion of Jesus Christ.” He summed up his vision in several studies entitled (quoting Virgil's Aeneid), ‘Sunt Lacrymae Rerum’ – ‘There are tears (of grief) at the very heart of things.’ The image of the Holy Face used for the tapestry, taken from a painting of 1946 which is now in the Vatican Museum, "focuses on the conquest of death by giving the face a serene expressionwith wide open eyes and by using calm harmonious colours."

Rouault was apprenticed to a stained glass maker and, as here, often used thick black outlines in his work, which were regularly compared to the lead lines in stained glass, yet he was only commissioned for stained glass in old age while Manessier, after taking Rouault’s advice, went on to create in excess of 70 windows.

Manessier, by contrast with Rouault, was a lyrical abstractionist who thought of stained glass less as a design than as “the simultaneous creation of a light-filled architectural unit, thought-out and created by the painter at one go.” Similarly concerned with suffering as was Rouault, he aimed to saturate his works with human feelings. For this to occur no resort to figuration was permitted, his goal being not to “portray a man in his state of suffering, but suffering itself”; “an attempt to translate this through the use of equivalent signs and colours.” “I start painting,” he stated, “when I feel a very close coincidence between the scene that I have before my eyes and my inner state. That relationship releases a creative joy which I long for and need to express.” As a result he sought “a new pictorial language” that would “fortify expression”. He wished to incarnate inner experience in visible form. As he put it, “More and more I want to express man’s inner prayer.” Abstraction was, for him, the means to achieve this desire; “The further I penetrated into non-figuration,” he said, “the more I approached the inwardness of things.” (Manessier, J. P. Hodin)

These approaches to his art developed from his experience while on retreat with the poet Camille Bourniquel at the Trappist monastery of Soligny in 1943. During the Salve Regina on the first evening he “felt profoundly the cosmic link between that sacred chanting and the world of nature all around, which thrust itself into the silence of the twilight.” It was the moment, he said, “when nature was appeased.” He saw in his mind songs rising and falling and thought that, if he “could succeed in grasping this inner light, this rhythm, this meaning,” he “could do more than render a visible image of it,” he “could give its essence.”

The concept of stained glass architecture - of a light-filled architectural unit – that we find at Hem is an attempt to recreate that experience for all who enter the space. Stained glass here is not windows, but walls. There is no narrative, instead a loose cubist concrete grid holds a great chromatic richness. The play of light and colour created in the space is redolent of the Carmelite spirituality of Thérèse of Lisieux, which was the inspiration for Manessier’s design. Stained glass here creates spiritual space, a sense of prayer and a glimpse of heaven.

Reflections on human suffering constitute the predominant theme of Jean Roulland’s work. In 1956 his discovery of Germaine Richier's works in the Dujardin Gallery in Roubaix was decisive in his definitive turn to sculpture which has led to his becoming chiefly known for his tormented lost-wax cast (cire perdu) bronzes. His expressive work shows no concession to the decorative aspects of sculpture in its relentless focus on the contorted anguish of human misery. Although I didn’t know it at this stage, I would see examples of these works when I returned to Calais at the end of the European leg of my pilgrimage. Roulland is a featured artist in Calais, at home and away, a series of exhibition spaces at the Musée des Beaux-arts de Calais which serve as an introduction to Calais, its artists and landscapes.

Roulland was collected by Philippe Leclercq, the wealthy manufacturer who had the Chapel at Hem built, and was commissioned to create a bust of Jean XIII and a processional cross (Christ de Procession). The processional cross shows the influence of Richier in that, as with Richier’s crucifix at Assy, Christ is made one with the cross and reduced to the most minimal representation possible. As with Richier’s work this has the effect of emphasising the sub-human state to which torture, torment and suffering reduce all who truly experience their pain and anguish. These works, as with the Sainte Face and Passion images of Rouault and the Crown of Thorns paintings of Manessier, are part of a strand of twentieth century art which equates the sufferings of the crucified Christ with that of the numberless victims found in a century characterised by persecution, torture and war.

Roulland and Eugène Dodeigne were close friends and fellow members of the Groupe de Roubaix, a group of friends who were artists characterized by their northern origins. Dodeigne has said that he views sculpture as a struggle against the material. His struggle may be sensed in the stressed and patterned surfaces of the Soignies blue limestone which he has sculpted since moving to Bondues in northern France in 1949. By contrast, his smaller Soignies forms, as here with his sculpture of St Thérèse, are highly polished. His work, in both monumental and modest scale conveys a mastery of the balance of volumes and lines of force.

