Winefride Wilson: Christian Art since the Romantic Movement

I've recently read 'Christian Art since the Romantic Movement' by Winefride Wilson. I found the book in a secondhand library sale.

The book, which was also published a 'Modern Christian Art' begins with the Romantic Movement. Winefride surveys the turbulent spirit of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century art and shows how the expressive artists of the twentieth century owes an unrecognized debt to the traditional Christian artists of earlier centuries. She discusses paintings and sculpture, emphasizing the important figures in this century: Graham Sutherland, David Jones, Eric Gill, Sir Jacob Epstein and many others. In separate sections, the author treats architectural trends, work in metals, ceramics, textiles and stained glass.

The book covers: The downfall of reason; Nostalgic brotherhoods; The age of revivals; Preaching boxes and true principles; Religious painting and European movements; Two centuries of Christian sculpture; A fantastical Spaniard and some contemporaries; Bright pavilions; and The precious arts.

The book is one of the most comprehensive I have read and is written in a polemical style that maintains the reader's interest throughout, even when one may not agree with the stated perspective. Winefride lectured widely and was the art critic for The Tablet. A former President of the Society of Catholic Artists, she was made one of the first Papal dames in 1994. She was taught the art of silversmithing by her husband Dunstan Pruden and joined the Guild of St Joseph and St Dominic in 1975.

I experienced a sense of frustration in finding this book as Winefride is not someone I have seen referenced previously despite having being widely read on the topic of Modern Christian or Sacred Art. The fact that her book is more comprehensive than many on this subject demonstrates the extent to which institutional memory is commonly disregarded in this field.

Eric Newton, for example, was another excellent earlier writer in this field who is relatively rarely cited. Newton's 'The Christian faith in art' is well worth a read. Like Winefride Wilson, Newton was also an artist. In a similar vein and from a similar period, 'Christianity in Art,' published in 1959, by Frank and Dorothy Getlein is also worth reading. 

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Bob Dylan - Caribbean Wind.

Modern Art in City Churches

The present Dutch Church was built between 1950 and 1954, and contains paintings, memorial plaques, stained-glass windows and tapestries symbolising the key elements of its history: the Christian religion and the Reformation, the history of the Dutch nation, and the relationship with the House of Orange.

External stonework, including relief crests above each window, and above the entrance - the latter commemorating the beheading of the Duke of Arnold in C14 (he was buried in the old church) - by John Skeaping. Skeaping was a 'sculptor, mainly of animals.' 'Skeaping studied at Goldsmith's College, London, and later at the Royal Academy. In 1924 he won the British Prix de Rome and its scholarship to the British School at Rome. Skeaping was the first husband of the sculptor Barbara Hepworth, with whom he exhibited during the 1920s. He was a member of the London Group, and later worked for a period in Mexico. He was elected to the Royal Academy in 1960.'

The glass in the aisle is by W Wilson, 1954-8, and includes a commemorative memorial to the church's friendly associations with the Church of England and the Church of Scotland. 'To the north of the sanctuary is glass donated by the Worshipful Company of Carpenters, connected to the Church since 1558. Opposite is glass donated by the Corporation of the City of London. Memorial window to Queen Wilhelmina, of 1962 by Rev. Kok. Three western windows by Max Nauta commemorate the history of the church and the sixteen English towns who permitted the Dutch community to worship in C16.'

'On the main stair is Max Nauta’s (1896-1957) stained glass commemoration of the Glorious Revolution of 1689, when the Catholic James II of England was defeated and succeeded by his Protestant daughter, Mary II, and her Dutch husband and cousin, William III.

Both are depicted in sparkling stained glass that has a jewel-like, three dimensional quality, owing to Nauta’s use of small pieces of differently coloured glass as a substrate before painting. The huge west window is Nauta’s work also, with vivid royal portraiture, saints and heraldry.' Dutch artist Max Nauta worked on two sets of windows in the UK, the Austin Friars Church and St Andrews, Roxbourne, Harrow.

'The first commission Nauta received as a stained-glass artist was from the elders and deacons of the Dutch Reformed Church at Woerden, to design a memerial window to commemorate Johannes Pistorius (1925). This window - which to this day is a great source of pride to the members of the congregation, was produced by the Bogtman Studio, Haarlem, under Nauta's supervision and with his personal cooperation. All his later windows were produced - also under the artist's supervision - in the studios of either Messrs. Schrier or Messrs. De Ru (both also at Haarlem). The treatment with “grissaille” of the most important details, as well as the sorting and arranging of the pieces of stained glass are invariably the work of the artist's own hands. Many other commissions followed after this: St. Jacobs Church at The Hague; the Great Church at Delft; Dutch Ford Automobile Works; Shell.'

'On the south wall is a large tapestry depicting the ‘Tree of Life’ by Dutch artist Hans van Norden (b. 1915). It is a remarkable work, recombining traditional Biblical imagery with modernist/ classicising forms in pastel, not pale, colours.' Van Norden studied at the State Academy of Fine Arts in Amsterdam under Heinrich Campendonk and John Jurres. Norden was a versatile artist (graphic artist, watercolourist, draftsman, glass painting, wall painting, monumental artist, painter, maker of mosaic, textile artist). He was a lecturer at the Academy of Drawing Teachers Tilburg. In 1946-1947 he was co-founder of the painters, the Realists' as the alternative to the famous Cobra movement and other "abstract'-working artists."'

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Brian Kennedy - A Better Man.