112 …and so, ‘Farewell’…

Giotto, The Scrovegni Chapel, c. 1305, Padua.

This is it, the very last ‘Scrovegni Saturday’. When I started out on this strand I had no idea what was coming, but I feel I understand Giotto’s decoration far better than I did before – and inevitably I also have far more questions about it than previously! I am enormously indebted to Ingrid Wassenaar who kicked the whole project off, simply because of her interest in the Virtues and Vices. Only gradually did I realise why. As I mentioned (Picture Of The Day 45), they were known to Proust, and Ingrid just happens to be an authority on Proust, whereas I know nothing. Nevertheless, it triggered this exploration of the entire fresco cycle, which I for one do not consider to be lost time.

The next thing is to learn something more about it. I confess that I have never read a book on the subject – I tend to glean, picking up scraps here and there, and learn most by looking. As with all of this blogging, a lot of what I have said about the chapel is my personal opinion, based on years of experience, and, with these frescoes, easy access online to the bible and the Golden Legend. But I am bound to have made some mistakes – indeed, I know I have: my brief foray into the British Library told me as much! So I wanted to share a couple more things with you, to give you my suggestions for further reading, and then to try and synthesize the whole thing (which I have been trying to do all the way through).

Three books, all of which seem to be rather good, were published in the space of a couple of years just over a decade ago. They would all be worth reading, I think. I’ll give you a link to Amazon, too, in case you want a closer look, although you might prefer to order them from your local book dealer. Come to think of it, you might prefer to go to your nearest library…

Laura Jacobus, Giotto and the Arena Chapel: Art, architecture and experience, Harvey Miller, 2008.

Of the three, this is the one I think I will start with when I next have the chance to get to the British Library (I’ll do that because I’ve just checked Amazon – sadly the book is out of print, but there is a copy selling for £250!!!). It is a thorough investigation of everything relating to the Chapel, from its history, its architecture and it setting through to Giotto’s decorations – which is the only aspect of the site that I have talked about. There is so much more to know about the building itself, and the patron. But also there is more to know about the lived experience of the chapel – of which, there is a little hint below. The illustrations in the body of the text are mainly black and white, and there is a section with the paintings in narrative order. I was a bit surprised to see that none of the books discuss the frescoes in this way, but that is surely because they are so interlinked that it could be more valuable to explore the themes and relationships between the separate images. However, I do think it helps to have an understanding of the flow of the narrative. One of the reasons I want to read this first is quite simple: I met Laura once when I was doing my PhD research, and she was both generous with her time, and spot on with her advice – so she’s clearly a good person! And, of course, she is one of the acknowledged authorities on Giotto and on Enrico Scrovegni.

Anne Derbes and Mark Sandona, The usurer’s heart: Giotto, Enrico Scrovegni, and the Arena Chapel in Padua, Pennsylvania State University Press, 2008.

This is a rather academic book, I suspect (my brief visit to the British Library only allowed enough time to flick through the three books, so I can’t vouch for every aspect of the text – although they are clearly all first rate). It deals very specifically with Scrovegni himself and the reasons behind his commission. In the process the authors explore the history of usury and the Church’s attitude towards it. Although it has the largest format of the three books, the illustrations are mainly black and white as before. There is a sequential arrangement of paintings at the end (although not all are included) and it has some wonderful fold-out ‘panoramic’ views, helping you to understand the layout of the decorations as a whole. The book’s title comes from one of the miracles of St Anthony of Padua, a miracle which in some ways seems to combine the reputation of Scrovegni’s father as a usurer (even though he lived after St Anthony) with the reputation of Padua as one of the few places where human anatomy was studied. Legend has it that an autopsy was carried out on a recently-dead miser, who was found to have no heart. St Anthony predicted that it would be found with whatever he loved the most, and inevitably it turned up in his treasure chest. Below is a photograph of Donatello’s relief illustrating the miracle, which was part of the elaborate bronze altarpiece he made for the Church of St Anthony – know universally as Il Santo, ‘The Saint’ – between 1447 and 1450. The miser is in the centre, his rib-cage cut open, while the treasure chest is on the far left, the very heart-shaped heart being lifted out at the end of a long, ribbed artery by a bearded man surrounded by what could be a group of bemused-looking students.

Donatello, The Miracle of the Miser’s Heart, 1447-50, Il Santo, Padua.

Andrew Ladis, Giotto’s O: narrative, figuration, and pictorial ingenuity in the Arena Chapel, Pennsylvania State University Press, 2009.

Andrew Ladis sadly died while this book was being edited, so it might be missing some of its polish. Nevertheless, as he starts from the premise that every single image in the chapel is placed in relationship to everything around it for very specific reasons, then we must be on the same wavelength. All of the illustrations here are in colour, which always adds to the joy of the world, given that all are of high quality. This would be my second choice – although both this and the previous volume are selling for around £69.00… Libraries have always been inviting, but this makes them more so (though if anyone was wondering what I wanted for Christmas…)

And I have two specific points – one I have never fully considered, and another I have always misunderstood. I really don’t know why. As it happens, they are at either end of the chapel, directly opposite one another.

When introducing Enrico Scrovegni himself (POTD 38) I said that he was presenting a model of the chapel to three angels. I was wrong. My excuse, and I’m sure it’s a feeble one, is that there is so much going on in the vast fresco of The Last Judgement that I have never had time to stop and look at every detail properly. The three people are clearly holy as they all have halos, but they have no wings. Now, not every painted angel has wings, but nevertheless, they are not angels. They appear to be wearing white, red and green, which are the colours related to the three Theological Virtues, Faith, Charity and Hope respectively – but that could be a coincidence, as all three are saints, and there is, in any case, some evidence that the colours have changed. Authors dispute the identity of these figures, but about the central one there is no doubt: it is the Virgin Mary. This may come as a surprise, as anyone versed in Italian religious painting will assume she wears blue – but this was not always the case. The connection with Charity is not a coincidence, as it happens: the chapel was dedicated to Santa Maria della Carità – St Mary of Charity, or St Mary of Love, or even, St Mary of Mercy. The hope was that she would be charitable – even merciful – towards Enrico Scrovegni’s father, and intercede on his behalf with her son. But who are the other two? There is some debate, and some would go so far as to suggest that the other two figures are different embodiments of the Virgin. I cannot agree with that. The one on the left does not have any form of hair dressing, hat, or even head covering, so must be male. The logical conclusion would be St John the Evangelist. Although I haven’t talked about them at all, aside from a brief mention, there are two side altars in the chapel. They are dedicated to St John the Evangelist and St Catherine of Alexandria. I have remarked before that a lot of Giotto’s inspiration came from the Gospel of St John and, if I am right, this would be why. The third person, wearing a crown, must be St Catherine (who was supposed to be a princess). Given that the chapel is dedicated to Mary, John and Catherine, it is surprising that there has been any debate about the identity of these figures – their presence here effectively maps out the dedication of the chapel. I’m only surprised that I hadn’t stopped to think about it more. I was probably too caught up with all the torments of hell – and every other detail in the enormous fresco – to pay it enough heed. Nevertheless, consider my wrist slapped!

At the other end, above the Chancel Arch, there is an image of God the Father painted on a wooden panel. I don’t know how I got the idea that this was a door (POTD 80). There comes a point, when one has been talking about something for over twenty years (and my first visit to the chapel with a group of students was in 1999), when you realise that you don’t know where your information came from. There were, as I mentioned, regular staged performances of a dramatized version of The Annunciation associated with the chapel. Indeed, on the feast day itself, 25 March, there was more than one performance which took place in different locations in Padua. But this wooden panel has no connection to them. It replaces a stained glass window which is presumed to have depicted God the Father. The light which entered here would have been partly practical, but mainly symbolic, representing Jesus, the Light of the World, coming into the world. I’m just sorry I didn’t know this until now, and look forward to reading more about it.

The dedication of the chapel to St Mary of Charity – or Love, or even Mercy – is embodied in the detail we saw above from the enormous Last Judgement which takes up the whole of the ecclesiastical West wall of the chapel. Christ is enthroned beneath another window – the light of truth, perhaps, shining down on his judgement – with the blessed gathered under his right hand (on our left) and the damned, with all the torments of hell, under his left (on our right).

Directly opposite this is another vision of heaven, with God the Father – initially in a window, so actually made of light, but now on a wooden panel – surrounded by some of the angelic host. Directly opposite hell we see Judas receiving the thirty pieces of silver, his fee for betraying Jesus, whereas opposite the blessed, who are approaching heaven, we see the Annunciate Virgin, wearing the same red as in the dedication, and below her, The Visitation, with Mary visiting her cousin Elizabeth. This story includes the first recognition of Jesus, even though unborn, as Saviour. The two side altars, dedicated to Sts John the Evangelist and Catherine of Alexandria, are clearly visible at the bottom right and left of this photograph.

Stretching from hell to Judas, along the bottom of the ‘North’ wall, are the seven Vices. On the other side, we see the seven Virtues. As we approach the High Altar, we should remember that Christ sits in Judgement behind us – and, like him, the Virtues are on our right hand, the Vices on our left – we have the capacity to choose right from wrong, and to be more like Mary than Judas. The story of Salvation is told within this overlying framework.

The Virtues are at the bottom – the High Altar, and the Visitation, are to the left, and the Last Judgement, with the blessed entering heaven, to the right

On the ‘South’ wall, spread around the windows, we see the Story of Joachim and Anna at the top, starting with Joachim’s rejection from the temple and ending with him being welcomed at the Golden Gate by his loving wife. Below this, we see the childhood of Jesus, from his Nativity, to the Massacre of the Innocents – he is born to save us, and they die to save him. At the bottom, closest to us as it is most important, we move from the Last Supper to The Mocking of Christ – Jesus moves from authority to humility. He institutes the Eucharist, the communion with God which could ultimately save us, near the altar, only to be brought gradually lower as the frescoes approach the scene of the Last Judgement. With no little irony, the injustice of his betrayal takes place above the depiction of the personification of Justice. And wow! I’ve just noticed something new, while proofreading the blog just before clicking ‘publish’! Directly above Justice we see Jesus, betrayed by Judas. To the left of Justice is Temperance, and again, Jesus is directly above, washing Peter’s feet – but only his feet. To the right is Faith, directly underneath Jesus in Christ before the Caiaphas and Charity is below him in The Mocking of Christ. These scenes do not line up vertically because of the space taken up by the windows, but Giotto still contrives to associate the evenly spaced Virtues with Jesus himself, by designing the composition of the narratives so that Jesus is directly above them: Genius. I keep being astonished by this remarkable man, and the amount of planning that must have preceded the execution of these frescoes.

Here the Vices are at the bottom, with the torments of hell to the left, and Judas receiving the 30 pieces of silver on the chancel arch to the right

On the ‘North’ wall, at the top, we see the birth and betrothal of the Virgin, ending with a procession – not unlike the processions that led to the chapel on the Feast of the Annunciation – which leads to the chancel arch, and to The Annunciation itself. In the lower two tiers, slightly separated from the top one, the narrative scenes are framed by the same decorative strips as above, but they also contain pictorial typological references to the Old Testament, which both illuminate the New Testament story, and make the whole decoration resonate with even greater depth.  The mission of Christ is in the centre, starting with his debate with the doctors in the temple, to which he returns on the far right to expel the money lenders. At the bottom, leading us away from the picture of hell – and away from hell itself – Christ takes his cross and is crucified. His victory over death is paralleled by the repentance of Mary Magdalene, and although he has been brought as low as is possible, he now rises, and then ascends to heaven. The Church is left to the apostles, now empowered by the Holy Spirit. They could, if it were possible, step out of the painting and preside over Mass at the altar which is just to the right of this image.