For all that the works by Dodeigne, Rouault and Roulland make their distinctive contributions here in Hem, it is Manessier’s glass which sets the tone and creates the spirituality which informs this marvellous space. Rightly, when reviewing Manessier’s exhibition at the Venice Biennale in 1962 - for which he was awarded the international prize for painting (to date, the last occasion that a French artist has been awarded this prize) - Jacques Lassaigne wrote of Manessier’s “majestic orchestration of vibrant tonalities and pure rhythms.” Lassaigne also suggested that at various points in Manessier’s very rich career “a kind of pause of meditation and inner transformation” had “enabled him to transform the powerful impressions which he had received … into new means of evoking and glorifying secret presences. Reflecting now on my visit to Hem, those words seem to be an accurate description of the experience that I enjoyed there at this the first stop on my sabbatical art pilgrimage.

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The Frames - Star, Star.

Sabbatical art pilgrimage: Europe - Day 10

Today I've visited Sint-Martens-Latem in Belgium, home to an artist's colony from 1900 - 1930. The Gaevert Minne Municipal Museum shows work by the key artists from the two groups that settled here (including Albert Servaes), with a particular focus on the work of George Minne and Edgar Gevaert. Work by artists from the colony can also be found at Sint Martinuskerk as well as older and more contemporary works. Most movingly, the church has an image of Christ by Servaes. A set of Stations of the Cross by Servaes provoked uproar when placed in a chapel at Luythagen in 1919 and was subsequently removed following a decree from the Holy Office, the first modern condemnation of art in the name of canon law (a decree which was later repeated on the same grounds in regard to the crucifix created by Germaine Richier for the Church at Assy). Given this experience for Servaes (his own taste of the rejection inherent in the crucifixion), it was moving to find his work affirmed and shown in the church at Latem. The neighbouring church of Sint Aldegondiskerk also had a similar range of work, including contemporary glass by
Ingrid Meyvaert.

Airbrushed from Art History? (3)

Traces du Sacré was a significant exhibition both sociologically and artistically. Sociologically, because it recognised the re-emergence of religion in the 21st century and artistically, because it was a broad re-telling of the story of Modern Art through its spiritual influences.

The story that the Centre Georges Pompidou sought to tell began in the eighteenth century with what has been called the “disenchantment of the world,” caused by factors as diverse as the Reformation, the rise of capitalism, the ideals of the Enlightenment, the worship of Reason and the growth of the town. In Traces du Sacré this starting point was symbolized by Francisco Goya’s etching Nada. Ello dirá (Nothing. We Shall See) which depicts a dead body as simply that, decaying flesh with no hint or hope of anything beyond death.

The usual telling of the history of Modern Art, which rises from this context at the end of the nineteenth century with the development of Impressionism, is a secular story which sees Modern Art’s development progressing through a focus on the forms rather than the content of art and thereby excludes religion or spirituality as an element within the story. Traces du Sacré accepted that the secularization of society occurred and was reflected in the development of Modern Art but the radical shift made in this exhibition was the claim that this process of secularization did not mean the disappearance of metaphysical questioning from Modern Art. Instead, Traces du Sacré argued that art’s fundamental concern with the questions of who we are, where we come from, and where we are going was reasserted and re-energized in and through Modern Art.

In making this claim, the exhibition recognized three broad time periods within which the traces of spirituality it uncovered fell. The first considered ideas which dominated from the late nineteenth century to the 1930s including Romanticism, the death of God, and the Superman. The second focused on the intellectual environment following World War II with its sense of the end of history, the decline of Europe, and the development of spiritualities without God. The third was the contemporary world in which we are either seeing the return of religion or, at least, the decline of irreligion.

One of the main strengths and fascinations of Traces du Sacré was the sheer scale and breadth with which its thesis was taken up and explored. From Caspar David Friedrich and Odilon Redon to Damien Hirst and Bill Viola by way of Vassily Kandinsky, Kasimir Malevich, Pablo Picasso et al, 350 major works were displayed in 24 thematic sections, with contemporary works shown alongside the Romantic and Modern. The Centre Pompidou saw Traces du Sacré as a return to the tradition of major multidisciplinary exhibitions on which its reputation was originally based and argued that this was the first exhibition of its kind to be held in France as earlier surveys of the spiritual in Modern Art either did not travel to France or were restricted to one medium (e.g. the abstract), one source of inspiration (e.g. the occult) or one context (e.g. the Church).

The exhibition uncovered the exploration of spiritual themes within most of the major movements in Modern Art. The themes selected spanned the movements with, for example, pagan spirituality expressed in the theme of the mask being revealed in the Cubism of Picasso, the Expressionism of Emil Nolde and the Dadaism of Marcel Janco, among others. The exhibition was at its strongest when uncovering evidence of the contribution that spirituality made to the development of Modern Art movements. Sections exhibiting works from the De Stijl movement, for example, showed how theosophical ideas combined with scientific experimentation to create new artistic forms.

