DOI Artikel:
Adamski, Jakub: Between form and meaning: research on Gothic architecture as a bearer of ideological content in Polish historiography of the last five decades
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.54670#0009
8
its unclear thematic scope and disjointed structure, both
of which indicate the absence of a well-considered vision
of the central subject as expressed in the books title.24 In
this context, the small but significant books by Christoph
Markschies25 and Martin Biichsel,26 published in, respec-
tively, the years 1995 and 1997 and comprehensively dis-
cussed by Jarosław Jarzewicz,27 also merit a mention. Ow-
ing to scrupulous analyses, especially of a historical and
philological nature, these two studies sounded the death
knell of the great theory that neo-Platonic philosophy in-
fluenced Abbot Sugers thought and the birth of Gothic
architecture in the middle of the 12th century.
As a result of all the above factors, the “iconologica!”
current, even though represented by well-known and of-
ten-analysed studies, had a limited influence on the devel-
opment of research on medieval architecture as a carrier
of ideological content. To put it plainly, this model of re-
search course was too difficult, burdened with too much
uncertainty, and carried too much risk of overinterpre-
tation to tangibly and practically influence the study of
medieval architecture. The other current, however, which
Crossley calls the “iconographie” one, soon came to dom-
inate this area of research on medieval art. In contrast to
the “iconologists”, the “iconographers” of architecture fo-
cused on the study of actual works in their historical and
functional specificity, looking for connections between
the world of forms and the world of ideas and meanings.
This was expressed mainly in the process of establishing
the relations between the form and the function of an edi-
fice, since this was most often the locus where the content
was encoded. Thus understood, the method of research-
ing iconography of medieval architecture was, according
to Crossley, “fundamentally inductive rather than deduc-
tive, historical than ideological, analytic than synthetic.
They [i.e. iconographers] fix their attention on the per-
sonality and ideals of the individual patron and architect;
and their conclusions rest on evidence of specific docu-
ments about specific buildings.”28 This was also what made
this approach far more popular - in Poland as well - and,
in a sense, more universal, by which we should under-
stand the applicability of this method in researching con-
crete structures, including those of lesser artistic quality.
The pioneer of this research current was Richard Krau-
theimer, whose 1942 essay Introduction to an “Iconogra-
phy of Medieval Architecture”, which defined the tasks and
24 P. Crossley, ‘Believing and Seeing: The Art of Gothic Cathedrals.
By Roland Recht’ (book review), The Burlington Magazine, 151,
2009, no. 1280, pp. 771-772.
25 C. Markschies, Gibt es eine “Theologie der gotischen Kathedra-
le?“ Nochmals: Suger von Saint-Denis und Sankt Dionys vom Areo-
pag, Heidelberg, 1995.
26 M. Büchsel, Geburt der Gotik. Abt Sugers Konzept für die Ab-
teikirche Saint-Denis, Freiburg im Breisgau, 1997.
27 J. Jarzewicz, ‘O dwóch niewielkich książkach i jednej wielkiej te-
orii’, Artium Quaestiones, 13, 2002, pp. 359-371.
28 Quotation after P. Crossley, ‘In Search’, p. 56 (as in note 9).
presented model iconographie analyses, became a point
of reference for the following generations of historians of
medieval architecture.29 The most inspiring section of that
essay was the one where Krautheimer focused his atten-
tion on the concept of a copy in medieval architecture.
He assumed that in the eyes of the original users of a giv-
en building, this building may have constituted a copy of
some other structure, infused with certain meanings, as
long as some specific, constitutive features of that ideolog-
ically desirable model were repeated in its architecture. In
Polish medieval studies of the last five decades, the most
successful and convincing example of tracing a similar in-
terdependence comes from the essays by Andrzej Grzyb-
kowski from the years 1971 and 1997.30 These essays con-
cern the octagonal church of St. Andrew in Gosławice
near Konin, erected ca. 1418-1426 by Andrzej Łaskarz, the
bishop of Poznań, as an “ideological copy” of the Church
of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Grzybkowski rightly
assumed that it should rather be described as an “indirect
copy”, since Bishop Łaskarz was familiar with the simpli-
fied shape of the central structure with the four rectangu-
lar annexes of the early medieval chapel of St. Maurice at
the cathedral of Constance, which he had certainly seen
when he was a participant in the famous Council held
there in the years 1415-1418.