And so, ‘Farewell’ to the Scrovegni Chapel. Virtually, at least – all that remains is to go and see it in person. Sadly, when you book your ticket you will only get 15 or 20 minutes inside, but if you go in prepared I hope you can breathe it all in at once, resonating as it does with the whole history of salvation!

That’s not the end of the blog, though. I shall carry on, I hope once a week, maybe more if I can, talking about anything that grabs my fancy – or anything you might suggest. It may also evolve into something of a newsletter to let you know what I am up to, and to tell you about any events, online or in person, that you can attend. I will try and update the diary page regularly (do nag me if I don’t!), but for now there still isn’t much. However, if you happen to be free the week after next there are still a couple of places available on our spontaneous escape, A Flash Trip to Venice, organised by Art History Abroad from 21-24 September!

So, until the next time, Addio! But before I go, one last thing – a phenomenon, and one that I knew nothing about until the other week. This is a picture I took from Laura Jacobus’s book. The original photographs were taken by Hans-Michael Thomas, and show the path taken by a shaft of sunlight falling across the fresco of The Last Judgement one 25 March – the Feast of the Annunciation, the day on which the chapel was dedicated. This, in itself, is a miracle. And one that, like everything else, Giotto must have planned. As I said above: Genius.

Mary, revisited…

Giotto, Stories from the Life of the Virgin, c. 1305, Scrovegni Chapel, Padua.

Yesterday was the Feast of the Birth of the Virgin, and I had meant to post then – but sadly I seem to be getting busy again. However, I thought, ‘Why not have a look back to the end of May, when I looked at Giotto’s Birth of the Virgin?’ – so here it is again. As her birth falls exactly nine months after the Feast of the Immaculate Conception (for reasons which should be evident), you might want to look at those entries too, as they are as essential to the Birth of the Virgin as the Annunciation is to Christmas. I looked at paintings by Crivelli and Velázquez – and the blogs on those paintings should help to explain why yesterday was such an important date in the Catholic Calendar. As for my calendar – well, as I’ve said, it is getting increasingly full, and if you check on my website, on the diary page, you will see that I am starting to update it more regularly. To start off with there are a couple of talks at the National Gallery, and a trip to Venice. My friends at Art History Abroad have reasoned that it’s very hard to plan anything at the moment – so we should just be spontaneous. So I’m taking a group to Venice for the week after next! Yes! We leave Monday week for four days. If you’d like to come on this ‘Flash Trip to Venice’ it would probably be as well to book as soon as possible (click on the blue text!), as there are only a few places left… Meanwhile, back in May, this is what I was thinking about:

Welcome back to the Scrovegni Chapel – we’re well into the story. Joachim has been rejected from the temple, and as William Caxton put it back in 1483, ‘And then Joachim, all confused for this thing, durst not go home for shame’ (POTD 66). Meanwhile, Anna is waiting at home, and an angel has announced the birth of a daughter. Joachim (not Zacharias – yes, I did stick in the wrong name last week…) gives a sacrifice to God, which is accepted, and an angel tells him to go and meet his wife at the Golden Gate. Will he go? Of course he will!

Joachim and Anna meet outside the Golden Gate to the City of Jerusalem and embrace. Giotto gives us no doubt of the fact that they are together, and united, as he doesn’t leave a single gap between the two forms. With the haloes on top of their heads, the self-contained arching form resembles nothing so much as the Golden Gate itself – which was probably Giotto’s intention. One of the epithets applied to Mary was Porta Coeli – the ‘Gate of Heaven’ – as the birth of Christ meant that we could be admitted into the presence of God. Joachim and Anna are part of that journey – the gate to the gate, if you like. 

Neither of them has come unaccompanied. One of the shepherds has made what I assume is a rare visit to the big city, probably just to make sure that Joachim actually gets there. I love the way he is slightly sheepish, just emerging into the scene from behind the picture frame: people think this type of ‘photographic’ cut-off originated with the Renaissance in the 15th Century, but as with so many other things, they learnt it from Giotto. Anna is chaperoned by her maid, who we last saw dutifully spinning on the porch. She is carrying an expensive fur-lined coat, presumably in case Joachim is chilly. As it is, he is dressed remarkably like Jesus, with a red cloak over a blue robe. There must be a reason for this – his role in our salvation is the most likely thing I can think of at the moment, but if I come up with a better idea, I’ll let you know!

And the kiss! Ah – the kiss! Always one of the true joys of this chapel, given the way he firmly clasps her shoulder, and she tenderly cradles his head between her hands, running her fingers through his beard. They go almost cross-eyed, looking at each other in such close proximity, and there is that sense of a nose-bump, narrowly avoided, as their lips touch. They just touch, with no sense of parting, and certainly no tongues – the ultimate chaste kiss. It was at this moment, some people believed, that the Virgin Mary was conceived. But very few people ever thought this – hers was not a virgin birth. However, it does represent the Immaculate Conception (POTD 71 &72), given the chastity of Anna and Joachim’s love. And let’s face it, you’re not going to show the conception in any other way, this is a chapel, for heaven’s sake, not the Palazzo Te (POTD 44 & 53). Look at the delicate transparency of Anna’s veil – and the careful attention paid to every single grey hair of Joachim’s head. It’s a miracle. It’s also the point in the story when things start to get interesting in terms of the arrangement of the paintings. 

First of all, we have a cast of characters – quite apart from Joachim and Anna, we have the shepherd, and the maid, who reappear from earlier paintings.

Also, we have a complete story – ‘Chapter 1’, if you like – starting with Joachim’s rejection from the temple, and ending here with his acceptance at the Golden Gate. Both buildings are angled inwards, each with its own entrance. Joachim’s role as protagonist is done now: he has come home, and his part of the story is over. At this point, we have to cross the chapel, and start at the top of the left-hand wall.

‘Chapter 2’ starts with the Birth of the Virgin. Mary has been born, and is washed and swaddled by two midwives, who are sitting on the ground: one of them is the trusty maid, showing her true value to the household, as she can perform more than one role. Anna sits up in bed, covered by a sheet and a rather grand bedspread. No, they didn’t have twins, this is a continuous narrative, with different stages of the story shown together. The maid was preparing a finer fabric to wrap around the swaddling clothes, and duly prettified and safely contained, Mary is presented to her mother. Friends have come round to visit the newborn miracle, and yet another turns up with a gift at the door. And if you think you recognise the setting, you would be right.

It is the same house that we saw on the opposite wall. I wouldn’t mind betting that it was the maid who took out the chest and bench to allow more guests to visit. Like all good theatre designers, Giotto has allowed the furniture to be flexible. It is the same: the same bedspread, the same curtain hanging from the same frame, but slightly shifted to enhance the narrative. The lighting is different, too: it’s the same building, but at a different time of day. In fact, it is night time: it looks dark through the window. I know the sky is still blue, but that is ‘heavenly background’ as much as anything else. It also needs to fit in with the other frescoes, and wouldn’t look that good if it were all black. Notice that, whereas Anna was kneeling in prayer, looking to the right (the direction of the narrative), it is now Mary who is handed over to the right. This is her story.

According the Golden Legend, when Mary was three, Anna and Joachim took her to the temple. This is from Caxton’s translation:

…they brought her to the temple with offerings. And there was about the temple, fifteen steps to ascend up to the temple, because the temple was high set. And no body might go to the altar of sacrifices that was without, but by the steps.  And then our Lady was set on the lowest step, and mounted up without any help as she had been of perfect age, and when they had performed their offering, they left their daughter in the temple with the other virgins, and they returned into their place. 

Two things are actually different here – one is that there are only 10 steps, rather than 15, and the other is that Mary has not set off on her own. Like any small child on their first day at school Anna has had to encourage her all the way to the top. Mind you, faced with that priest I don’t suppose most 3-year-olds would have been that keen. There’s no particular reason why Giotto should diverge from the text – but then, there was no particular reason why he should stick to every detail.

The Golden Legend doesn’t specify what the ‘offerings’ were, but they were clearly heavy. Joachim doesn’t carry them himself – they have a servant for that – and even though they only fill one basket, the servant is bent low by the weight. Giotto attempts a particularly daring foreshortening, quite hard to read from a distance, and one of the most unusual views of the human figure I know before the 16th Century.

It is the same temple as we saw in the very first painting – and yet we are on the other side. You see the same ciborium or ‘canopy’ over the altar, and the same raised pulpit, high enough over the screen for the entire congregation to see. These are features of medieval churches, of course, rather than having anything to do with Solomon’s temple, or, for that matter, a synagogue. One of my friends said it reminded him of a piece of theatrical scenery on wheels, and he’s absolutely right – Giotto has simply turned it round. I say ‘simply’ – this is a rather complicated thing to do, and, if we’re honest, it is another one of those theatrical tricks where it looks like the same building, but in reality it is slightly modified.

Mary lives with the other virgins (small ‘v’) in the temple until she is 14, when all of the others find suitable spouses. This is where I started back on the very first Scrovegni Saturday, POTD 31. If you re-read that, you will get the long story – but here it is, short. All the eligible bachelors were asked to come to the temple with rods, and place them on the altar. Nothing happened, so they put out a second call, and it turned out that an old guy called Joseph hadn’t come forward. When he did, his rod flowered, and a dove landed on it – so he got to marry Mary. The rest were furious. At this stage, they are only being betrothed – i.e. engaged – the wedding was to follow some time later. Now you might want to argue that this is not the same temple we saw before, but the reason for this comes from Caxton’s text. He talks of  ‘the altar of sacrifices that was without’ – which is the one under the ciborium, and the one which Joachim had attempted to go to before. For this part of the story we are clearly at an altar that is ‘within’.

After the betrothal, Mary was taken in procession to the house of her parents, followed by the other virgins, and led by a viol player, and a couple of elders. She is welcomed home by two ceremonial trumpeters. I’m afraid I don’t know why this particular part of the fresco is in such a bad condition – it is due to humidity, but I don’t know why that should have been so bad here. It might have something to do with the part of the Scrovegni Palace which was, until the 19th Century, behind this wall, or whatever happened to this bit of the wall when the Palace was destroyed. The two trumpets were clearly painted a secco – after the plaster had dried – meaning that the paint was not bound to the wall, and has completely gone. Alternately, they could have been gilded, although why the gold should go here, and not on the haloes, I don’t know. A bay window from the house makes it onto this wall: we’ll see more of that when we come back next week.

p.s. As suggested yesterday, I will be giving two online lectures this week:

• if you want to tune in to Artemisia on Monday morning at 11am, please email trish@summerleazegallery.co.uk

• if you would like to sign up for Seeing is Believing: van Eyck and the Art of Illusion at 6pm this Wednesday, 3 June, please go to the Art History Abroad website by clicking on the words Art History Abroad! Mix yourself a cocktail before you sign on – I will!

I’ll start updating the ‘diary’ on the website soon…

111 – Full circle

Giotto, Pentecost, c. 1305, Scrovegni Chapel, Padua.

One last image for Scrovegni Saturday before a final summing up next week: Pentecost, in which God hands over responsibility to man, and Giotto remains entirely human, and entirely poetic. I have covered the story before – twice, in fact: on the day itself, with Plautilla Nelli’s little known version in Perugia (Picture of the Day 74), and the following day, with El Greco’s visionary telling of the story now in the Prado (POTD 75) – so do re-read them if you want more background to the story itself.

Giotto gives us a calm and straightforward rendition which, unlike either of the paintings we have seen before, does not appear to be a drama performed for our eyes. On the contrary, there is evidence that we are entirely incidental. But before we look at the painting, let me remind you what the bible says on the subject, in Acts 2:1-4:

And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. 2 And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. 3 And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. 4 And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.