One of the issues, however, with an exhibition of this type is the extent to which the art becomes subordinate to the argument. The argument was essentially sociological; a documenting of secular spiritualities. The art was then viewed as emerging from these spiritual movements and specific works were selected to feature in the exhibition as evidence supporting the argument. Nevertheless, there remained much of interest when synergies did develop between art styles and emerging spiritualities allowing for their depiction and exploration through art. The room devoted to differing depictions of 'Homo Novus' provided one example, as did the critique of established religion found in the 'Offensives' section, where works by Francis Picabia and Max Ernst put religious belief and fervour into question.

In an exhibition of this type and title, one would anticipate encountering a strong strand of Christian spirituality but this was not actually the case. The argument made here was that the secularization of society delivered artists from their subordination to the Church and that, as a result, the traces of spirituality found in both Modern and Contemporary Art are ones that stand outside of organised religion (and Christianity, in particular). References in this exhibition to art within an ecclesiastical context were generally negative; the assumption being that the dogmatic purposes of religion sought to make art subservient.

To feature in this exhibition then, art that has some link to an ecclesiastical context had to demonstrate, in the eyes of the curators, an intrinsic spiritual function exceeding the dogmatic purposes that religion seeks to impose. Interestingly, the one room within the exhibition explicitly devoted to 'Sacred Art' also sought to articulate this argument. This section of the exhibition highlighted the work of Father Couturier, a Dominican friar, who was actively involved in the reconstruction of churches in France during the 1950s and who commissioned work from significant contemporary artists such as Le Corbusier, Fernand Léger, Henri Matisse and Germaine Richier. Couturier was convinced that it was from “the vitality of profane art” that a new Christian art would be born. Therefore he commissioned work from the best contemporary artists regardless of whether they professed faith or not. The curators argued that, via Couturier, the entry of contemporary art into the fold of the Church was as a distinctly secular endeavour.

The rigour with which this argument was applied to Modern Art throughout Traces du Sacré meant that the Christian faith of artists such as Maurice Denis and Georges Rouault, for example, was masked and hidden through the categories chosen for the exhibition. As a result, the essence and wellsprings of their inspiration were not fully apparent. Both featured rightly in the 'Sacred Art' section as both were commissioned by Couturier but, as ardent Catholic artists whose art was vitally informed by their faith, neither fitted the sacred from profane art argument that characterized that room.

Rouault also featured in the 'Homo Homini Lupus (Man is a wolf to Man)' section of the exhibition, where his oil on paper version of a Miserere etching gave this room its title. This section of the exhibition argued that the horrors of World War II negated pre-war expectations of the birth of the New Man. Yet Rouault’s Miserere et Guerre, from which this image derives, while conceived during and as a response to the war years, was also conceived as a prayer for the rebirth of humanity in and through Christ, and not as a secular Superman.

Not only were the Judeo-Christian influences of certain artists (including Mark Chagall, Alfred Manessier, Barnett Newman, Nolde and Paul Sérusier) masked by the exhibition’s categorization and argument but much that was significant in Modern Art which derived from Judeo-Christian influences was entirely absent.

The Roman Catholic influence on Modern Art, for example, can be briefly summarized as a case in point. Post-Impressionism and Symbolism was initiated and developed by artists who were often ardent Catholics. Through Denis, in particular, the effects of their influence were widely felt especially in Belgium, Canada, Italy, Russia and Switzerland. The French Catholic philosopher, Jacques Maritain, was an influential figure linked to artists such as Alexandre Cingria, Jean Cocteau, Otto Van Rees, Rouault, Albert Servaes and Gino Severini. Severini’s conversion and Catholic contacts then played a part in the development of a Futurist Sacred Art. Similarly, Albert Gleizes’ development of Cubism led to his return to Catholicism and, through his tutoring of Mainie Jellett and Evie Hone, to a strong strand of Christian spirituality featuring in the development of Irish Modern Art.

Just as the secular story of Modern Art excluded Judeo-Christian influences, the argument of Traces du Sacré had the same effect to the detriment of a full understanding of the impact that spirituality has had on the practice of Contemporary Art. Traces du Sacré provided ample evidence of the enduring and revived significance of spirituality in our secular culture but a broader, more inclusive, story of the traces of spirituality in the development of Modern Art remains to be told. It is to be hoped that the significance of this major exhibition was as a staging point on the journey towards the full telling of that tale.

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Violent Femmes - Jesus Of Rio.