Feuilleton

✥ We don’t know the names of many of the greatest artists in the Western tradition who worked before the Renaissance. Of course there have always been “Old Masters” of a sort. Pheidias of Athens remains renowned even today for the monumental sculptures he created for the Parthenon during the 430s B.C.—the finest of these, the Elgin Marbles, can still be seen in the British Museum. The names and works of many of the most important artists of classical and Hellenistic Greece have retained some of their fame thanks mainly to Pliny the Elder. In 1506, when the famous Laocoön group of statues (now in the Vatican) was unearthed in Rome, it was immediately identified thanks to Pliny’s description in book thirty-six of his Natural History. The greatest Renaissance painters and sculptors saw themselves in direct competition with the artists described by Pliny.

That said, most of the finest creators of Greek and Roman classical art are now anonymous. True, many of the painters of Athenian vases signed their work, but we have no idea who created the majority of portrait busts, bronze statues, mosaics, wall paintings, sarcophagi, carved grave stelae, cult images, monumental friezes, or large-scale works of decorative art that can now be seen in the great collections of Europe and the New World. Yet there is always a strong sense of personality in the most important art: This is what separates celebrated pieces like the Parthenon Frieze from the frigidly impressive monumental scenes on Augustus’s Ara Pacis.

In the case of the statues in Roman museums that are copies of lost Greek originals, we have no idea who is responsible for pieces like the exceptionally sensitive reproductions that were unearthed in the ruins of the Emperor Hadrian’s villa at Tivoli. Whoever sculpted the crouching Venus that is now in the Palazzo Massimo alle Terme had a skill with marble that remained unequaled until the sixteenth century. But the men who created these—even the best of them—were, for the most part, thought of as mere artisans in a workshop.

Ancient art was considered a focus for the viewer’s emotions, not an outlet for the artist’s. Greek and Roman artistic conventions are ultimately rooted in ancient religion and its notions of divinity, its sacrificial rituals, its manners of worship and devotion, and its range of concepts of what man is and what his role might be in the world or the universe. Christian doctrines and dogmas are by no means incompatible with the elements of classical art, but no Christian artist can adopt Greco–Roman precedents unthinkingly without risking incoherence in what he creates.

When we talk about “classical art,” we are generalizing broadly to describe works created mainly in Athens from the fifth and fourth centuries B.C.; the Hellenistic Greek world in the third, second, and first centuries B.C.; and Rome and her empire. What counts as “classical” art in a Roman context is a little harder to delineate, although it begins with the tradition of hyper-realistic portrait busts in the third century B.C. or so and ends in the third century A.D., when the last great monumental sarcophagi are created. Early Christian art of the Roman period is never “classical”; it tends to be important for spiritual or historical reasons rather than purely aesthetic ones.

Roman art and architecture went into visible decline after the death of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius in A.D. 180: This is obvious to any normal person walking past a row of portrait busts in a museum. The self-destruction of the Roman Empire in the West was, of course, fundamentally a spiritual matter even more than it was a concatenation of material realities, economic conditions, venal and stupid governments, a degraded constitution, a bloated and cowardly administrative class, a degenerated population, corrupted morals, a corrosive general culture, and a range of intellectual fashions that failed to take nature into account or conform to reality.

Christianity found expression in Roman literature long before Christians began to develop a visual language. This is inevitable given the precarious status of Christianity in the Roman Empire before the fourth century A.D. The martyr-bishop Cyprian of Carthage was writing the sweetest, most perfect Latin of his age well over a century before Saints Jerome and Augustine began composing the last major bodies of literary work in the Roman tradition prior to the fall of the Western Empire in 476.

Christian art had no such flowering. The Great Persecution ended in 313; by that time, architecture and the visual arts were in a sorry state indeed. The products of the Emperor Constantine’s lavish patronage of that time look embarrassingly childish when compared with the imperial art of the second century. At best, the artists, architects, and craftsmen of the Eastern Empire could make luxury objects or symbols of power and wealth. On closer examination, the glory of Byzantine art is not always God’s; the viewer’s reaction tends to be: That must have been expensive. Let it be emphasized that the apparent primitivism of Byzantine religious art is not necessarily barbarous. Byzantine and medieval art developed conventions that often served as effective aids to prayer. The sheer repetitiveness of symbolism and imagery and the lack of creative invention on the part of the artist sometimes enhance a given piece’s spiritual function.

Many of us use visual stimuli as an aid to prayer. The fifteen mysteries of the Rosary can be difficult to imagine for the purposes of contemplation, as you know if you have ever tried to picture the Resurrection in your head. But if you make use of visual aids, your mind may wander less, enabling you to focus and concentrate on that mystery rather than on some trivial distraction. Some famous pictures that might help with the Joyful Mysteries are Botticelli’s Cestello Annunciation, Mariotti Albertinelli’s Visitation, Gerrit van Honthorst’s Adoration, Giovanni Bellini’s Presentation, and Bernardino Luini’s Christ Among the Doctors.

If these images are already familiar to you, then you will not contemplate them purely as art. Instead you will look through them, past the artist’s interpretations, and immerse yourself in these scenes in ways that might be difficult if you were trying to reconstruct them in your head purely from memory of the relevant Gospel passages. But there are limits to the usefulness of visual aids to prayer. No artist has ever produced a really satisfying evocation of the finding in the temple of the child Jesus, for example. A painting, drawing, or engraving can only reveal a facet or two of a given mystery, as you realize when you go back to the New Testament for refreshment. When you use religious art to help you pray, you come to wonder just how much realism you need.