The text doesn’t say how many of them ‘they’ were, but Giotto simplifies to twelve. The apostles sit in an enclosed room, one of the very few identifiably ‘gothic’ buildings that Giotto depicts in the Scrovegni Chapel. It is at a slight angle, and oddly, has no visible door. It’s not at all clear how they managed to get in there, short of clambering through the arcade and over the benches, on which they now sit. Their bottoms spread across the hard wood as they do in the Last Supper, and their feet are visible in the shadows under the seat. In another echo of the Last Supper, those with their backs to us appear to sit with their halos in front of their faces. We don’t actually see the Holy Spirit, but the tongues of fire which reach towards the apostles suggest that the dove must be hovering some way above the roof. This is the point in the biblical narrative when the people gathered outside the room could understand the apostles as if they were speaking in their own language, although Giotto does not include any of these witnesses – but then neither did Nelli or El Greco. However, he doesn’t include Mary either – unlike most other depictions of the story. More on that below.

Matthias was appointed to replace Judas at the very end of Chapter 1 of the Acts of the Apostles, so he should be present here. If we compare this image to others in the cycle, the only ‘type’ who hasn’t been seen before is the person on the far right, a young man with a short – or at least thin – dark beard. This must be Matthias, at the far end of the table from Peter. He is wearing yellow, as Judas used to, almost as if he has taken over the same position on the ‘team’. Six apostles sit along the back of the room, and four along the front. John the Evangelist sits next to Peter, a little further back, and one of the columns of the arcade cuts across his face. This is the evidence I mentioned that suggests that we are incidental – Giotto is not pretending that the apostles have arranged themselves so that we can see them clearly. Despite the column, though, we can still identify him: young, beardless, and wearing the same blue and pink he has elsewhere.  Further along, though, another of the apostles is completely hidden by the architecture, a nod to naturalism which we would see as almost photographic. Perhaps it is even a tacit acknowledgement by Giotto that we would probably not be able to work out who this was anyway. The others are equally difficult to identify, as far as I am concerned, with the exception of St Andrew, just to the right of centre with his back to us, sporting the long, curly grey hair, and green toga over a red robe that we have seen before (e.g. 105). Next to St Andrew, chatting away to the newcomer Matthias, is St Bartholomew in his flashy patterned fabric.

I said above that this image is poetic, and yet initially it might seem rather mundane: there is apparently nothing remarkable about it. The first thing to suggest otherwise is the overtly Gothic architecture. Despite their ‘Roman’ clothing, the apostles are seated in what was for Giotto a contemporary building – and this is entirely apt. This is the point in the biblical narrative at which the apostles can be understood by all the nations of the world, thus enabling them to head out and evangelise. In other words, this is the point at which they take over from Jesus, and become his vicars – his representatives on earth: the priesthood is born. There are no women present – Mary would have been out of place in this particular version – and the reason why becomes clearer if we remind ourselves where we are in the chapel.

We are at the bottom right of this image, at the end of the story, and close to the high altar. From here, you can almost imagine the apostles stepping out of the fresco to officiate over the mass. Their role, Giotto says, is the same as that of the contemporary priest, who is effectively their successor, and of course, when this was painted, the idea of a female priest was unthinkable (as for some it still is today) – hence Mary’s absence. And, if they are like the contemporary priest, it makes sense that they would be in a gothic building.

It is not irrelevant that the scene directly above Pentecost is The Expulsion of the Money-changers from the Temple (see 102), in which Jesus effectively cleanses his Father’s house. The temple itself is depicted with round-topped arches. This comparison of architectural styles is quite common in Northern European paintings of the Nativity, and represents an idea of progress. The round arches, like those used in classical Roman and subsequent Romanesque architecture, represent the old order – as embodied here by Solomon’s temple. On the other hand, pointed Gothic arches were seen as ‘modern’, and so stand for the new order – the Church. Above these two paintings, Mary processes towards her parents’ house, and, in terms of the Scrovegni Chapel, towards the Annunciation, effectively a mystical marriage between herself and God. When she becomes pregnant, she is effectively, like Temple and Church, the house of God. In much medieval theology there was a direct equivalence between Mary and Ecclesia, the personification of the Church. Thus in the column of three images close to the altar we have different representations of the church, the temple and the church again, one on top of another.

In this view of the chancel arch Pentecost can be seen, at an angle, at the far end of the wall on the left: its proximity to the High Altar is, I hope, clear. Almost directly opposite, just this side of the window at the far end of the wall on the right, is The Last Supper, the painting to which it is most obviously related in terms of composition and setting. We have come full circle. On the right Jesus presides over the Last Supper, as he institutes the Eucharist. His passion, death and resurrection lead us away from the altar and back again, until with Pentecost the apostles are once more next to the altar, and are ready to continue Christ’s mission on earth.

So much is similar between these two images. Peter and John still occupy places at the ‘head’ of the table – although in the Pentecost they are facing towards the high altar in the chapel. Indeed, Peter is either looking at us, or at the altar itself, which lies on the diagonal in which he is looking. Andrew and Bartholomew are sitting next to each other again, although, without Jesus, the latter has turned to talk to Matthias. The gothic arcade creates more of an enclosed space, perhaps, but we still have access to the scene, in the same way that we would if looking through the rood screen in an Anglican church (although I’m afraid this is not entirely relevant to Giotto’s Italian experience). As previously mentioned, the apostles have the same weight in both, with their bodies pressing down on the bench and their shadowy legs visible below. And while those with their backs to us still have halos apparently in their faces, those halos are notable different. In The Last Supper they were silver, although this has tarnished to black. By the time we get to Pentecost they have been ‘promoted’, and all rejoice in the same gold halos previously only given to Jesus. They are now his representatives on earth, and should be seen as such. It is a minor difference, perhaps, but poetic genius nonetheless.

110 – The Ascension

Giotto, The Ascension of Christ, c. 1305, Scrovegni Chapel, Padua.

Welcome back to Scrovegni Saturday – and I mean the Saturday bit specifically! Having said that, I think there are only two more to go. One next week (or the week after, to be honest), to look at the final image, and a ‘coda’ to sum things up. On Tuesday I went to a library for the first time since we went into lockdown – the British Library, no less – and I can recommend the experience. They have put all sorts of systems in place which meant that I felt totally secure – a one-way route, allocated desks, allotted times… Unfortunately, given the way things fell out, I could only stay for an hour. I had ordered three books on the Scrovegni Chapel (what else?!), and oh, how useful they would have been for this endeavour! I only had time to skim through them, to look at the way they are organised, and illustrated, but I will give you a brief summary in a couple of weeks should you be interested in ‘further reading’. And maybe by then I will have had the chance to go back and read them properly!

Today, though, I want to think about The Ascension of Christ, a subject which I discussed on the feast day itself, which this year fell on 21 May. The picture was by Pietro Perugino, painting at his poised and elegant best. Do look it up (Picture Of The Day 64) to remind yourself about the narrative and its source in the bible.

Giotto has painted Jesus at the very top of the image – so far up, in fact, that his fingers are hidden behind the inner green frame of the nearly-square field. This is a standard ploy to convey the sense of movement – indeed, in many medieval versions of the Ascension all that remain to be seen are his feet. The upward motion is conveyed in other ways too – the fact that all the figures kneeling on the ground are looking up, for one thing. The two angels occupying the central space are looking down to this ‘audience’, and point upwards, not only indicating Jesus’s direction of travel, but also directing the kneeling figures – and us – to look up towards him. I’m fairly sure Perugino would have known this image: he certainly uses the same technique, with angels pointing the way. This wouldn’t be his only quotation from the Scrovegni Chapel.

On either side of Jesus are more figures, whose gestures of prayer and praise add to the swooping, upward movement. All of the figures have haloes, and those in the lower row also have wings – they are angels. However, those in the upper row are not – no wings – so they must be souls of the formerly ‘mortal’ already in heaven. The only ones I would want to identify (this is where those books might have come in useful!) are the two closest to Jesus. My guess would be (and that’s all it is) that these are John the Baptist (on our left) and Adam. After all, Jesus would have seen them – and freed them from their bonds – during the Harrowing of Hell, a scene which is notably absent from the Scrovegni Chapel (but see POTD 24 and POTD 25).

Down below we see the apostles and Mary. Unlike Perugino, who seemed to include a couple of excess apostles, Giotto sticks to what I would think is the logical number – eleven. Judas is dead, having hung himself with guilt (he can be seen hanging among the damned in hell in the Last Judgement as it happens), and Matthias has not yet been appointed to take his place. Mary is slightly separated from the other figures, and more central: both of these features help to emphasize her status. She is also, if Jesus were to face forward, at her son’s right hand, always the position of honour. Immediately behind her (to our left) is Peter, in his mustard yellow cloak, his left hand raised to shield his eyes as he follows Jesus’s progression heavenwards. Next to him is John the Evangelist, and behind him, in the foreground, St Andrew, who has been a prominent figure throughout the frescoes of the lower two tiers. The only other apostle I would identify with any security is St Bartholomew, who, for reasons I have never fathomed, often has the most elaborately patterned clothing. Now that I’ve said that you will see him straight away!

Not only is Jesus heading up towards heaven, but he is moving from left to right – the direction of the narrative in almost all of the images in this cycle. As a result, he looks not a little like Hope, one of the three theological virtues we saw in POTD 45. As so often, this echo is deliberate, and profound. The virtue of Hope is an ambivalent one. With true Faith, you might assume that hope was not necessary – but ‘hoping for’ in this context would effectively mean ‘waiting in full expectation of’. I’ve cropped the fresco here, but Hope is reaching up towards a crown being held by an angel in the top right of the field: it is the crown awarded to the blessed on arrival in heaven. And, positioned as it is on the South wall, the figure reaches towards the image of heaven on the West wall. Jesus, likewise, is heading towards heaven – not just in terms of the narrative, but physically, in the chapel. There are two images of heaven, one at either end. Above the chancel arch God the Father sits enthroned in a section of the painting which is on a wooden support (POTD 80 – but more about that in a couple of weeks).

If you can see The Ascension towards the bottom right of this image, you will see that Jesus’s direction of travel will take him towards the top of the chancel arch, which would be directly to our right when looking at this wall. Jesus is about to enter heaven, and Hope lives in expectation of the same.

This particular image also reminds us that, on the North wall, there are decorative panels between the vertically arranged pictures, and in the lower two tiers (dealing with the life of Christ), these contain vignettes relating to a typological interpretation of the bible – I’ve discussed some of these already in POTD 100. They always refer to the picture which follows, the one which is just to the right of them. They don’t seem to be discussed very often, probably because they are so small, but they are significant. I can’t even find an image of the one to the left of the Crucifixion, but it shows Moses with the brazen serpent. While the Israelites were on their long journey in search of the promised land, they were attacked by a plague of serpents, which threatened to kill them all. God advised Moses to erect a sculpture of a serpent made of bronze (hence ‘brazen’), promising that anyone who saw it would be cured. Given that the serpents were threatening death, from which you could only be saved by looking at something raised up above ground level, it seemed fairly obvious to early Christian theologians that this was in some way related to the Crucifixion, when Christ was raised up on the cross. After all, anyone who looked on him would be saved from serpent-related sin. The brazen serpent was therefore identified as a ‘type’ of Christ at the Crucifixion. This is ‘type’, as in ‘typeface’ – the shape or form that would ‘print’ the proper image.

