Friday, October 30, 2009

Vienna -- gilded jewel of Eastern Europe

"Neither a lofty degree of intelligence nor imagination nor both together go to the making of genius. Love, love, love, that is the soul of genius." - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Austrian composer (1756-1791)

Elegant, lavish Vienna! Home to Sigmund Freud, wiener schnitzel, and some of the most beautiful architecture and music in Western Civilization. The list of composers who made Vienna their home in the 18th and 19th centuries contains some of the most celebrated names in music history: Mozart, Beethoven, Haydn, Schubert, the two Strausses, Brahms. This is where the waltz caught on, a scandalous dance for its time that has its origins in the rural taverns on the city's outskirts. And Vienna's buildings themselves -- a rich tapestry of Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, and Gothic and Classical Revival -- seem to echo the melodic, exuberant strains of The Blue Danube.

The balmy autumn weather we'd enjoyed in France, Switzerland, and Germany has given way to a premature Arctic blast. But the splendor of this city shines through the windy cold. We're staying at a hotel in the heart of the city, backing onto the sculpted gardens of the Belvedere Palace. My sister takes advantage of our proximity to this monument to visit its art museum where the centerpiece is undoubtedly Klimt's The Kiss (an excursion I missed because of work obligations).


But you don't need to pay admission at a museum to witness firsthand the "art" that infuses daily life in Vienna. Over the course of the next few days, we frequent what has to be the world's most beautiful McDonald's (a relatively cheap meal in a city where a simple breakfast can top US$ 28). Can a Baroque Burger be in our futures?

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Guten tag to Basel, Switzerland and Kandern, Germany

"If we have traveled with our hearts and minds truly open, we return with our mental protoplasm slightly rearranged." - Diana C. Gleasner, American travel writer.


It's time to say good-bye to France for now. Challenging logistics force us to leave our friends' appartment by 5:30am and catch a cab to a metro station for the most direct route to Gare St-Lazare and our train to Basel. I think that's one of the paradoxes of traveling in a culture foreign to you -- a simple logistical challenge (what's the least expensive, most reliable, least cumbersome way to get from Point A to Point B?)is at the same time exhilarating and exhausting. The cumulative effect of travel -- for me, at least -- is one of experiencing all senses "en pointe" heightened to take it in, to manoeuver, to lock it in memory and sleuthe the solution all at once. Reality in mega-technicolor!

Train stations have changed a lot since the first time I came to France and hopped the rails with my student Eurrail pass. They're akin to upscale malls with their cafes and shops, and even at the early hour, the fare is tempting.

Basel is the closest town to the village of Kandern, Germany where I have a visit with Black Forest Christian Academy. We're not in France anymore, and hearing German and spending Swiss francs instead of euros takes some adjustment! But Basel and the surrounding countryside is enchanting (the Black Forest in divine fall color) and challenging with the language barrier. The architecture is decidedly different and offers its own charm. Always a revelation how only a relatively few miles make such a difference in Europe.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Saint-Denis, birthplace of Gothic

tombs of French monarchs"I never weary of great churches. It is my favorite kind of mountain scenery. Mankind was never so happily inspired as when it made a cathedral." - Robert Louis Stevenson, Scottish poet and author (1850-1894)


I start the day in the hustle and bustle of modern-day Paris and work my way back a millenium. My mission today is to get up to the north edge of Paris and visit Saint-Denis. According to legend, Denis was a 3rd century leader in the fledgling Christian Church who waexteriors martyred by the Romans. The legend continues that, after his beheading, Denis picked up his head and walked to the site where the abbey and later cathedral now stand, died, and was buried by his followers. Denis became the patron saint of France and was so revered by French leaders through the centuries that they all wanted to be buried near him (a good connection to heaven). Indeed, the nave and side chapels are almost crowded with sarcophaghi and elaborate monuments of royalty going back to the 8th century. Saint-Denis – in addition to once being a thriving town, powerful abbey, and intellectual center – is the Westminster Abbey of France, the necropolis for over 42 kings, 32 queens, 63 princes and princesses and 10 other notable figures in French history.
Ironically, the town retains none of its former glory. Stepping off the train, I note this is a neighborhood of immigrants and beggars, trash and graffiti. As I round the corner one block from the station, however, I’m stopped in my tracks by the imposing structure across from me. I spend nearly three hours in and around the cathedral which has had a long and storied part in French history. This is considered by many to be the birthplace of what came to be known as Gothic art.