—Jaspreet Singh Boparai

✥ After the infamous draft letter attributed to Bishop M— of the Diocese of C— was leaked earlier this year in the daily religion press, we chose not to report on our own copy, which we obtained independently. We also assumed the two documents were substantially the same, but it now appears that the version provided to THE LAMP was a somewhat earlier draft, which included additional restrictions unmentioned in earlier reporting. While attempts to verify the accuracy of the proposed rules were unsuccessful at the time this issue went to press, we are prepared to stand by our reporting of the following extracts:

Since there is no mention of them in the conciliar documents, priests should refrain from wearing glasses while celebrating Mass.

The maximum number of guitars in parish music ministry is three. Bass guitars are not included in this calculation (have as many as you want!). Drum solos are prohibited, except during the Offertory, when a one-minute solo may be acceptable.

Although women assisting at Mass should not wear mantillas, scarves, or similar head coverings, men are allowed and encouraged to do so.

On the first Sunday of the N.F.L. season, the presider is encouraged to cheer “Go Panthers!” immediately prior to the final blessing. If the Panthers play on Thursday of Week One, the presider should find ways during Mass to comment on the outcome of the game.

If the Panthers are playing in an international game broadcast in the United States on Sunday morning, streaming the game is an appropriate use of projection during Mass.

All vestments should be at least eighty-seven percent polyester.

All priests have permission to celebrate the liturgical books promulgated by Pope Saint Paul VI and Pope Saint John Paul II in Esperanto, so long as the readings and homily remain in the vernacular.

All homilies must begin with an obviously fictional story set in the present. The story should ideally include obvious anachronisms, such as landline telephones.

The appropriate place for the homilist to give his sermon is in front of the sanctuary close to the first row of pews. Light crowd work is encouraged.

New and remodeled churches should avoid placing the tabernacle in the center of the sanctuary behind the altar. Instead, it should be placed in a broom closet–like space or in the parish basement.

✥ It’s been too long, hasn’t it? After a long hiatus, our bedtime story series returns with “Toads and Diamonds” from the Blue Fairy Book:

There was once upon a time a widow who had two daughters. The eldest was so much like her in the face and humor that whoever looked upon the daughter saw the mother. They were both so disagreeable and so proud that there was no living with them.

The youngest, who was the very picture of her father for courtesy and sweetness of temper, was withal one of the most beautiful girls ever seen. As people naturally love their own likeness, this mother even doted on her eldest daughter and at the same time had a horrible aversion for the youngest—she made her eat in the kitchen and work continually.

Among other things, this poor child was forced twice a day to draw water above a mile and a-half off the house, and bring home a pitcher full of it. One day, as she was at this fountain, there came to her a poor woman, who begged of her to let her drink.

“Oh! ay, with all my heart, Goody,” said this pretty little girl; and rinsing immediately the pitcher, she took up some water from the clearest place of the fountain, and gave it to her, holding up the pitcher all the while, that she might drink the easier.

The good woman, having drunk, said to her: “You are so very pretty, my dear, so good and so mannerly, that I cannot help giving you a gift.” For this was a fairy, who had taken the form of a poor country woman, to see how far the civility and good manners of this pretty girl would go. “I will give you for a gift,” continued the Fairy, “that, at every word you speak, there shall come out of your mouth either a flower or a jewel.”

When this pretty girl came home her mother scolded her for staying so long at the fountain.

“I beg your pardon, mamma,” said the poor girl, “for not making more haste.”

And in speaking these words there came out of her mouth two roses, two pearls, and two diamonds.

“What is it I see there?” said the mother, quite astonished. “I think I see pearls and diamonds come out of the girl’s mouth! How happens this, child?”

The poor creature told her frankly all the matter, not without dropping out infinite numbers of diamonds.

“In good faith,” cried the mother, “I must send my child thither. Come hither, Fanny; look what comes out of thy sister’s mouth when she speaks. Wouldst not thou be glad, my dear, to have the same gift given thee? Thou hast nothing else to do but go and draw water out of the fountain, and when a certain poor woman asks you to let her drink, to give it to her very civilly.”

“It would be a very fine sight indeed,” said this ill-bred minx, “to see me go draw water.”

“You shall go, hussy!” said the mother; “and this minute.”

So away she went, but grumbling all the way, taking with her the best silver tankard in the house.

She was no sooner at the fountain than she saw coming out of the wood a lady most gloriously dressed, who came up to her, and asked to drink. This was, you must know, the very fairy who appeared to her sister, but now had taken the air and dress of a princess, to see how far this girl’s rudeness would go.

“Am I come hither,” said the proud, saucy one, “to serve you with water, pray? I suppose the silver tankard was brought purely for your ladyship, was it? However, you may drink out of it, if you have a fancy.”

“You are not over and above mannerly,” answered the Fairy, without putting herself in a passion. “Well, then, since you have so little breeding, and are so disobliging, I give you for a gift that at every word you speak there shall come out of your mouth a snake or a toad.”

So soon as her mother saw her coming she cried out: “Well, daughter?”

“Well, mother?” answered the pert hussy, throwing out of her mouth two vipers and two toads.

“Oh! mercy,” cried the mother; “what is it I see? Oh! It is that wretch her sister who has occasioned all this; but she shall pay for it,” and immediately she ran to beat her. The poor child fled away from her, and went to hide herself in the forest, not far from thence.

The King’s son, then on his return from hunting, met her, and seeing her so very pretty, asked her what she did there alone and why she cried.

“Alas! sir, my mamma has turned me out of doors.”

The King’s son, who saw five or six pearls and as many diamonds come out of her mouth, desired her to tell him how that happened. She thereupon told him the whole story; and so the King’s son fell in love with her, and, considering himself that such a gift was worth more than any marriage portion, conducted her to the palace of the King his father, and there married her.

As for the sister, she made herself so much hated that her own mother turned her off; and the miserable wretch, having wandered about a good while without finding anybody to take her in, went to a corner of the wood, and there died.