In this image we can see the vignettes which precede The Lamentation over the Dead Christ, The Resurrection, and, even though the scene itself isn’t included, The Ascension. However, they are rather small – so here they are on their own:

In between The Crucifixion and The Lamentation we can see an enormous fish swallowing a person. This is Jonah, who, according to the eponymous book, was swallowed by a ‘great fish’. It was not a whale. That was Pinocchio. However, regardless of species, genus or even class, Jonah was thrown overboard and was swallowed, ‘And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights’ (Jonah 1:17), after which he delivered God’s message to the people of Nineveh and they were saved. According to the Apostles’ Creed, as translated in the Book of Common Prayer (1662), Jesus,

Was crucified, dead, and buried:
He descended into hell;
The third day he rose again from the dead;
He ascended into heaven…

The similarity between Jonah’s ‘three days and three nights’ and Jesus rising on ‘The third day’ is striking. Having been eaten by a fish, Jonah should surely have died, but he was regurgitated as if resurrected. So Jonah’s experience was a type for the death and resurrection of Christ. Here we see just the death – disappearing into the fish – preceding the image in which we see Jesus dead. So what is represented before the resurrection? Well, it’s a lion (it has a mane), which appears to be roaring at three cubs. Pliny the Elder, in his Natural History, said that lion cubs were born unformed, and that their mothers had to lick them into shape. However, the medieval mind had a different point of view, which might have evolved from Pliny, or, from the same animal behaviour (cleaning the newly born cubs, whose eyes are closed) which Pliny had misinterpreted. It was widely believed that lion cubs were born dead, and that after three days their father breathed life into them – which is what he is doing here. One of the cubs is apparently still ‘dead’, while another looks more alert. The third, on the right, is actually looking quite perky. It’s a bit like an animation. The connection to the resurrection of Christ, on the third day, through the agency of God the Father, is clear, telling us that it is not just elements of the Hebrew scriptures that can be ‘types’ but the whole of God’s creation. In the third example, which precedes the Ascension, there is another, more traditional type. In 2 Kings 2:11, Elijah had been preparing Elisha for his departure, when the following happened:

11 And it came to pass, as they still went on, and talked, that, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven.

Elijah was only the second person to get to heaven without dying (the first being Enoch – although the bible is not entirely clear whether he was taken by God dead or alive), but Elijah and the Chariot of Fire are a fairly obvious type for the ascension of Christ, and Giotto makes the angle of departure similar for both. Elisha’s face can just be seen, as can his hand reaching up for Elijah’s mantle, ‘which fell from him’.

These details may be small, but they are significant, and add so much depth to the interpretation of the chapel – I could so easily finish here. But in the same way that I ended with what I called ‘the story of Mary Magdalene’ last week, this week I’d like to finish with a ‘story of Jesus’. It’s just a small part of the narrative, obviously – two whole tiers of the decoration are concerned with the life, death and afterlife of Jesus, after all – but like last week’s ‘triptych’, this one episode is beautifully and poetically represented using body language and composition alone. Even without the other people present in each image, I think the narrative would be clear.

In The Lamentation Jesus is dead. He lies at the bottom of the image, on the far left. In The Resurrection he is standing, his feet now on the ground, his head higher than that of the kneeling Mary Magdalene, and some way to the right of her. As Jesus said, ‘I am not yet ascended to my Father’ (John 20:17) – but his elbow is hidden by the frame, he is on his way out. In The Ascension, mother Mary kneels as her namesake did before, and again Jesus is higher and to the right – although this time, at a far steeper angle. Jesus has left the ground, and his fingers are behind the frame. Like the lion cubs we have something like an animation, an animation of resurrection and ascension.

I love the fact that these two elements of the narrative overlap. When seen on the wall of the chapel, as in the illustration above, a line drawn between Mary Magdalene’s face and Jesus’s hand in the Resurrection continues to the face of Christ in the Ascension: Mary’s repentance means that she is looking towards heaven. There is an insistent upward movement along most of this wall, from the slope of the hill in the Lamentation and Mary’s gaze in the Resurrection to the direction of travel in both the Elijah vignette and the Ascension. And, while we’re there, have another look at the position of the Ascension on the wall: Jesus’s entry into heaven is immediately underneath his entry into Jerusalem. He could so easily leave this picture and enter through the same gate.

There is one more image to go – but I’m afraid it will have to wait for a while. Next week – and I really can’t quite believe this – I will be in Italy. I’ll let you know how it goes – and get back to you as soon as I can!

109 – Death and Resurrection

Giotto, The Lamentation over the Dead Christ and The Resurrection, c. 1305, Scrovegni Chapel, Padua.

I know – the whole idea of ‘Scrovegni Saturday’ was blown apart weeks back when I first failed to hit the deadline, but never before have I been early. So welcome to the first, and presumably only, ‘Scrovegni Friday’. I’m off to Norfolk later, and suspect I might not have the necessary bandwidth to post this tomorrow! Two more images today, and two more wonders, inevitably. But, to understand how and why they go together, here they are with the preceding image, The Crucifixion.

The death and resurrection of Christ are inevitably tied together – in the Christian message one is not possible without the other. However, while the Crucifixion and the Resurrection are both part of the biblical narrative, The Lamentation over the Dead Christ is not. It is part of church tradition, and, as such, it is as much a part of the pictorial tradition as any of the other scenes which are represented in the chapel. Giotto includes it to give us a chance to stop and meditate on the implications of Jesus’s death. The Crucifixion is presented as the Ultimate Sacrifice, with Christ lifted high above the gathered witnesses, but in The Lamentation he has been brought low. The angels continue their own lamentations, flying through the sky in their almost inexpressible grief, and below them Jesus is surrounded by the mourning figures of family and friends. The Crucifixion appears almost like an exclamation mark, something which exists on its own, symmetrical, with Jesus fully centred, whereas in The Lamentation over the Dead Christ he is at the bottom left of the image, the left always marking the beginning of a journey. When seen together, we can see that the landscape, as often before, is a part of the narrative. A hill leads our eyes upwards from Christ’s head, at the bottom left of the Lamentation, towards the right of the image. In The Resurrection it reaches its summit, and then leads downwards, taking us towards the Risen Christ on the right hand side. It is almost as if the hill expresses the unseen exertion that Jesus went through when he ‘descended into hell’, the very exertion that Donatello depicts so powerfully in the relief we saw back on Easter Sunday (Picture Of The Day 25).

This hill is such a profound metaphor, and Jesus, as we have said, is at the very bottom. He is surrounded by women – Holy Women, presumably, although only four of them have halos. Of these, two can be identified with ease: Mary, his mother, cradling him in her arms, wearing her traditional blue, and Mary Magdalene, at his feet as she was in the Crucifixion, with her long red hair, and her green-lined red cloak. Oddly, neither of the other two haloed women is wearing the yellow worn by the person I assumed last week was Mary’s sister, Mary Cleophas – although there is a woman wearing precisely that colour who is supporting Jesus’s head. My suggestion would be that this is the same woman – Mary Cleophas, if I was right last week – and that Giotto chose not to include her halo here as it would get in the way. He would not be the only artist to make that choice. So who are the other two? This is from Matthew 27:55-56:

55 And many women were there beholding afar off, which followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering unto him: 56 Among which was Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joses, and the mother of Zebedees children.

The ‘many women’ are certainly there – there are at least 8 standing around the haloed figure, who must be a young woman as her hair is not covered. Mark 15:40 also mentions ‘many other women’, as well as ‘Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the less and of Joses, and Salome’, while Luke, who does not name any of the women present at the Crucifixion, says later (24:10) that, on Easter Sunday, the tomb was visited by ‘Mary Magdalene, and Joanna, and Mary, the mother of James’. So we should have little doubt that one of these haloed women is Mary the Mother of James, who in medieval tradition was Mary Cleophas. Likewise, in medieval tradition, the ‘Salome’ mentioned here was known as Mary Salome, and like Mary Cleophas was also one of the half-sisters of the Virgin Mary (long story short: according to the Golden Legend, St Anne’s husband Joachim died, and she remarried. The second husband also died, and she remarried again. With each husband she had a daughter called Mary: there were three half-sisters with the same name). It was also assumed that Mary Salome married a man called Zebedee, which would make her the woman mentioned by Matthew. Confused? I’m not surprised. I must talk about a painting of the Holy Kindred one day. Still, if Mary Cleophas is the woman in yellow with her back to us, one of the two haloed women – one above Jesus’s head and the other holding his hands – must be Mary Salome. The other is possibly Joanna, who was one of the women who, according to Luke 8:3, ‘ministered unto [Jesus] of their substance’ – i.e. helped to provide for him.

And then there are the men. Fortunately they are far easier to identify. All three have halos, and could be characterised as young, old, and middle aged, going from left to right. The young man, with no beard and short hair, is John the Evangelist, his arms flung backwards in his despair and disbelief. Giotto shows he is important by making him stand out clearly – and he does that by placing him on his own, and against the rising hill. The other two are both mentioned in John 19:38-39 (and elsewhere…): Joseph of Arimathea, who ‘took the body of Jesus’, and Nicodemus, who ‘brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes’ which will be used immediately after the Lamentation when they wind Jesus’s body in the shroud, which Joseph currently has slung around his shoulders. At the top of the hill is a tree. At first glance, it is devoid of leaves – but look again: there are leaves, but they are tiny, just breaking out of the bud – the promise of new life. This would suggest that we should move straight on to The Resurrection, but before we do, I want to look back, in order to point out one of Giotto’s most subtle, but most moving echoes.

I’m comparing Jesus’s first appearance in the Scrovegni chapel – in chronological terms – with his last, or rather, what would be the last were Jesus not the Son of God. These are the moments of Jesus’s greatest humanity: his birth and his death. In the first – The Nativity – he is handed to the Virgin Mary by a midwife, and in the last – The Lamentation over the Dead Christ – he lies equally helpless in his mother’s arms, but for altogether different reasons. To make the parallels clearer, have a look at these details.

In both, Mary wears blue (although the surface has worn in The Nativity), and leans over her son. Her right arm goes behind his back, to support him, her left reaches across. The angle of her body, the angle of her head, and the direction of her gaze are the same. It is the emotion that is different. At his birth we see awe, at his death, profound grief – but the motherly love which provokes both echoes across the chapel, making the space resonate with a depth of profound feeling. Giotto makes this echo resound more fully by providing a witness to each emotion, a supporting figure helping Mary to hold her helpless son, her hands delicately touching the swaddling clothes, or the back of his lifeless head.

If we now move on to The Resurrection, we might realise that the burial of Christ has not been represented. It is hinted at in the decorative panel in between these two scenes, but there is so much to talk about today that I will have to come back to that next week. As so often, Giotto subtly elides different parts of the story. It is Easter Sunday, and Christ has risen – but the soldiers are still fast asleep. No hint here, as in many other versions, that they might actually have awoken and witnessed the resurrection themselves. The hill keeps us moving towards Jesus, who is on the verge of leaving the story altogether – indeed, his left elbow is already behind the frame. He reaches down towards Mary Magdalene, keeping her at bay, and although his mouth is clearly shut, the words that would be spoken at this point are ‘Noli me tangere’– ‘Don’t touch me’ – the part of the story we saw depicted by Fede Galizia just a few weeks ago (104). There too the two angels were present, although looking more like a couple of toddlers than the men in white we see here, who are sitting – or almost floating – on the edge of the tomb, and pointing towards the saviour. But for Fede – and most artists who depict the Noli me tangere – the soldiers are nowhere to be seen. They have usually cleared off by the time Mary Magdalene gets to the tomb. Their presence here helps to evoke the resurrection itself, filling in that moment of the story by reminding us of its pictorial tradition. Jesus is now dressed entirely in white, although he does not appear to be wearing the shroud as a toga as he does in some paintings. Both robe cloak have gold hems, a heavenly garb like that of the two angels. He carries the Cross of Christ Triumphant – the red cross on a white background, his suffering and his purity – which we have seen before (e.g. POTD 25 and POTD 50).

To understand this image fully, it is really important to know where it is in the chapel – and I’m very glad that a good image of this section of the wall is available!