There's little to signal the interior glory of the cathedral from outside. During its heyday, the cathedral was but one aspect of a sprawling Benedictine abbey complex (none of which exists at present). Unlike most French cathedrals, this one charges admission but it will soon prove more than worth the cost. I step inside and am immediately overtaken by the light that falls from the glass of the chevet (eastern end of a cathedral encompassing the altar and absidioles behind it) and seems to spill downward through the nave. This is the jewel-like quality that Abbot Suger was seeking when he undertook the renovation of St-Denis (see link at right to his writings about this). This is the first time we see a rose window (one of Suger's innovations) and the cross-ribbed vault that would take Gothic to its soaring height.


Suger was so devoted to his life's work that he included a portrait of himself, dressed in monastic habit and dedicating his work to the Blessed Virgin, in one of the chevet panels.
There's one marked distinction at St-Denis over other French Gothic cathedrals. It seems most of the available floorspace outside of the nave is covered with recumbent statues (funereal statues representing the person entombed there). There's Francois I and Henri IV, even a cenotaph of a kneeling Louis XVII and Marie Antoinette (a cenotaph is a funereal monument where the body is not present -- in the case of this pair, the remains were lost during the chaos of the Revolution). As I learn from my pamphlet, the 12th century statues show the dead with open eyes, while the compositions grow larger and grander during the Renaissance and the subjects have closed eyes (illustrating death with the hope of resurrection).

I wish I had reviewed my French history before coming here, because the names are all so familiar and span centuries as far back as the early Middle Ages. The stained glass art is a combination of Old and New Testament narrative, saints, and grisaille with mythological creatures like the griffon (a symbol of Christ). The stories of Moses and St. Paul are told side by side, linking old and new.


The overall impression of the interior is one of light and color. Perhaps the prevalence of so much white, gleaming marble in the funereal art reflects it and heightens this impression. Suger's obsession with gold and jewel-like character in the windows and ornamentation is astounding, and an 18th century renovation only added to that.


I spend considerable time in this space, drinking it in, and trying to "experience" it from different vantage points, imagining the numerous processions and burial ceremonies held here, the activity of the great learning center in the days of the abbey. It's puzzling to me that St-Denis is not a household word like Notre-Dame, Chartres, or Sainte-Chapelle. The town shows no outward sign of modern-day pilgrimage. Scholars dispute Suger's motives and piety in undertaking such a project; nonetheless, he birthed a gem that became a model and inspiration for the builders of the better known cathedrals.

Monday, October 26, 2009

Ah, Paris!

"Paris is always a good idea." - title character in the movie "Sabrina"Mary Ann and I view the 'sparkling' Tour Eiffel at dusk.


Paris. Known as the "City of Light", so it's quite appropos that I spend some time here, n'est-ce pas? Staying with friends in the Parisian suburb of Clamart, I make my way to the Musée Cluny (after the requisite café au lait and pain de campagne). The museum is located in the heart of the city’s Quartier Latin (“Latin Quarter”) on the Left Bank, so named because medieval scholars studying at the Cluny Abbey and the Sorbonne conversed regularly in this ancient language, part of their renewed interest in the classics. It remains the intellectual heart of the city to this day. Indeed, the Sorbonne (where I spent a semester as an undergrad all those years ago) is a stone’s throw from the Cluny. Somehow, I never made it to this mCourtyard of the Cluny Museum.useum back in those days, despite being encouraged by professors at the time. Mieux tard que jamais! (Better late than never!)
Entrance today is free because of a faulty cash register, so I would spend those euros on a few books when I get to the museum’s bookshop. The museum is within the ruins of natural thermal baths that date back to Roman times. Today, the building that graces the site is what's left of a Clluniac complex that was begun in the early 14th century. The remaining building was an abbot's mansion, constructed in a combination of Gothic and Renaissance styles. Famous exhibits include the Lady and the Unicorn, heads of French kings (and a few Biblical kings as well) shorn off their bodies by French revolutionaires in the 18th century, reliquaries of every gruesome shape imaginable, panels of stained glass, and household items dating back to Roman times.

Sunday, October 25, 2009

Journee d'Etude #2


"We are all pilgrims together, finding our way...Let us mark the way well, filled wih new life and license, let us bring the cymbals of light and shadow together and begin again." - Gail Sheehey, American writer

The second and final day of class. The morning session seems to drag a bit, or perhaps it’s jet lag setting in. I’m not alone in my fatigue. Snickers and amused looks react to an older gentleman snoring a couple seats in front of me. But the speaker continues unabated, going into detail about the polychromie (uniform coloration) of the cathedral. They’ve only recently discovered that the Gothic cathedrals in France were likely painted inside and out. Restoration work is discovering multiple layers of paint, colors changing from season to season or perhaps century to century. (The French have always been into changing fashion, n’est-ce pas?) Hues used in Gothic times ranged from a creamy yellow to an ochre in later years. White paint was used to give better definition to the vault ribbing. A second morning speaker has evidently cancelled, as the various professors use the final morning hour to answer questions and comments from the previous day’s lectures.

