Great Gothic Cathedrals of France


Book Description

Great Gothic Cathedrals of France guides readers on a tour of twelve French cathedrals that best exemplify one of the greatest glories of Western civilization. From the beautiful facade of Notre-Dame in Paris to the transcendent beauty of the stained glass at Chartres, this book clarifies the significant elements of their architecture by means of its text and images. The cathedrals of Amiens, Paris, Saint Denis, Chartres, Reims, Laon, Noyon, Soissons, Sens, Beauvais, Bourges and Troyes as well as Sainte-Chapelle are all presented to give the reader and visitor to France a clear understanding of these extraordinary buildings. This publication also provides the reader with a chapter on how to "read" a stained glass window.




Cathedrals of France


Book Description




Notre-Dame


Book Description

WINNER OF THE 2022 FRENCH HERITAGE SOCIETY BOOK AWARD The profound emotion felt around the world upon seeing images of Notre-Dame in flames opens up a series of questions: Why was everyone so deeply moved? Why does Notre-Dame so clearly crystallise what our civilisation is about? What makes ‘Our Lady of Paris’ the soul of a nation and a symbol of human achievement? What is it that speaks so directly to us today? In answer, Agnès Poirier turns to the defining moments in Notre-Dame’s history. Beginning with the laying of the corner stone in 1163, she recounts the conversion of Henri IV to Catholicism, the coronation of Napoleon, Victor Hugo’s nineteenth-century campaign to preserve the cathedral, Baron Haussmann’s clearing of the streets in front of it, the Liberation in 1944, the 1950s film of The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, starring Gina Lollobrigida and Anthony Quinn, and the state funeral of Charles de Gaulle, before returning to the present. The conflict over Notre-Dame’s reconstruction promises to be fierce. Nothing short of a cultural war is already brewing between the wise and the daring, the sincere and the opportunist, historians and militants, the devout and secularists. It is here that Poirier reveals the deep malaise – gilet jaunes and all – at the heart of the France.




French Gothic Architecture of the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries


Book Description

Gothic architecture is the most visible and striking product of medieval European civilization. Jean Bony, whose reputation as a medievalist is worldwide, presents its development as an adventure of the imagination allied with radical technical advances—the result of a continuining quest for new ways of handling space and light as well as experimenting with the mechanics of stone construction. He shows how the new architecture came unexpectedly to be invented in the Paris region around 1140 and follows its history—in the great cathedrals of northern France and dozens of other key buildings—to the end of the thirteenth century, when profound changes occurred in the whole fabric of medieval civilization. Rich illustrations, including comprehensive maps, enhance the text and themselves constitute an exceptionally valuable documenation. Despite its evident scholarly intention, this book is not meant for specialists alone, but is conceived as a progressive infiltration into the complexities of history at work, revealing its unpredictable vitality to the uninitiated curious mind.




Chartres Cathedral


Book Description

The author is the world's foremost authority on Chartres, and is in residence there most of the year. He shows us the history of the cathedral and teaches us how to "read" the world-famous stained glass and sculpture, explaining the references to Scripture and the teachings of the Church. Chartres alone, of all the great medieval churches, has survived into the 20th century almost intact, not only architecturally but with its vast inconographic program in 12th-and 13th-century stained glass and sculpture. Medieval art was intended not just to embellish the church but to instruct the people, for there was no printing. Scholars could therefore teach their students, the clergy preach sermons and parents read the lives of the saints to their children using the 'texts' in stained glass and sculpture. The sister churches of Chartres have been sadly vandalized to varying degrees by Reform, revolution, war or natural disaster. Here in Chartres the 'text' is virtually complete. A concise glossary of symbolic images has been included as well as a complete plan of all the windows in the cathedral, and an index.




Cathedral


Book Description

This richly illustrated book shows the intricate step-by-step process of an imaginary cathedral's growth.




Notre-Dame


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Written in aid of the crucial restoration work to restore Paris’s great cathedral, Notre-Dame: A Short History of the Meaning of Cathedrals is a moving, short piece of non-fiction celebrating the stunning history of this beloved building, from Ken Follett, author of the multi-million copy selling Kingsbridge series. ‘Two days after Notre Dame burned, I flew to Paris to appear on the TV programme La Grande Librairie for a discussion about cathedrals. The following morning I had breakfast at the Hotel Bristol with my French publisher and she asked me to write a short book about Notre Dame and what it means to all of us. She said she would donate the publisher’s profits to the rebuilding fund and, if I wished, I could do the same with my royalties. Yes, I said; of course, I’d love to.’ – Ken Follett A minimum of 50p per copy on each sale of this book will go to the heritage and restoration charity La Fondation du Patrimoine.