The Resurrection of Christ is directly below The Resurrection of Lazarus – and if that’s not a stroke of genius, I don’t know what is. We saw in POTD 100 that the decorative strip which precedes Lazarus includes an image of the Creation of Adam: God gave Adam life, but Adam sinned, and the wages of sin, according to Christian theology, are death. But Jesus gives us new life – as he demonstrates with Lazarus. And how do we have new life through Jesus? Well, through his sacrifice on the cross, and his triumph over death, witnessed by The Resurrection. Notice how the death and resurrection of Christ are linked to the resurrection of Lazarus by the landscape. The hill may rise and fall from one scene to another on the bottom tier, but the hill in The Lamentation can also be seen as continuing upward in The Resurrection of Lazarus: they are part of the same message. Notice how Lazarus wears his white shroud in the middle tier, and the Risen Christ wears white more-or-less directly below. Notice also how Mary Magdalene kneels to Jesus, wearing her red cloak, in both. And now, notice how Mary Magdalene, forming a red triangle at the bottom of the wall, is kneeling directly below the kneeling priest – forming a very similar red triangle – at the very top. In that scene, one of the very first from the Scrovegni that I discussed (POTD 31), the suitors are waiting for a sign, a message from God. At the bottom, Mary Magdalene is the first witness to a different sign, which would be counted as God’s greatest – a sign which speaks of the promise of new life: the resurrection. I have previously described the painting at the top right of this image as a dramatic pause – nothing is happening. The closest equivalent would probably be The Lamentation over the Dead Christ – which earlier today I suggested represents a moment for reflection, and not, strictly speaking, part of the biblical narrative – they are not directly linked vertically, but the resonance is there. But can we find these connections between the other paintings here? Is there a connection between The Wedding at Cana and The Lamentation, for example? I’m not sure. You could argue that, after The Baptism, Christ’s mission has started – turning water into wine was his first miracle, whereas The Lamentation represents Christ’s last appearance as ‘merely’ human (although he is believed to have been entirely human and entirely God throughout his time on earth). So you could say that they represent ‘first and last’. And how about the placing of the rods on the altar in the top tier? Well, they are planning a wedding – the suitors are seeking the hand of the Virgin Mary in marriage – and a wedding takes place below. But these are not as convincing as the more obvious connections, which are remarkable enough. Given the needs of the narrative it would be impossible for this to work in all directions, like sudoku! However, there is one last idea that I want to consider this week – and it is one of the things I find most beautiful, and most poetic, in the entire chapel. It is the story of Mary Magdalene.

Look at her appearance in these three images. And if it’s not clear what I mean, look at these three details.

At the Crucifixion her long red hair, with which, according to tradition, she had washed Christ’s feet with her tears and with precious ointment, flows freely down her back. It reaches to waist level, and spreads out around her, beautifully displayed. Her red cloak has fallen to the ground, lying around her knees and ankles. Next, while lamenting over the dead Christ, her hair has been dressed – wound around her head, restricted in some way, and only reaching as far as her chest – and her cloak has been brought up around her waist, covering her legs more fully. And finally, at the resurrection, as she reaches in longing towards Jesus, the cloak has been pulled up over her head. Her hair and her body – the tools of her trade – are completely enveloped, hidden from view. I do not know of a more moving expression of the penitence of the Magdalene than this.

108 – The Crucifixion

Giotto, The Road to Calvary and The Crucifixion, c. 1305, Scrovegni Chapel, Padua.

And so we begin the final chapter in the epic that is the Scrovegni Chapel, and to give you a better sense of where we are, I have found an image of the whole of the North Wall – clearly taken from a double spread in a book, as there is a fold down the central decorative strip.

We see the stories of the Birth and Betrothal of the Virgin running along the top (Picture Of The Day 73 and POTD 31), and the Mission of Christ (POTD 93, 100, 102) in the middle. Along the bottom we can see the trompe l’oeil marble wainscoting, with seven imaginary niches, each containing a fictive sculpture of one of the seven Vices (POTD 52 and POTD 59). These connect the West Wall, with its image of the torments of hell, with the depiction of the Temptation of Judas on the North side of the chancel arch (102). Today we are starting the journey along the bottom tier, with The Road to Calvary leading directly to The Crucifixion. The first thing to notice is that Jesus is walking out of the city of Jerusalem as if he were walking away from the image of hell on the West Wall. Although his whole life and mission so far have been leading up to this moment through the implacable left-to-right movement of all of the narrative scenes, he is now approaching the point at which he will truly give up everything to free mankind from the implications of sin. Working one the level of metaphor, his actions here allow others, like him, to walk away from hell.

The way is led by the two thieves, who are just about to exit the picture field on the right. It might not be obvious who they are, but they can be identified by looking back at pictorial tradition: the two thieves regular precede Jesus in the procession to Calvary, almost as if they are an ‘introduction’, while he is the ‘star attraction’, left until last. The thief on the right carries something over his shoulder – the base of his cross, most of which was painted a secco and has been lost. Much of the surface of this particular image has gone, probably the result of the destruction of the Scrovegni Palace, which, as you may remember, was originally on the other side of this wall. The destructino of teh palace in the 19th Century rendered the North Wall of the chapel more susceptible to the adverse effects of weathering. The thief on the right has darker clothes and hair than his companion, who is turning round and looking back. My guess would be that the man on the right is the Bad Thief, whereas the blonder one (with hair more like Jesus), who repents – and looks back to Jesus – would be the Good Thief. Including them here means that Giotto doesn’t need to depict them in the Crucifixion itself, thus enabling him to focus on Jesus, who stands out all the more clearly in both images thanks to the space all around him. Despite the soldier who reaches out to push him on, no other figure touches him or overlaps him. He is surrounded by clear blue sky, and looks over his shoulder, enabling us to see his face clearly. He is already more than halfway across the picture, driving the action forward and leading us inexorably on to the next image. Indeed, he is just about to arrive at the foot of the hill – Golgotha – on which he will be crucified: the ground has started to rise under the feet of the thieves.

But before we get there, there are other things to notice. What will be the horizontal of the cross forms a diagonal in this image. Not only does this add to the forward movement of the narrative, leading our eyes to the right, but it also leads upwards, and ultimately, to heaven, as the Crucifixion could eventually lead the faithful to Heaven. A group of soldiers are gathered at its lower end, almost as if they are weighing it down, their ghost-like spears being one of the losses to the image, as are their silver leaf helmets. There are also priests, and other figures, including a man who tries to make the Virgin Mary turn back, her face distorted in her grief. This marks her reappearance in the narrative – if you look back to the scenes on the lower tier of the South Wall, she does not appear at all. Another element that is not so obvious, is that Jesus appears to be leaving the City by the same gate through which he had entered only five days previously. If it is the same gate we have crossed the road, and if not, it is at least of the same type, flanked by two octagonal towers. The triumph of Palm Sunday (102) has been replaced by the bitterness and shame – as it would have been seen – of Crucifixion.

The Crucifixion itself is presented entirely formally. Jesus is central, and raised up on the cross. It is the same structure that he carried in the previous scene – more a ‘T’ than a ‘cross’, but now the titulus has been attached. The titulus is the panel at the top of the cross which here bears the inscription ‘Iesus Nazarenus Rex Judeorum’ – Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jews. According to the Bible (John 19:20), this ‘was written in Hebrew, in Greek, and in Latin’, although often we only see the abbreviation, I.N.R.I. The angels fly around Jesus in paroxysms of grief, wringing their hands, throwing them up in despair, gathering the precious blood from the wounds in his hands and chest, and tearing their clothes – and this happens directly opposite the scene in which the High Priest also ‘rent his clothes’ (107). Below, the gathered assembly is divided much as it is in the Last Judgement on the end wall (POTD 38), with the good under Jesus’s right hand and the bad under his left. At the bottom left of the image we see Mary, who has fainted as a result of her grief, supported by John the Evangelist and one of the holy women. Presumably this is one of the people mentioned in John 19:25 who were present at the Crucifixion, who is described as Jesus’s ‘mother’s sister, Mary, the wife of Cleophas’ (John 19:25). Mary Magdalene, her red hair streaming down her back, kneels at the foot of the cross, with all her attention directed towards Christ’s feet, which she had previously washed with precious ointment using the hair which is so prominent in this depiction.

Although we saw the foot of the hill just outside the city gates in the last image, there is little hint of it here – but that is because we are at the summit, apparently consisting of a plateau, with a small central mound into which the cross is buried. At its foot is a skull, and other bones – explained by the fact that Golgotha means ‘the place of the skull’. However, the Bible does not explain is how the hill got this name. According to the Legend of the True Cross, one of the stories told in the Golden Legend, the skull which we see belonged to none other than Adam: part of God’s ineffable plan meant that Jesus was crucified in the self-same place where Adam had been buried.

On our right – under Jesus’s left hand – are those who will be condemned to hell. A mass of soldiers are gathered in the background, their tarnished silver leaf halos forming an ill-defined black area above the more visible faces. In the foreground an argument is taking place. Two men hold a red robe – this belongs to Jesus – and they pull at its shoulders. The man on the right wields a knife – it could be used to threaten his opponent, and to prevent any violence a third man grasps his wrist. It could also be used to cut the garment into sections. It is a seamless robe, which cannot be unstitched, which would have allowed the men to share the precious material between them. In the end they will neither fight over it, nor cut it up. Instead, they will gamble for it. Often paintings of the crucifixion show them rolling dice, or drawing straws, in fulfillment of an Old Testament prophecy. This is what it says in John 19:23-24, immediately after the mention of the titulus, and just before the presence of John and the three Maries is noted:

23 Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a part; and also his coat: now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout. 24 They said therefore among themselves, Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be: that the scripture might be fulfilled, which saith, They parted my raiment among them, and for my vesture they did cast lots. These things therefore the soldiers did.

In the King James Version, this prophesy is found in Psalm 22:18:

18 They part my garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture.

However, one figure stands out on this ‘bad’ side – how could he not? He has a halo, after all. He gestures up to Jesus, and looks towards the priest standing to his left. The unusual form of his helmet, with two pointed ‘ears’, suggests he is no normal soldier. It is not a standard ‘western’ form – the implication is that he was somehow foreign – he appears to be marked out as an outsider. However, his halo tells us he was a Christian. This suggest he could be a recent convert, and indeed, he has only just had this revelation. He is the centurion mentioned in Mark 15:29:

39 And when the centurion, which stood over against him, saw that he so cried out, and gave up the ghost, he said, Truly this man was the Son of God.

As with so much of the painting in this Chapel, the attention to detail seen in every one of the images is only enhanced when we look at the relationships between the different elements of the narrative. Here, for example, are the first two scenes on all three tiers of the North Wall, with the decorative panels in between omitted (we will return to them next week – or soon after).

At the top left, we see the Birth of the Virgin – this is, for obvious reasons, Mary’s first appearance in the narrative. Directly below, in Christ Among the Doctors, she enters the scene from the left, having temporarily lost Jesus – he had been left behind in Jerusalem. We see her again, directly below the depiction in the middle tier, as she follows the procession from the city gate. The physical position in the image is the same, but the emotional one could hardly be more different – having found what was lost in the middle tier, she is about to lose her son to death. If the top tier marks her first appearance in the narrative, the lower two both represent her return: ‘Enter Mary, Stage Right’. She was not present in the Massacre of the Innocents, which is opposite Christ Among the Doctors, nor in the whole of the lower tier of the South Wall.

Jesus is not yet present in the top tier, but starts his ‘mission’ by debating with the doctors in the middle tier, his bright red robe making him the most prominent figure in the room. This red is also what makes him stand out against the blue sky in the lowest tier, where he is enacting God’s plan, surely the subject of the discussion taking place in Christ Among the Doctors, which is painted directly above..