After lunch, the final speakers talk about the references to light in the Bible and the significance and use of light in various forms of medieval liturgy. I could (and will) do my own study of “light” references in Scripture, and wish the speaker would have expounded more on how theologians of the time interpreted these references to the cathedral’s art and architecture. So it seems I’ll have to research that myself. Dr. Jean-Paul Deremble, the last speaker (and the scholar who also seems to have been the coordinator of the week-end as well as the first presenter), sums up the journées by reminding us once again that the eastern orientation of the Gothic cathedral -- so the entering faithful would face the rising sun -- was to orient the believer toward the true light, the return of the Son. For Christians through the centuries, this has been the hope of each new dawn.
(I took some 26 pages of notes during these lectures, now translated and condensed down to their main points. I'll be happy to share them. Just leave me a request and email address in the comment area.)

Saturday, October 24, 2009

Journee d'Etude #1

"Then they took the holy tunic
From the mother of God, who departed...
The Lady who wore it
When she bore the son of God
Thought it would be put
At Chartres, in her main church,
And that it would be preserved
In the place of which she is called the Lady."
- Jean le Marchard, mid-13th century chronicler and poet


street where Jours d'Etude lectures were held, one block from cathedral
Class today. About 50 of us huddle in a small classroom down a narrow medieval street in the shadow of the cathedral. The cold rainy weather doesn’t dampen the spirits or enthusiasm of those in the room. As far as I can tell, I’m the only American here, but I could be from Mars and it wouldn’t matter. People are polite, reserved, and focused. I meet a young woman from Paris who is a stained glass artist and teacher. She’s often commissioned to recreate Gothic panels and wants a better understanding behind these requests. All of us want to unlock a few of the mysteries that lie behind this art and the light that brings it to life.
Lots of revelation. It’s hard to keep up with the lectures at times, not so much because of the language difference, but because of the overriding passion with which these historians and restoration experts present their work! I’ll share some of this material in future postings and in my MA work as it develops. One of the day’s highlights is a two-hour tour of the vitraux (stained glass) in the cathedral, given by the gentleman in charge of the current restoration – a major crypt of cathedralproject that will continue through 2015 and encompasses all elements of the cathedral. A last minute addition to the tour is a climb down into the cathedral’s crypt, a claustrophobia-inducing space that predates all five structures known to have been built on this spot dating back to the third century. Funny to think that the faithful in the Middle Ages viewed this cavernous space as “ancient” just as we view the current cathedral today.
We re-emerge from the crypt just in time to see a wedding party enter the nave. The monstrous pipe organ blares the beginning notes of an overture, and young men in long tails with red rose boutonnieres take their places. The bride descends from a classic coupe and gathers up her train, dwarfed by the façade behind her. How many ceremonies has this cathedral seen over the centuries? I can’t imagine getting married in such a setting!!!

Friday, October 23, 2009

Arrivee a Chartres!

caption


"Certainly, travel is more than the seeing of sights; it is a change that goes on, deep and permanent, in the ideas of living." - Miriam Beard, American humorist
(1901-1983)



Chartres! The familiar silhouette of its spires appears in ghostly form through the haze of an overcast day. More than 14 hours of planes, shuttles, trains, and buses melt away as we clamor our suitcases over the cobblestones toward the cathedral square and find our lodging in a hôtellerie run by the Diocese of Chartres. The courtyard of St.-Yves looks straight up at the apse (end of Courtyard of St. Yves Complexthe nave with the altar) of the cathedral – barely a stone’s throw away.
Deciding that a nap and shower can wait, I make my way into the cathedral for a peek, this time with eyes a little less ignorant about the story and form of the building. There’s the window with the Jesse Tree, there the famous blues of the Vièrge de la Belle Verrière (stained glass window with the Blessed Virgin), there the altar bearing the reliquary of the Sancta Camisia (Virgin Mary’s garment she wore when she gave birth to Jesus) brought to this site in 876 AD from Constantinople by Charles the Bald, grandson of Charlemagne – the fragile piece of silk that started all the fuss here in Chartres. The obscure cloth remnant, now ensconced behind glass and gold, became a revered object of pilgrimage for thousands of faithful from the early Middle Ages to the present. (Indeed, I met a lady from California at the hôtellerie who identified herself as a”pilgrim”.) Its miraculous escape from the flames that destroyed an earlier Romanesque basilica on this site spurred the construction of the present Gothic structure at the end of the 12th century.
A stroll outside the cathedral brings me to other familiar ornamentation. One is a column on the north portal, the statue of Abraham about to sacrifice his son Isaac. In marked distinction from its Romanesque predecessors, this sculpture is alive in emotion and animation. Knife in hand, Isaac turns his head sharply upward in response to a voice from heaven. There, just above the heads of the Old Testament figures who flank Abraham, is suspended the head of an angel that seems to drop out of position in its Gothic symmetry to deliver the heavenly reprieve. Abraham (as well as the other figures emerging from their bas relief as “columns” on the portals) stands on a symbol or element of his particular story: a sheep that would replace Isaac in sacrifice. I spot the Beau Dieu figure or

