Beginnings of Medieval English art

1170 AD: Wall painting Winchester cathedral

For long years after the Norman occupation foreign artists were imported to adorn the stone buildings which were being thrown up across the country. The indigenous cultural traditions and established early English style along with the steady growth of native creativity had been discarded as unworthy by the Norman masters whose slavish copying of Parisian inspired Romanesque art forms revealed the shallowness of Norman cultural roots and exposed its pretentions. It is very telling that no new pictorial forms were introduced during this period as the native taste for linear complexity and ambiguity of form was suppressed.

Anglo-Saxon cathedrals and churches would have been a wonderment of bright painted art and wall coverings.

It took over 100 years for the aftershocks caused by the destruction of the old English culture to subside in terms of the pictorial and applied arts: for literature it took much longer. It was only with the re-emergence of the English language almost 300 years later that the indigenous culture regained its former expression and wholeness of structure.

As enthusiasm for all things French declined the English artist and craftsman was finally able to return to his native sources of inspiration in a country still dominated by a mediaeval clergy who although they were the most important patrons of the arts at this time could not prevent the English artisan from expressing himself in terms of fantasy and elaborate decoration.

One example of this is the Winchester Psalter, a truly original work, which re-forges the link between old English illuminated art and the new order.

The confidence of the design showing Hell’s mouth, its clear lines and perfect execution along with the glowing colours place this firmly in the mainstream of English linear art. Similarly brilliant colouring and flowing design appeared in church glass of the period.

1190 AD: Winchester Psalter - Hells mouth - Pure fantasy and a glorious linear design.

This illumination, by an unknown artist, shows a love of clear colour and bold design. Note the mirror images of the gaping toothed mouths into which the souls of the damned fall to their doom.

The Winchester Psalter.

1180 AD: Stained glass Canterbury Cathedral - Adam Delving.

The windows in Canterbury Cathedral evolved during the medieval period over several centuries into a collection which is considered to be one of the finest in Europe. The earliest shown above is one of the ‘Ancestors of Christ’ series of windows.

Canterbury Cathedral. Canterbury, England.

1240 AD: Under seat carving (misericord) showing man with pipes and tabor Exeter Cathedral, Devon, England.

The execution of St Alban.

1250 AD: Matthew Paris - Execution of St Alban

Matthew Paris is one of the earliest artists about whom we know something. He was a man who travelled, created sculpture, illuminations and wrote books. His reputation as a writer and historian grew and important people visited him, no doubt hoping that he would say good things about them in his records. Those who visited him included Henry III. However, Matthew disagreed with Henry's policy of appointing foreign advisers and he was often very critical of the king.

As well as being a talented English writer, Matthew was a gifted English artist, and in the margins of his books he illustrated the text with drawings and paintings. Although he has been criticised for relying too much on rumour and gossip and being prejudiced against foreigners and friars, Matthew Paris is considered to be one of the most important artist/historians of the medieval period. He died in 1259 AD.

1250 AD: The Evesham Psalter

The Evesham Psalter shows the beginnings of a more naturalistic treatment of human form and the natural world.

The Evesham Psalter shows more depth to human form.

Circa 1270-1300 AD: Medieval English Metalworking

Love of metalworking has always been second nature to the artisan in all areas in England. The graceful lines of the ring plate above form flower heads where nails give a raised centre to the design.

By the fourteenth century the rise of the merchant class was making itself felt and the new wealth these merchants owned was translated into houses and tapestries, fine books and beautiful objects. The church still provided the main source of patronage for the artist but increasingly the mood of the rich was becoming more secular.

Ring plate with stamped work, great hall entrance, Bisham Abbey, Berkshire. (handle renewed). Similar styles are copied in modern English art.

1340 AD: Luttrell Psalter - The earthly paradise

Realism interspersed with pure decoration and fantasy. The peasant sows corn whilst behind him a crow eats the grain from his sack. In front of the seed sower his dog scares off another bird, which lets a few grains fall from its beak. Intricately ornamented strap work transforms itself into leaf and acorn forms to produce geometric shapes thus fusing abstract with organic forms, and revealing the ambiguity of form, which formed part of a centuries old English art tradition.