There is always more of a connection between the lower two tiers – indeed, there is an additional decorative frieze which separates the story of Mary from the central tier. Nevertheless, The Presentation of Mary to the Temple, where she is received by the priesthood, and her status is effectively acknowledged, sits above The Baptism of Christ, where God the Father acknowledges his Son. The connection between The Baptism, and The Crucifixion below it, is especially profound. Both are more or less symmetrical, with Jesus in the centre, facing front. In both Jesus is presented as entirely humble, and entirely human, naked in The Baptism and all but naked in The Crucifixion. On the left of The Baptism two angels hold Jesus’s clothes – the blue cloak and the red robe, which hang limply from their hands. In The Crucifixion the same red robe hangs down from the hands of the soldiers on the right, but where is the blue cloak? There is apparently no sign of it, but it is evoked: Mary, in her typical blue, hangs limply from the arms of Mary Cleophas and John the Evangelist much as the blue cloak hangs from the arms of the angel above. And look below the red robe held by the angel. Even if Jesus’s robe has been taken to the ‘bad’ side, by the soldiers, another red item has been let drop: Mary Magdalene’s cloak, which lies on the ground around her knees. This cloak will take on more significance in the next week or so… but until then… keep looking!

107 – Jesus in Custody

Giotto, Christ before Caiaphas and The Mocking of Christ, c. 1305, Scrovegni Chapel, Padua.

OK – so – Scrovegni Monday. Apologies… However, I will cover two pictures today – I will, I will, I will… They are the scenes which lead directly up to the Crucifixion of Christ, and as such form a cliff-hanger in the chapel: what will happen next? Obviously, we know, because we know the story and we’ve seen the pictures, but in the chapel itself it is worth point out that this focus on the bad deeds leads us directly to the depiction of heaven at the end wall – without Christ’s sacrifice, it says, there is no hope of getting there.

In both cases we are in an enclosed room. Like Christ among the Doctors, on the opposite wall (Picture Of The Day 87 – you may remember that I put it on the wrong wall for a week, apologies again…), the room itself takes up most of the picture – the cutaway walls form a double frame to the left and right, leaving a slice of blue sky at the top – despite the fact that it is after sunset, as it was for the Arrest of Christ last week (106). This is acknowledged in two different ways in these two pictures. On the left, Christ before Caiaphas, the servant in brown (third from the right) holds a flaming torch – this was painted a secco in its entirety. Although the torchbearer himself is solid and clear, the torch he is holding appears to have worn away, and the flame is, even for a flame, rather immaterial. However, it does light up the back wall of the room, leaving the ghostly flame slightly darker than the wall, the pool of light gradually darkening to the sides. The shutters of the windows are closed, as they might well be at night, although what are apparently shutters on the left wall are open. However, this is probably the door through which people have entered.  In The Mocking of Christ by contrast, there are no shutters – just bars across the windows (this is, after all, some form of prison) – and we can see the dark night sky through them, even though, at the top of the painting, we see the normal daylight blue. Giotto does everything to maintain unity within the chapel as a whole – we see it all by daylight, after all, even if the settings tells us that some scenes take place at night. Whereas in the first image everyone is comfortably within the room, and safely contained, in the second some people are in front of the slim columns which mark the end of the walls. The action has been pushed forward, making it more intense, and more immediate.

The cycle moves rapidly from the Last Supper and the Washing of the Feet (103 and 105) via The Arrest (106) to Christ before Caiaphas, and several scenes are omitted, as I have mentioned before. The Agony in the Garden is just one of these. John’s Gospel mentions that Jesus is taken from one authority figure to another. The first is Annas, the father-in-law of Caiaphas, and then Annas ‘sent him bound unto Caiaphas’. From thence Jesus was taken to the ‘hall of judgement’, which is where he encounters Pilate. The meeting with Caiaphas is the only one of the three which is represented: Giotto is presumably abbreviating the story to fit this complex part of the narrative into one ‘chapter’, i.e. just one wall of the chapel. However, it is worthwhile remembering the other episodes: so much took place between Thursday night and Friday morning. Having said that, Giotto appears to be combining the first two meetings into one picture. The two priests seated on the right hand side could easily be Caiaphas, in green, and his father-in-law Annas, seated beside him in red. I would take the longer hair and beard as a sign of greater age, for one thing. Also, the figure on the right can be identified as Caiaphas, because of his action, tearing at his clothes. Matthew 26:65 and Mark 14:63 both mention that the High Priest ‘rent his clothes’ in his anger at Jesus’s perceived blasphemy. Although Giotto has him do this without much energy – his elbows are neatly tucked in – the fabric has parted and gapes wide, revealing a slightly hollow chest and just a hint of paunch. Jesus’s hands are bound, as John says they were when Annas sent him to Caiaphas, but the soldier in red and gold has raised his right hand to hit him. This comes from John 18:22, ‘one of the officers which stood by struck Jesus with the palm of his hand’ – and this happens before he is sent over to Caiaphas. Jesus looks out – though not directly towards us. He gazes off to our right, deep in thought, contemplating what is to come. This allows us to see his face clearly, perfectly framed by the circular halo as it is, and bears witness to his long-suffering patience, calmly enduring all of these sacrifices for the salvation of mankind.

The image of The Mocking of Christ is a similar combination of different ideas. Given that the accounts in the four gospels are sufficiently varied, this almost always happens. There are actually two points in the narrative when Jesus is mocked. According to the synoptic gospels, on the Thursday evening, he is blindfolded, then beaten and spat at. The following morning, he is taken to Pilate – John’s gospel also suggests that he is taken to Pilate early on Good Friday. There is then a second ‘mocking’, when Jesus is dressed as a king, and taunted. Matthew suggests he was dressed in scarlet, whereas Mark and John both go for purple, but little should be read into this. Both colours denote royalty, after all, and, in any case, the term ‘purple’ was not fully defined for centuries. Luke, on the other hand, says that Jesus was dressed in ‘a gorgeous robe’, and this is the option Giotto chooses. He makes it white, with an elaborate gold pattern, combining a sense of royalty with one of purity. The crown of thorns is thrust onto his head, and he is given a reed as a sceptre, which they then take to beat him with. Giotto shows some of them pulling his hair, and preparing to hit him, while another kneels in mock homage.

Pilate himself is curiously side-lined in this cycle. He is there though – standing on the right of the scene, dressed from head to foot in red, a regal band around his head, not unlike the crown of thorns in appearance. He gestures towards Jesus, as do members of the priesthood: a debate is clearly taking place about Christ’s future. This could easily be an illustration of Luke 23:4-5:

4 Then said Pilate to the chief priests and to the people, I find no fault in this man. 5 And they were the more fierce, saying, He stirreth up the people, teaching throughout all Jewry, beginning from Galilee to this place.

Yet more elements of the biblical narrative are missed out – there is no flagellation, no debate over the freeing of Barabbas, and Herod doesn’t even seem to get a look in (however, see below…). Jesus’s fate is sealed though, and we know what is to come. It is not just that Giotto feels free to edit at will, he is obliged to do so: there is no more space on the wall.

Having completed this penultimate chapter, I shall stop and think about the placement of these scenes in relationship to those above, as I asked you to two weeks ago. Whereas for the first two pairs, I think the relationship is one of similarity, for the remaining three, we are dealing with opposition. In the first pairing, the Nativity is above the Last Supper, with Jesus at the far left of each, closest to the altar of the chapel: he is seen in relationship to the bread of the Mass, the Body of Christ. In the second pairing, the eldest Magus kneels to Jesus, whereas below it is Jesus who kneels to Peter. Although this reads like an opposition, it still speaks of essential good – the recognition of Christ as King, and the recognition Jesus himself suggests we award one other.

However, things change in the last three pairings – although I should make clear that I am hypothesising here. It could be that the placement of the stories occurs through necessity, although it might help to explain which of the various elements of the narrative were chosen for the lower scenes. Above the Arrest of Christ is the Presentation in the Temple. In the earlier story Jesus is given, in the later one, he is taken. Both involve identification – the High Priest recognises Jesus as the Messiah, whereas Judas betrays him as Judea’s ‘most wanted’. In the next pairing the Flight into Egypt is above Christ before Caiaphas. The upper story is one of escape, while the lower focuses on Jesus’s captivity. And finally, the Massacre of the Innocents is paired with the Mocking of Christ. The upper scene is unusual in the narrative of the Childhood of Christ, as it is the only one in that chapter in which Jesus himself does not appear. The Innocents suffer and die, thus saving Jesus: it was widely believed that, as a result, their souls went straight to Heaven. The lower scene is another violent one, with the cruelty finally directed towards Jesus – the delay in his death is finally coming to an end. Both stories should include ‘King Herod’ – although, historically speaking, this is not the same character. To be honest, it is quite difficult to pin down the Herods. Herod the Great, who ordered the Massacre of the Innocents, married at least ten times and among his descendants were three sons, a grandson and a great grandson, all of whom were called Herod. Two of the sons married a woman called Herodias, which doesn’t help. It was one of these last two, Herod Antipas, the older half-brother and second husband of Herodias, who ordered the death of John the Baptist. He also wanted Jesus killed, some 33 years after his father had failed to achieve the same end. In the upper scene Herod the Great points down from his balcony, ordering the massacre (a common feature in the iconography of this story, even though he would have been nowhere near Bethlehem at the time). He appears in profile, looking down to the right, wearing a white robe and a red cloak. Notice how, in the lower scene, over Pilate’s outstretched arm, is a man with a similar profile, similarly dressed. If Herod Junior (i.e. Herod Antipas) is included in this scene, this must be him. This would mean that Herod Senior is effectively pointing to his son. However, as I say, these connections could be coincidental. If you can see any other links, though, please do let me know – I’d love to know more! Next week – or for that matter, later this week – we shall start the final chapter.

106 – The Arrest of Christ

Giotto, The Arrest of Christ, c. 1305, Scrovegni Chapel, Padua.

Happy Saturday! If you’re new to the blog, (a) Welcome! And (b) this is just one in a long series about Giotto’s decoration of the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua: at the bottom of this page you will find a link labelled ‘Scrovegni’ Chapel’, which will bring you up to date!

We are halfway along the lower tier of the South Wall of the Scrovegni Chapel, so halfway through the penultimate chapter of this story. The Arrest of Christ follows on directly from Christ washing the Feet of the Disciples (105). As we shall see next week, at this point in the narrative certain episodes are omitted, so that Giotto can end this chapter – let’s call it ‘The Beginning of the End’ – on the South Wall, and start the next chapter – ‘The End and a New Beginning’ – on the North. Last week we discussed the reasons why Giotto swapped The Last Supper with the washing of the feet, and the first thing I’d point out is that he hasn’t included the Agony in the Garden: in most Passion cycles, Christ heads out to the Garden of Gethsemane after the Last Supper, and prays for deliverance from the suffering that will follow. He is usually accompanied by three of the apostles, Peter, James and John, and, in the background, you can often see Judas arriving with the soldiers, ready for the arrest. However, Giotto cuts to the chase. Only, of course there is no chase: Jesus gives himself up almost willingly, and in the Gospel of St John he even identifies himself. This is John, 18: 3-5:

3 Judas then, having received a band of men and officers from the chief priests and Pharisees, cometh thither with lanterns and torches and weapons. 4 Jesus therefore, knowing all things that should come upon him, went forth, and said unto them, Whom seek ye? 5 They answered him, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus saith unto them, I am he. And Judas also, which betrayed him, stood with them.

As I pointed out last week, John’s Gospel is the source for much of the material in the Scrovegni Chapel, and it does not include the narrative of the Agony in the Garden, which might be why Giotto doesn’t paint it here. John does not include what is potentially the bitterest detail of the betrayal, though – that Judas identified Jesus with a kiss. For this we have to look to the three synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke. Giotto somehow manages to make the kiss particularly repellent.