Romanesque Cathedrals in Mediterranean Europe


Book Description

Gerardo Boto Varela & Justin Kroesen, Romanesque Cathedrals in Mediterranean Europe: Balance and Perspectives. I. Shaping Cathedrals in the Pre-Romanesque Era: Beat Brenk, The Cathedrals of Early Medieval Italy: The Impact of the Cult of the Saints and the Liturgy on Italian Cathedrals from 300 to 1200. Jean-Pierre Caillet, French Cathedrals around the Year 1000: Forms and Functions, Antecedents, and Future. II. Building Romanesque Cathedrals on Older Substrates: Matthias Untermann, Between 'Church Families' and Monumental Architecture: German Eleventh-Century Cathedrals and Mediterranean Traditions. Mauro Cortelazzo & Renato Perinetti, Aosta Cathedral from Bishop Anselm's Project to the Romanesque Church, 998-1200. Gerardo Boto Varela, Inter primas Hispaniarum urbes, Tarraconensis sedis insignissima: Morphogenesis and Spatial Organisation of Tarragona Cathedral (1150-1225). III. Romanesque Cathedrals in Urban Contexts: Quitterie Cazes, The Cathedral of Toulouse (1070-1120): An Ecclesiastical, Political, and Artistic Manifesto. Saverio Lomartire, The Renovation of Northern Italian Cathedrals during the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries: The State of Current Research and Some Unanswered Questions. Xavier Barral i Altet, Medieval Cathedral Architecture as an Episcopal Instrument of Ideology and Urban Policy: The Example of Venice. Javier Martínez de Aguirre, The Architecture of Jaca Cathedral: The Project and its Impact. Jorge [Manuel de Oliveira] Rodrigues, The Portuguese Cathedrals and the Birth of a Kingdom: Braga, Oporto, Coimbra, and the Historical Arrival at Lisbon -- Capital City and Shrine of St Vincent. IV. Liturgical Layout and Spatial Organization: Michele Bacci, The Mise-en-Scène of the Holy in the Lateran Church in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries. Elisabetta Scirocco, Liturgical Installations in the Cathedral of Salerno: The Double Ambo in its Regional Context between Sicilian Models and Local Liturgy. Marc Sureda i Jubany, Romanesque Cathedrals in Catalonia as Liturgical Systems: A Functional and Symbolical Approach to the Cathedrals of Vic, Girona, and Tarragona (Eleventh-Fourteenth Centuries). V. Visual Discourses and Iconographic Programmes: Francesc Fité i Llevot, New Interpretation of the Thirteenth-Century Capitals of the Ancient Cathedral of Lleida ('Seu Vella'). Peter K. Klein, The Iconography of the Cloister of Gerona Cathedral and the Functionalist Interpretation of Romanesque Historiated Cloisters: Possibilities and Limitations. Marta Serrano Coll & Esther Lozano López, The Cloistral Sculpture at La Seu d'Urgell and the Problem of its Visual Repertoire. José Luis Hernando Garrido, Romanesque Sculpture in Zamora and Salamanca and its Connections to Santiago de Compostela.




Framing the Church


Book Description

Examines Gothic architecture and the visual and cultural significance of the adoption of externalized buttressing systems in twelfth-century France. Demonstrates how buttressing frames operated as sites of display, points of transition, and mechanisms of demarcation.




The Art of the Italian Renaissance


Book Description

The Italian Renaissance is among the most glamorous epochs of European art. Art historians as well as a wide public are fascinated by three centuries of exceptionally prolific artistic creation that produced works of international fame such as Michelangelo's frescos in the Sistine Chapel. The cityscapes of the great centers of that time would be vastly different without their Renaissance architecture - cities like Florence, Rome, and Venice are veritable museums of an epoch whose art remains vital and influential even today. Impressive illustrations of works from every branch of the fine arts feature prominently in The Art of the Italian Renaissance, which not only explains various aspects of Renaissance art, but also invites readers to observe them closely with its fabulous pictures.