The Luttrell Psalter

Ripon Cathedral North Yorkshire. Utility, grace and elegance of line in ironwork of this period. The Nordic roots exposed.

Late 14th Century strap work (with 19th century refurbishment)

1349 AD: The Black Death and its lasting effects.

And then suddenly the world was changed overnight by a dreadful visitation of biblical magnitude. The Black Death had arrived in England from the Continent bringing with it the destruction of half the population of the country and altering the balance, which had existed for centuries between landowner and peasant.

Suddenly the work of the labourer was keenly sought and his slavish bonds were broken. The numbers of workers to plough and sow, to reap and harvest were desperately low, so instead of being a bondsman forced to servitude on one manor for life, the agricultural labourer began to demand freedom of movement and the right to work for whom he chose and for the highest wage he might get. In Kent as in other counties and shires land, which had been cultivated for generations stood empty and desolate so in desperation a plea went out to the London poor. They were told by Kentish landowners that in return for their work on the farms families would be given an acre or two of land on which to grow their own crops and keep one or two animals, and that they might build houses for themselves. Many from the disease ridden slums took up the offer and made a good living in the countryside, some even becoming in the course of several generations yeoman farmers themselves.

These yeomen over time joined the merchant class and formed the beginnings of a middle class in England who wanted the trappings of wealth; good houses, fine paintings even books.

1349 AD The Black Death had altered the way men looked at their lives. In architecture the flamboyant French inspired gothic style was abruptly replaced in all new constructions by the English perpendicular style which matched the new mood of the country which was rapidly abandoning French and Latin pretensions and speaking the language of the people who now held greater sway in a land where for the first time it was realised that all parts of society were important for the well being of the realm. Poets were writing in English, pictorial art was showing everyday scenes drawn from earthly English life, not solely remote ecclesiastical imagery; however, King and Clergy were still the main sources of power throughout the land, and thus the main commissioners of English art.

1350 AD: The Black Death in English art

Riches cannot fight the Black Death! It would come to all in medieval England. Irrespective of rank or wealth.

1395 AD: English National Identity through art

English National Identity through art.

The Wilton Triptych shows St. Edmund The English Martyr, St Edward, St. John the Baptist and King Richard II being presented to the virgin. Note England’s National flag on the right – The Cross of St George. Those who refuse to show it – don’t know how old it is! This picture shows how far the English painter had come from the ethereal iconic Byzantine and Romanesque art of previous centuries. All the figures in the left panel are portraits of real people. On the right are the heavenly host whom nonetheless look human.

1350 – 1485 AD: The aftermath of the Black Death - The dawn of the new ‘humanism’ in English art.

The new human approach took it’s opportunity to remake the link with books, and one of the earliest portraits of an ordinary man-not a saint or King or member of the nobility, was of a poet and writer of prose; the father of English literature Geoffrey Chaucer. Chaucer was a man of the folk, his Canterbury tales tell us much more of what it was like to live through this time than any learned treatise, and he gave us characters like the wife of Bath and the Miller and a host of others showing the various strata of society from top to bottom.

1412 AD: Thomas Hoccleve - Return to the narrative in art.

Carving in the middle ages echoed this new found interest in humankind, most notably in ‘grotesques’, amusing characters drawn from life and intricately crafted in areas such as beneath misericords –ledges on the top edge of hinged seats for standing priests or monks who had to prop their ailing bodies due to age or infirmity.

Geoffrey Chaucer. This is a faithful likeness made by his humble admirer and follower.

15th-century: Painting on the walls of South Leigh church in Oxfordshire St Michael, with wings and sword raised, weighs a departed soul in the balance.

1450 AD: English Folk Woodcarving

Carving of a woman grooming her daughter’s hair. Exeter cathedral. This very personal expression by an unknown medieval craftsman is Folk art in essence.

