High Romanesque Sculpture in the Duchy of Aquitaine, C. 1090-1140

Download or read book High Romanesque Sculpture in the Duchy of Aquitaine, C. 1090-1140 written by Anat Tcherikover and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 1997 with total page 668 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Anat Tcherikover unveils a chronological order in the remarkably diverse world of High Romanesque sculpture in central-western France. She traces a regional school which formed against the background of the powerful feudal principality of Aquitaine, and was itself commensurably important andtherefore representative of the main artistic trends of the time. These involved a constant tension between two different sculptural modes. On the one hand, architectural decorations in the spirit of the eleventh century manifested a final flowering of great intricacy. On the other, monumentalfigure sculpture was being revived independently at a fast pace, leading directly to proto-Gothic. A combination of political prominence, economic prosperity, and a keen response to ecclesiastical reform made the school one of the most innovative of its time.