It’s the way that Judas is puckering his lips, I think, that puts me off. He has thrown his arms around Jesus, enveloping him in his yellow cloak, and goes straight in, looking more as if he is going to head-butt him than kiss him. The kiss, a gesture of mutual friendship, acceptance, tenderness and intimacy is used here for violent ends – the act itself is betrayed. Jesus remains impassive, long-suffering, and looks straight ahead, knowing what is to come. His golden halo shines out from the dark mass of helmets, such a crowd of soldiers to arrest one peaceful man, the silver leaf of their helmets – like the halos of the apostles in the Last Supper – now tarnished to black.

Seeing the full image you realise how fully Jesus is engulfed by Judas’s poisonous presence, the yellow ringing out loud and clear in the centre of the image. The dark aura created by the helmets, together with the porcupine-like array of clubs, batons and torches, focus our eyes on the lighter, placid, Jesus.

The ‘lanterns and torches and weapons’ are specified in the text, but they are also there for another reason. The sky is blue, as it is in every other image in the chapel, but it is after the Last Supper, and, although not depicted, after the Agony in the Garden. By this point it must be night. However, a black sky would have been unprecedented at the time. The first nocturnal scene in Western Art is always said to be in Santa Croce in Florence, and painted some 30 years after the Scrovegni Chapel. In any case, a black sky would have looked unbalanced here, in the context of the whole. But why else hold flaming torches, unless it were night? Quite simply put, the torches tell us that it is. I think this was probably quite a common ploy in painting, and it was also a tool used later by Shakespeare, whose plays were performed, on the whole, in the open air in daylight. For example, in Act 5, Scene 3 of Romeo and Juliet – the very last scene – almost every character mentions artificial lighting in some way. The lines include, ‘Give me thy torch, boy’ (Paris), ‘Give me the light’ (Romeo), ‘What torch is yond…?’ (Friar Lawrence) and ‘There, where the torch doth burn’ (Page) – and these are just some of the examples. They are effectively stage directions, constantly reminding the actors that it is night time and that they are in a dark place, so they should remember to do ‘dark’ acting. But, of course, the lines also serve as a reminder to the audience that it is night time. Indeed, Shakespeare was so aware of this convention that he could even make fun of it. At the end of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the mechanicals include the character of ‘Moonshine’ in their performance of Pyramus and Thisbe, to tell the court that it is night. Not only that, but when Pyramus (played by Bottom) enters, his first lines are:

O grim-looked night! O night with hue so black!
O night, which ever art when day is not!
O night, O night, alack, alack, alack…

…so there should be no excuse for not knowing the time of day. For Giotto, the torches and lanterns perform the same function, but with far greater subtlety. On the right of the image there are yet more soldiers, with yet more weapons – spears and halberds (the ones that look like spears with axes attached) – and some wonderful character studies.

In the foreground, in pink and gold (implying some connection to the ruling classes, perhaps), with his head covered, is presumably one of the chief priests that Luke mentions. He is clearly an authority figure, given his secure stance, and the commanding gesture, which orders the arrest. Above his out-stretched arm we see a young man, one of the torch bearers, an intense look created by a slightly lowered chin and raised, dark eyebrow – I’m hoping this boy has realised he would rather not be there. Behind him, and in contrast to his full head of hair and healthy good looks, is a scrawny looking man, with receding hairline, pointed nose and open mouth, his chin has dropped in astonishment – he’s almost more of a caricature. Meanwhile, there is a lot going on on the other side of the picture.

All four gospels mention the fact that one of the servants of the high priest had his ear cut off – you can see it quite clearly detached, falling down, in this detail. Luke adds that Jesus went on to touch this man’s ear, and heal it, whereas John tells us it was Peter who did this, and that, ‘The servant’s name was Malchus’. Above Malchus’s head a young man holds a club aloft, on the verge of striking Jesus – both he and Malchus face to the right in profile. Above Peter’s arm, another figure faces to the left – someone’s head, behind Peter’s halo, is covered in a pink cloth (someone not wanting to be seen in the presence of the arrested man, perhaps?) and underneath Peter’s outstretched hand, clasping the silver leaf knife, is another arm reaching out to the left. All of this mayhem relates to details reported in the bible. Once Jesus had been arrested Matthew adds, ‘Then all the disciples forsook him, and fled’. Mark also mentions this – and adds another detail. This is Mark 14:50-52:

50 And they all forsook him, and fled. 51 And there followed him a certain young man, having a linen cloth cast about his naked body; and the young men laid hold on him: 52 And he left the linen cloth, and fled from them naked.

Now, Giotto doesn’t have anyone running away naked – it would be inappropriate in a chapel, perhaps, unless you were one of the sinful souls in hell (POTD 38). However, in the foreground, and so very prominent, there is another ‘soldier’ with his back to us. I say ‘soldier’, as he is not the most official-looking person. He doesn’t seem to be wearing any armour, but has a dark cloak and hood, and an equally dark skirt. He has baggy brown leggings and boots. His is the arm reaching in the opposite direction to Peter’s, and he holds a pink cloak – although we can’t see its owner. It could belong to the ‘certain young man’ who is currently outside the frame, about to abandon this cloth and flee naked. A second apostle, identified as such by a halo, appears over Peter’s shoulder – the man in profile above Peter’s hand is presumably trying to grab him – while the head covered in pink could be yet another apostle about to flee. The small gap between Peter’s head and the heads of the soldiers speaks of this separation. Do you notice how Peter and the second apostle now have gold halos? It’s almost as if they’ve had a promotion since the Last Supper, when their halos were silver – though here I suspect it is as much to distinguish them from the silver helmets of the soldiers.

Oh dear! As so often I had hoped to cover more – three of the images – but as so often I got distracted… so the homework I set you last week will have to wait until next! Just as a warning, I will be on holiday – but I’ll try and get writing before I go! Have a great week. And don’t go hugging and kissing people – especially if your intention is dishonorable.

105 – Wash one another’s feet

Giotto,  Christ washing the Feet of the Disciples, c. 1305, Scrovegni Chapel, Padua.

After a socially distanced Jesus and Mary Magdalene, we arrive at the issue of washing our hands, something I know that, by now, we are all more than used to. Not that we didn’t do it before, of course. I imagine relatively few of us would have had our hands washed by others, though, and I’m sure I can exclude the feet, too. And yet that is the subject of today’s picture.

We are in exactly the same room as we were last week (103), a simple, rectangular room, cut away on two sides so that we can see in, with two windows on each remaining wall, those most clearly visible open to the same degree in each picture. The roof has terracotta tiles, and the eaves are decorated with carved friezes, pinnacles and two stone birds, as well as mosaic elements bracketing the supports and hanging down in the centre. The walls are lightly patterned in the same way in each image (I’ll show you them together below) with geometric motifs, mainly circles. The main difference, then, is the action – the dining table has been cleared away (one advantage of such open walls), as has the bench at the front. Or rather, as we’ll find out, they haven’t yet been moved in. The benches at the back and left walls remain, and there is a new seat at the front left, on which St Andrew sits fastening his left sandal. Opposite him, on the far right, on another ‘new’ chair, is St Peter, looking grumpy (again) and looking at Jesus, who kneels before him, holding one of his legs. Two younger apostles stand behind Jesus, one of whom holds a large jug of water, with seven more apostles seated around the benches against the walls.

As so often in the Scrovegni Chapel the details are drawn mainly from the Gospel of St John – this is 13:4-5:

4 He riseth from supper, and laid aside his garments; and took a towel, and girded himself. 5 After that he poureth water into a bason, and began to wash the disciples’ feet, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded.

You can see in this detail that he has ‘laid aside’ his blue cloak (not that it’s visible anywhere in the picture), and is just wearing the red robe that we usually see underneath, and is ‘girded’ with a white towel around his waist. The ‘bason’ – or basin – was applied, like the haloes, with silver leaf, and, like them, has now tarnished. Peter has removed his sandals – one lies just beneath his left foot, and the other is tucked behind the ‘bason’ (I’m quoting the King James Version as always) in a lovely example of naturalistic depiction. Also rather lovely is the delicate way with which Jesus holds Peter’s leg, and some more naturalistic observation – the precise fall of light and shade on Peter’s calf. Giotto then starts to play: the apostle behind has removed his sandals, has one foot up on his knee, and is scratching between the toes. His other foot remains on the ground, with the toes poking out just under Peter’s right foot – in the same way that Jesus’s fingers do a little further up. Jesus’s blessing hand is neatly framed by this apostle’s knee. Peter lifts up his worn blue robe with his left hand to keep it dry, and scratches his head with his right – he is clearly confused. Indeed, in John 13:6 he asks Jesus, ‘Lord, dost thou wash my feet?’ – the confusion which leads to the gesture. A few verse on it continues:

8 Peter saith unto him, Thou shalt never wash my feet. Jesus answered him, If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me. 9 Simon Peter saith unto him, Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head.

There is more that is relevant both before and after these verses, of course, but I have always loved this particular part of the exchange. The character of St Peter is so clearly defined in the Gospels as entirely human, and this is one of the best examples. First he says ‘Thou shalt never wash my feet’ but as soon as Jesus says, ‘If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me’, he jumps straight in with, ‘Well, do everything then’ – he is so impulsive, so desperate to be part of Jesus’s life.

As in The Last Supper the corner pillar clearly caused Giotto some problems. By the looks of it, it was probably painted a secco after everything else, so he could paint Peter and be secure about his position without the pillar getting in his way. Whatever the reason, it has now gone, and has left some gaps in the halos. Either it has flaked less from the halos, or it has affected the way in which they have tarnished. It creates a certain amount of confusion, which is only compounded by Giotto’s rather sophisticated layering of forms. The apostle over Peter’s shoulder has part of his profile hidden by Peter’s halo, and the next apostle back has his entire face eclipsed by the halo of the second apostle – you can just see his hair, framed by his own halo, appearing behind it.

St Andrew, on the far left, can be identified by his clothes and hair, and from his appearance in earlier paintings in the cycle, as he was last week (103). This is such a brilliant piece of painting, I think, with Andrew sat in profile, bending over as his lifts his left foot over his right knee to attach his sandals, his long, wavy white hair and beard tumbling down, the stool he is sitting on carefully depicted in three dimensions. I also love St Bartholomew’s manspreading pose – he sits there in his white robe and patterned cloak with both hands planted on his thighs, one holding a scroll, the other wrapped in his cloak. Three apostles sit against the end wall, in between Andrew and Bartholomew. If you look at their three halos, they are not all the same – those left and right have radiating lines, with a clear, crisp circular edge. The one in the middle has an aura which is dark and nebulous – not tarnished silver leaf like the others. There is just a hint of yellow above Andrew’s halo, and he has a rather large nose. This is Judas, portrayed as he was at the Last Supper. And, if you think about it, it is rather surprising that he should be there, after the Last Supper…

This is how the two images appear on the wall, albeit with a window in between. And, if you think about it some more, they really shouldn’t be in this order at all. Today I have quoted John 13:4-9. Last week, I quoted John 13:23. The events depicted in the picture on the left happened after the events depicted on the right. Jesus washes the disciples’ feet before the Last Supper itself, with its revelation that one of the number will betray him, prompting Judas’s departure. So why has Giotto painted them this way round? Surely, he can’t have got it wrong? No! Of course not! This is Giotto, remember. And this is where the image I showed you last week is really useful… so here it is again.