Yet Krautheimers conception of a “copy” also carried
a risk of overinterpretation and distortion, mostly because
the 1942 essay does not contains suitably detailed theo-
retical considerations regarding the range of meanings he
ascribed to the term “copy”.31 Hence the latter half of the
20th century abounded in studies in which the relation of
the alleged “copy” to the original structure was practically
reduced to the formal similarity of the two buildings, a re-
lation not confirmed by source materials and usually not
found to have been motivated by ideological reasons.
Examples of such a careless application of the term
“copy” unsupported by a suitably precise analysis of ar-
chitectural forms or a definition of the historical context
are provided by the works of Marian Kutzner. In an article
published in 1986, Kutzner described the parish church of
St. James in Toruń as a copy of the church of the Virgin
Mary in Lübeck, in spite of all the differences in the scale
29 R. Krautheimer, ‘Introduction to an “Iconography of Medieval
Architecture’”, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 5,
1942, pp. 1-33.
30 A. Grzybkowski, ‘Kościół w Gosławicach. Zagadnienie genezy’,
Kwartalnik Architektury i Urbanistyki, 16,1971, pp. 269-310; idem,
‘Kościoły w Gosławicach i Miszewie jako pośrednie kopie Ana-
stasis,’ in Jerozolima w kulturze europejskiej, ed. by R Paszkiewicz,
T. Zadrożny, Warsaw, 1977, s. 155-168 [reprinted in idem, Między
formą a znaczeniem. Studia z ikonografii, architektury i rzeźby go-
tyckiej, Warsaw, 1997, pp. 120-138].
31 Cf. L. Bosman, Architektur und Zitat. Die Geschichtlichkeit von
Bauten aus der Vergangenheit’, in Architektur als Zitat. Formen,
Motive und Strategien der Vergegenwärtigung, ed. by H. Brandl,
A. Ranft, A. Waschbüsch, Regensburg, 2014, pp. 12-13.
its unclear thematic scope and disjointed structure, both
of which indicate the absence of a well-considered vision
of the central subject as expressed in the books title.24 In
this context, the small but significant books by Christoph
Markschies25 and Martin Biichsel,26 published in, respec-
tively, the years 1995 and 1997 and comprehensively dis-
cussed by Jarosław Jarzewicz,27 also merit a mention. Ow-
ing to scrupulous analyses, especially of a historical and
philological nature, these two studies sounded the death
knell of the great theory that neo-Platonic philosophy in-
fluenced Abbot Sugers thought and the birth of Gothic
architecture in the middle of the 12th century.
As a result of all the above factors, the “iconologica!”
current, even though represented by well-known and of-
ten-analysed studies, had a limited influence on the devel-
opment of research on medieval architecture as a carrier
of ideological content. To put it plainly, this model of re-
search course was too difficult, burdened with too much
uncertainty, and carried too much risk of overinterpre-
tation to tangibly and practically influence the study of
medieval architecture. The other current, however, which
Crossley calls the “iconographie” one, soon came to dom-
inate this area of research on medieval art. In contrast to
the “iconologists”, the “iconographers” of architecture fo-
cused on the study of actual works in their historical and
functional specificity, looking for connections between
the world of forms and the world of ideas and meanings.
This was expressed mainly in the process of establishing
the relations between the form and the function of an edi-
fice, since this was most often the locus where the content
was encoded. Thus understood, the method of research-
ing iconography of medieval architecture was, according
to Crossley, “fundamentally inductive rather than deduc-
tive, historical than ideological, analytic than synthetic.
They [i.e. iconographers] fix their attention on the per-
sonality and ideals of the individual patron and architect;
and their conclusions rest on evidence of specific docu-
ments about specific buildings.”28 This was also what made
this approach far more popular - in Poland as well - and,
in a sense, more universal, by which we should under-
stand the applicability of this method in researching con-
crete structures, including those of lesser artistic quality.
