Stained glass of the middle ages in England & France . New College,Oxford, which, in other respects, belong far moreto the succeeding period. Yet in spite of this loss of naturalism in move-ment, in the actual drawing of forms, both ofthe figure and of drapery, there is an you will compare St. Luke from the clere-story of St. Ouen at Rouen in Plate Methuselah from Canterbury in Plate III.,you will see the change that has occurred. has far less character and force, he is farless alive, his pose and gesture mean nothing,or at most are mildly argumentative, and yetthe
Stained glass of the middle ages in England & France . New College,Oxford, which, in other respects, belong far moreto the succeeding period. Yet in spite of this loss of naturalism in move-ment, in the actual drawing of forms, both ofthe figure and of drapery, there is an you will compare St. Luke from the clere-story of St. Ouen at Rouen in Plate Methuselah from Canterbury in Plate III.,you will see the change that has occurred. has far less character and force, he is farless alive, his pose and gesture mean nothing,or at most are mildly argumentative, and yetthere is a certain sense in which he, and stillmore his drapery, is better drawn, or if not better,at all events in a more advanced manner. Thisis more noticeable if you compare St. Luke orthe little figures in Plate XXX. with the bigangel from Chartres in Plate X., which is notso well drawn as the Methuselah. The fact is that the twelfth and thirteenth PLATE XXV WINDOW WITH LIFE OF ST. GERVAIS,FROM SOUTH CHOIR AISLE, ST. OUEN, ROUEN Fourteenth Century. THE STYLE OF THE SECOND PERIOD 143 century convention in figure drawing had served The effortits turn well, but was now worn out. Deriving, ^^^^^^^ o grace of originally, as we have seen, out of Greek art its Byzantine form, it had formed a stock onwhich the artist of the Early Period had beenable to graft his own observation and love ofnature, but it had now ceased to satisfy and wastherefore abandoned. The progress of drawingin other arts, or at all events in sculpture, hadtaught men to demand something different. Theartist of the late thirteenth century, as the lastinfluence of Greek art died out of his work,had undoubtedly neglected grace of form in hisenthusiasm for vigorous and naturalistic move-ment ; and, as so often happens when one qualityin art is neglected, a reaction had come, in whichpeople demanded that quality above all , the chief effort of the draughts-man of the fourteenth century, if I
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, bookpublisherlondo, bookyear1913