English Folk Woodcarving

1485 – 1588 AD: English Art Re-birth

After the long and savage Wars of the Roses much of the old aristocracy lay dead having destroyed itself through its own mighty ambition and unrelenting aggression. A new social order was growing as due to the reformation monasteries were dissolved, which meant that artists could no longer look to the church for patronage instead having to turn to the new aristocracy and newly rich merchant gentry.

Rather than stained glass and ecclesiastic images of saints and angels the new taste was for family portraits and scenes taken from everyday as well as courtly life. This new age now dawning coincided with ideas sweeping the continent and referred to as ‘the renaissance’ or re-birth. This was due to a renewed interest in ancient Greek philosophy and classical forms.

1514 AD: English art becomes secular

Whilst royalty chose foreign artists to depict themselves and their families in regal splendour, the newly rich English gentry sought a new breed of indigenous artist and craftsman. Hampton Court was begun in this time and Cardinal Wolsey employed James Nedham and Richard Ridge to create the renaissance details.

This was a great age of building in a new era of prosperity and relative peace that had never before been seen in England and was in marked contrast with the hundred years of dynastic wars that had preceded it.

Up and down the country land owning gentlemen were having houses built in order to show off their new found wealth and status in a spate of Tudor Gothic and classical invention.

The German painter Hans Holbein whose portraits continued the English linear tradition had admirers and accomplished followers such as John Bettes who produced some outstanding portraits in the northern tradition. An interest in portraying character can be seen not just the outward trappings of titled sitters, but in ordinary personage of new wealth.

1549-1550 Thomas Wentworth 1st Baron Wentworth

1545 Man in a cap

Both Hans Holbein and John Bettes favoured the use of hidden symbol and pictorial allegory.

1558 – 1603 AD: The Elizabethan Golden Age

No age in English history conjures up such images of expansion, optimism, innovation, bravery and adventurousness as this.

For the first time a clutch of famous English faces such as writers Shakespeare and Marlowe, sea-going heroes such as Drake and Raleigh, dramatic,’ larger than life’ courtiers such as Lord Leicester, Sir Francis Walsingham, Lord Essex, Lord Dudley and the great Queen Elizabeth I herself seem as familiar to us as people from our own age, perhaps more so. All of them remain to us as images painted by native, mostly unknown artists.

In contrast to the large ‘Ditchley’ portrait of the ‘Virgin Queen’ and other numerous pictures painted of the queen at different ages by talented court painters, at the same time the art of the miniature was now fashionable.

Nicholas Hilliard, son of a goldsmith endowed his tiny masterpieces with a jewel like brilliance and clarity not seen since the golden age of King Alfred had produced gold illuminations alongside sacred texts.

In particular his paintings of a young Queen Elizabeth I and ‘Young man among roses’ epitomises the spirit of the age.

English Queen Elizabeth I - The Virgin Queen.

Below, a young man, clearly in love leans languidly against a tree next to a bush of pure white roses. If one painting crystallises the spirit of the time this is it. Ardour, longing, romance, valour, it is “the very age and body of the time” to quote the great English Bard himself - Shakespeare.

1585 AD: ‘Young Man Amongst Roses’ - Nicholas Hilliard

1590-95 AD: Isaac Oliver – Allegorical scene

Isaac Oliver worked in similar manner and like the great Hilliard, his exquisite portraits were fashionable and favoured by those wishing to court their lovers as well as to display their wealth and taste. In a period renowned for its remarkably talented men and women in every sphere of activity George Gower stands out as a celebrated court painter who in 1581 became ‘Serjeant Painter to the Queen’. His talent for portraiture was in the native tradition with emphasis on line, pattern and decorative detail that give it a delicacy and lightness so often lacking in the work of the many Flemish artists at court at this time.

Isaac Oliver – Allegorical scene

1581AD: George Gower – ‘Lady Kytson’