The pioneer of this research current was Richard Krau-
theimer, whose 1942 essay Introduction to an “Iconogra-
phy of Medieval Architecture”, which defined the tasks and
24 P. Crossley, ‘Believing and Seeing: The Art of Gothic Cathedrals.
By Roland Recht’ (book review), The Burlington Magazine, 151,
2009, no. 1280, pp. 771-772.
25 C. Markschies, Gibt es eine “Theologie der gotischen Kathedra-
le?“ Nochmals: Suger von Saint-Denis und Sankt Dionys vom Areo-
pag, Heidelberg, 1995.
26 M. Büchsel, Geburt der Gotik. Abt Sugers Konzept für die Ab-
teikirche Saint-Denis, Freiburg im Breisgau, 1997.
27 J. Jarzewicz, ‘O dwóch niewielkich książkach i jednej wielkiej te-
orii’, Artium Quaestiones, 13, 2002, pp. 359-371.
28 Quotation after P. Crossley, ‘In Search’, p. 56 (as in note 9).
presented model iconographie analyses, became a point
of reference for the following generations of historians of
medieval architecture.29 The most inspiring section of that
essay was the one where Krautheimer focused his atten-
tion on the concept of a copy in medieval architecture.
He assumed that in the eyes of the original users of a giv-
en building, this building may have constituted a copy of
some other structure, infused with certain meanings, as
long as some specific, constitutive features of that ideolog-
ically desirable model were repeated in its architecture. In
Polish medieval studies of the last five decades, the most
successful and convincing example of tracing a similar in-
terdependence comes from the essays by Andrzej Grzyb-
kowski from the years 1971 and 1997.30 These essays con-
cern the octagonal church of St. Andrew in Gosławice
near Konin, erected ca. 1418-1426 by Andrzej Łaskarz, the
bishop of Poznań, as an “ideological copy” of the Church
of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Grzybkowski rightly
assumed that it should rather be described as an “indirect
copy”, since Bishop Łaskarz was familiar with the simpli-
fied shape of the central structure with the four rectangu-
lar annexes of the early medieval chapel of St. Maurice at
the cathedral of Constance, which he had certainly seen
when he was a participant in the famous Council held
there in the years 1415-1418.
Yet Krautheimers conception of a “copy” also carried
a risk of overinterpretation and distortion, mostly because
the 1942 essay does not contains suitably detailed theo-
retical considerations regarding the range of meanings he
ascribed to the term “copy”.31 Hence the latter half of the
20th century abounded in studies in which the relation of
the alleged “copy” to the original structure was practically
reduced to the formal similarity of the two buildings, a re-
lation not confirmed by source materials and usually not
found to have been motivated by ideological reasons.
Examples of such a careless application of the term
“copy” unsupported by a suitably precise analysis of ar-
chitectural forms or a definition of the historical context
are provided by the works of Marian Kutzner. In an article
published in 1986, Kutzner described the parish church of
St. James in Toruń as a copy of the church of the Virgin
Mary in Lübeck, in spite of all the differences in the scale
29 R. Krautheimer, ‘Introduction to an “Iconography of Medieval
Architecture’”, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 5,
1942, pp. 1-33.
30 A. Grzybkowski, ‘Kościół w Gosławicach. Zagadnienie genezy’,
Kwartalnik Architektury i Urbanistyki, 16,1971, pp. 269-310; idem,
‘Kościoły w Gosławicach i Miszewie jako pośrednie kopie Ana-
stasis,’ in Jerozolima w kulturze europejskiej, ed. by R Paszkiewicz,
T. Zadrożny, Warsaw, 1977, s. 155-168 [reprinted in idem, Między
formą a znaczeniem. Studia z ikonografii, architektury i rzeźby go-
tyckiej, Warsaw, 1997, pp. 120-138].
31 Cf. L. Bosman, Architektur und Zitat. Die Geschichtlichkeit von
Bauten aus der Vergangenheit’, in Architektur als Zitat. Formen,
Motive und Strategien der Vergegenwärtigung, ed. by H. Brandl,
A. Ranft, A. Waschbüsch, Regensburg, 2014, pp. 12-13.