As I said last week, the altar in the chapel is to our left. Giotto deliberately painted the Institution of the Eucharist – the Last Supper – as close to the altar as he possibly could. Seen from this point of view, when approaching the altar, the Washing of the Feet precedes the Last Supper and reminds the congregation of the need to be pure before partaking in communion, thus relating the Washing of the Feet to the Sacrament of Confession. Just above the Last Supper is the Nativity, and I remember suggesting when we looked at that (POTD 87) that it was as if the body of Christ had been taken from the altar in the chapel. And above that, Joachim is turned away from the altar in the Temple (POTD 66). These three scenes are all included at the far left of the wall not only because that is where the narrative flow would have them, but also because they have a direct relationship to the sacramental nature of the real altar in the chapel to our left. And, actually, the ‘narrative flow’ would not have the Last Supper just here, as it has been swapped with the Washing of the Feet. But there is another, truly brilliant justification of this swap, and one that I have only just noticed. Look at what is above the Washing of the Feet:

OK, so I’ve cut out the window, but this is how the first scenes at the left of the south wall fit together. The Nativity is above the Last Supper, as we have already discussed, but like this it is more clear that the Christ Child is directly above the adult Jesus, and that both are as close to the altar as they can be. And I can’t help but notice that Mary’s loving gaze gives her the same angle of the head, and profile, as that of the sleeping St John, the disciple ‘whom Jesus loved‘. In the next pair, Jesus is directly below the eldest Magus – and both are kneeling. In the Adoration of the Magi the wise men recognise Jesus as the Boy Born to be King – and fulfil the prophecy in Psalms 72:10-11:

10 The kings of Tarshish and of the isles shall bring presents: the kings of Sheba and Seba shall offer gifts. 11 Yea, all kings shall fall down before him: all nations shall serve him.

It was because of these verses that the Magi – the Wise Men – were promoted to the status of Kings – the Nativity story doesn’t mention kings at all. Well, these verses and others in Isaiah, including Isaiah 60:3: ‘And the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising‘. However, Jesus turns all this on its head in John 13:14-15:

14 If I then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet; ye also ought to wash one another’s feet. 15 For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you.

Giotto finds the perfect expression for this idea by placing the King kneeling before the infant Christ above Christ kneeling in front of Peter. So here’s your homework for the week: what are the connections between the bottom tier and the middle tier that we will see next week? You’ll need to look at the photo of the South wall above – which is admittedly small. I’m not guaranteeing that there are any, but I have a sneaking suspicion we’ll find something!

104 – Don’t touch!

Fede Galizia, Noli mi tangere, 1616, Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan.

Great news this week, which I know some of you will have heard already. But just in case you haven’t, I’m glad to let you know that the National Gallery has managed to completely re-schedule the Artemisia Gentileschi exhibition. And not only that, but they will be allowing it a full 3 ½ months, from 3 October – 24 January: click on her name for more information. To celebrate, I should really talk about one of her paintings – but instead, I’m going to suggest you look back to my earlier blogs about Judith and Holofernes (Picture Of The Day 17) or the Self Portrait as the Allegory of Painting (POTD 69). I thought this would be a good time to talk about another 17th Century woman, though: Fede Galizia. She too was supposed to have an exhibition dedicated to her work this year, but, after research through a number of contradictory websites, I’ve just emailed the Castello del Buonconsiglio in Trento and they got back to me 20 minutes later to say that it has been postponed until next summer. I’ll try and remember to remind you nearer the time! I’m still going to look at this painting, though!

I should have talked about this subject earlier, as it really is an ideal painting for lockdown (it turns out there are so many). The title, Noli mi tangere, translates as ‘Don’t touch me’, and even if we are not as locked down as we were, it still seems wise not to go around touching other people unnecessarily, particularly when you don’t initially know who they are. The story comes from John 20:13-17. It is Easter Sunday, and Mary Magdalene has gone to the tomb and found it empty. She tells Peter and John, who go straight to the empty tomb to see if Mary is talking sense, and, once they have reassured themselves that she was right, they return home. At this point, Mary, in tears as so often, looks back into the tomb to see two angels:

13 And they say unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? She saith unto them, Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him. 14 And when she had thus said, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus.15 Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away.16 Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni; which is to say, Master. 17 Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.

I’ve always thought that ‘Don’t touch me’ was an unusual request, and somewhat understated under the circumstances, but the explanation, ‘for I am not yet ascended to my Father’ would seem to make sense. Jesus is in neither one place nor the other, and, as both God and Man, having triumphed over death, there must still have been an uncertain sense of transition. Nevertheless, a little further down the chapter – verse 25 to be precise – he does issue Thomas with the instruction, ‘Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side’. I’m sure this issue has been explored extensively by theologians, but I have not found a justification why Thomas could touch Jesus but Mary Magdalene could not – unless, within Jewish law at the time, the female touch was considered unclean. And, while we are on the edges of the potential misogyny involved, it is worthwhile noting that we are also at the centre of one of the most significant moments which is conveniently ignored by some members of the church: Mary Magdalene was the first witness to the Resurrection, and was instructed by Jesus, ‘…go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father…’. Not only did she see the resurrected Christ before anyone else, but she was also told by Jesus to tell the others what was going on. So I really don’t understand the objection to the ordination of women. Having said that, and despite the fact that this is painted by a woman, that’s not what this particular picture is about, of course.

We see Jesus standing on the right. Galizia gives us no explanation for Mary’s confusion – there is no hat, no hoe, nothing whatsoever which would suggest that Jesus could be a gardener, so why the mistake? We will have to assume that she was blinded by her tears. Jesus wears the shroud as a toga (as he does often at the Resurrection, POTD 25), his head glowing with sanctity around his beautiful and notably blonde hair. Both hands are held out towards the Magdalene so as to keep her at a distance, but also to display the wounds, which are also clearly visible in his chest and feet. Mary kneels beside him, richly dressed in a pink robe, with a white chemise underneath, and a golden-yellow brocaded cloak that is lined with a deep blue. Her hair – as blonde as Jesus’s but many times longer – is elaborately plaited around her head, and flows freely down her back and under her left arm. It is pointedly not covered: she shows every sign of being a well-to-do courtesan, and one who has not, as yet, entirely repented of the vanities of human life (POTD 100).

On the left we see the opening to the tomb, at roughly the same height as Jesus’s head – I’m sure this is deliberate, as it serves to emphasize that he has triumphed over the darkness within. Two cherubs stand within the sarcophagus, not exactly the ‘two angels in white’ one would imagine from John 20:12, nor are they still sitting. The one on the left appears to be kneeling in prayer, while his companion points towards Jesus – or to the stone which has been moved out of the way, perhaps. Above Jesus’s right hand we see a garden gate, reminiscent of the type that is depicted in Northern Renaissance images of the Garden of Gethsemane – you can just about see one in Riemenschneider’s relief on the right of the Holy Blood Altarpiece (POTD 22). Beyond that is Jerusalem. We are still ‘without a city wall’ (the far away ‘green hill’ is at the top right of the painting), and the city gate can be seen at the end of a curving road. Within the city are a couple of details which remind us that this was part of the Roman Empire – a column, like that of Trajan, topped by an indistinct golden statue, and a form of obelisk. There is also a large circular building, the Temple of Solomon, the image of which was derived from the Dome of the Rock, which, during the middle ages, people mistook for the Temple itself. On the far left we see some of the wonderful botanical details Galizia included, and I am indebted to the Ecologist for their correct identification.

They include an iris (Iris x germanica) at the top, with a great mullein, or Aaron’s rod (Verbascum thapsus) to the right of it, with a spike of yellow flowers, and large leaves below. Down to the left is lily-of-the-valley (Convallaria majalis) with its white, bell-like flowers, and the delicate blue flowers are perhaps spring squills (Scilla verna). In this detail we can also see the brilliance of Galizia’s depiction of fabrics, with the transparent veil around the Magdalene’s shoulders, the embroidered hem of the robe, and laced edging of the chemise, as well as a deep blue ribbon, matching the lining of her cloak, which is wound around the plaits in her hair.

Under Mary’s left elbow we see deep blue columbine, or aquilegia (Aquilegia vulgaris), and double hollyhocks (Alcea rosea) – notice how, colouristically, they are perfectly matched with the pink robe and deep blue lining.

At the very bottom of the painting are some snapdragons (Antirrhinum majus) and what in all probability are buttercups (Ranunculus sp.) – the shape and colour of the flowers is certainly indicative, as is the shine on the petals. However, without the leaves it is impossible to tell which species of buttercup this is, and none of the leaves visible here would appear to belong to these flowers, anyway. Here too Galizia has been careful to match the colours – the buttercups are related not only to the rich brocade of the cloak, but also to the Magdalene’s signature jar of ointment, apparently ceramic with a slightly crazed glaze. According to Mark 16:1 and Luke 24:1 the holy women took spices to the tomb: it makes sense, therefore, that Mary has this jar with her.

There are some narcissi to the left of the Magdalene, just where the long strands of wavy hair seem to evaporate, and some anemones at the bottom left, under her toes. On the far right are some tulips of different colours, just below a pair of slightly sulky rabbits. Below Christ’s left foot, which is delicately poised on a stone, is a small piece of paper bearing Fede Galizia’s name, and the date – 1616.

It is not at all clear whether these flowers are symbolic or not. Some of them have appeared in paintings from the Renaissance onwards. The iris is related to the Virgin Mary’s suffering, while the buttercup has connections with sin. The columbine, its name deriving from a word for ‘dove’, is associated with the Holy Spirit. But some of them are just there for the ride – if Mary Magdalene mistook Jesus for the gardener, maybe this is the evidence. After all, several of these plants are not the wild varieties. The double hollyhock is definitely a cultivar, and the snapdragons are also a garden variety. Tulips were famously cultivated, and their bulbs would be traded at over-inflated prices in the Netherlands a few years after the Noli mi tangere was painted. They are certainly not all spring flowers, even if the narcissi, tulips and squills are.

It is the context of the garden which is most important, I think, and, added to that, perhaps, the fact that Fede Galizia was famed as a painter of Still Life. She had made it her speciality to paint things in intricate, naturalistic detail, and is not wasting an opportunity here. Like many other women artists, she had been trained by her father, Nunzio, who was born in Trento – which is why they will be hosting an exhibition. Fede herself was born in Milan, though, sometime around 1578. In 1590, when she must have been at least 12, though possibly a bit more, the artist and author Paolo Lomazzo, wrote his Idea of the Temple of Art, in which he said that ‘this girl dedicates herself to imitating the best exponents of our art’. As it happens, he was a friend of Nunzio, but this wasn’t just a favour for a friend – she clearly had talent and her career took off. She was much in demand as a portrait painter, perhaps as a result of her attention to detail, but also received several commissions from churches: today’s picture was painted for the High Altar of the Church of St Mary Magdalene in Milan, which was destroyed after the Napoleonic suppressions of 1798.

The flora in this painting works in a number of ways – some of the flowers definitely remind us of Spring, and so Easter, and refer to the Resurrection. Others have a more ‘generic’ religious relevance, referring to the Virgin’s suffering (a major part of which was seeing her son crucified), or to sin, as a result of which Christ’s sacrifice was necessary.  But how about the fauna? Well, rabbits, and their ability to reproduce, are associated with new life, and fecundity – but they also refer to the Resurrection.

Meanwhile, at the top of the painting, a pair of swallows are flying through the sky. They live with us throughout the Summer, but then disappear – only to come back in the Spring. It was thought that they lived in the mud during the winter (well, medieval observers couldn’t track their migrations), as if they were being buried and then coming back to life. Inevitably, therefore, they are also a symbol of the Resurrection. And, just in case we’d missed the point, at the top right of the painting we see that green hill far away, with two of the three crosses still visible and still standing. The reminder of Christ’s death is there, in the background, and it would be as well not to forget it. Although he is clearly once more in rude health, it would be wise not to get too close. Please remember that as you head back out into the world!