Beau Dieu figurethe Beautiful God that welcomed the faithful at eye level as a benevolent, handsome deity incarnate, in stark contrast to Christ the Judge who oversees the weighing of souls at the portal of the Last Judgment. The entire story of man’s creation, fall from grace, and salvation is richly and exquisitely told in layers on this building. It should be read and digested in chapters to appreciate it all!
Mary Ann and I enjoy a pique-nique supper of (what else?) French bread and cheese and make our way to the cathedral this evening for a pièce de résistance: a concert given by a boys’ choir from Paris. Hearing sweet angelic voices singing the timeless tones of Schubert’s Ave Maria and other sacred works while sitting beneath the soaring vaults of Notre Dame de Chartres is a little piece of heaven on earth!

Thursday, October 22, 2009

En voyage

"Pay attention to your dreams: when you go on a trip, in your dreams you will still be home.
Then after you've come home you'll dream of where you were. It's kind of a jet lag of
the consciousness." - Barbara Kingsolver, American writer


Le début de l’aventure!


I’m sitting in the Charlotte airport, just reunited with my sister who (blessedly!) will be my travel companion the next two weeks. She's also shared her photos for this blog. Thanks, #5.

This will be my third visit to Chartres, and I think back now to the first time I “encounter” the town and its cathedral. As a college student and language major, I was fulfilling a life-long dream of studying in France, spending a semester at the Sorbonne in Paris. It was an experience both thrilling and daunting, and I cherished every challenging moment. But I remember one week-end feeling the need to clear my head, escape the urban pulse that throbs through any major city, and find refuge in a smaller, calmer milieu. So I took the train and headed west, through rolling wheat fields as monumental Parisian splendor gave way to pastoral tranquility. And then I saw them: the mismatched spires of Chartres rising on the horizon like a beacon on a distant shore. My eye followed those spires as I hiked from the station to the ancient square spread before the great building. I was merely the latest in a millennia of pilgrims making their way to this spot, all of us feeling the heavenly – some would say “mystical” -- appeal that permeates the mammoth structure.

Fast forward a couple decades. I’m in France again, this time with my parents and younger sister. We’re doing the requisite Paris sights – the Louvre, Sacré Coeur, Notre Dame, the Champs-Elysées, along with sampling the decadent “chocolat africain” at Angélina’s. Wonderful experiences all, but we’re weary of the crowds and bustle of the city. So I lead my family to Chartres where we explore the medieval square that still anchors the town, stroll reverently beneath the soaring vaults and “read” the stone and glass Bible that is Chartres. The perfect day is capped off with a steaming bowl of soupe à l’oignon in the ancient Café Serpente on the cathedral square. I’m older this visit, but somehow the cathedral is not. It stands as timeless as ever, a grande old dame, ageless as the God whose story it tells.

My first pilgrimage took place in the dreams and adventures of youth. My second, a blessed gift from my parents who (I believe) caught a glimpse of what made their eldest daughter such an unrepentant Francophile. Now the third pilgrimage another ten years hence. This time, I’ve come to dig deeper into her mystery, unlock a few secrets in her masonry and stained glass, again walk the labyrinth, and perhaps get a very elementary understanding of the faithful artisans who built her – this undisputed masterpiece of Gothic. I’m participating in a two day study session called Journées d’Etude Culturelle (Cultural Study Days) sponsored by the Centre International du Vitrail (International Stained Glass Center), located in the shadow of the cathedral. I’m a student again – this time, working on an MA in History and Culture with the French Gothic Age as the centerpiece of my study -- and I feel that same combination of excitement and apprehension I felt all those years ago when I approached my term at the Sorbonne.

Join me as I go visit this Gothic treasure and others of the French Moyen Age, as we delve deeper into the special essence and transcendent quality that continue to draw the faithful and the merely curious from across the globe and across time.