Text and Illustrations from Wikipedia - the free encyclopaedia,
unless otherwise stated.
English: The longitudinal emphasis, in the Nave of Wells Cathedral,
Somerset, England, is typically English.
Français: Intérieur de la cathédrale de Wells, Somerset, Angleterre.
Photo: 6 May 2005.
Source: Own work.
(Wikimedia Commons)
The distinctive characteristic of Gothic Cathedrals of the
Iberian Peninsula is their spatial complexity, with many areas of different shapes leading from each other. They are comparatively wide, and often have very tall Arcades surmounted by low Clerestories, giving a similar spacious appearance to the
hallenkirche of Germany, as at the Church of the
Batalha Monastery, in Portugal.
Many of the Cathedrals are completely surrounded by Chapels. Like English Cathedrals, each is often stylistically diverse. This expresses itself both in the addition of Chapels and in the application of decorative details drawn from different sources. Among the influences, on both decoration and form, are
Islamic architecture, and, towards the end of the period, Renaissance details combined with the Gothic in a distinctive manner.
The West Front, as at
Leon Cathedral, typically resembles a French West Front, but wider in proportion to height, and often with greater diversity of detail, and a combination of intricate ornament with broad plain surfaces. At
Burgos Cathedral, there are Spires of German style. The roof-line often has pierced Parapets, with comparatively few Pinnacles. There are often Towers and Domes, of a great variety of shapes and structural invention, rising above the roof.
English: Front of the Pope's Palace in Avignon, France.
Français: Façade avant du Palais des Papes à Avignon.
Deutsch: Vorderansicht des Papst-Palastes in Avignon.
Photo: 3 April 2005.
Source: Own work.
(Wikimedia Commons)
The distinctive characteristic of Italian Gothic is the use of polychrome decoration, both externally, as marble veneer on the brick façade, and, also, internally, where the Arches are often made of alternating black and white segments, and where the Columns may be painted red, the walls decorated with frescoes and the Apse with mosaic. The Plan is usually regular and symmetrical.
With the exception of Milan Cathedral, which is Germanic in style, Italian Cathedrals have few and widely spaced Columns. The proportions are generally mathematically equilibriated, based on the square and the concept of "armonìa", and, except in Venice, where they loved Flamboyant Arches, the Arches are almost always equilateral. Colours and mouldings define the architectural units rather than blending them.
Italian Cathedral façades are often polychrome and may include mosaics in the Lunettes over the doors. The façades have projecting open Porches, and Occular or Wheel Windows, rather than Rose Windows, and do not usually have a Tower.
The Crossing is usually surmounted by a Dome. There is often a free-standing Tower and Baptistry. The Eastern End usually has an Apse of comparatively low projection. The windows are not as large as in Northern Europe and, although Stained Glass Windows are often found, the favourite narrative medium for the Interior is the
fresco.
English: Metropolitan Cathedral-Basilica
of the Nativity of Saint Mary,
Milan, Italy.
Italiano: Basilica cattedrale metropolitana
di Santa Maria Nascente,
Milano, Italia.
Photo: February 2009.
Source: Own work.
(Wikimedia Commons)
Synagogues, commonly built in the prevailing architectural style of the period and country where they are constructed, were built in the Gothic style in Europe during the Mediaeval period. A surviving example is the
Old New Synagogue in Prague, built in the 13th-Century. Many examples of secular, non-military, structures in Gothic style survive in fairly original condition. The
Palais des Papes, in Avignon, France, is the best complete large Royal Palace, with partial survivals in the Great Hall at the
Palace of Westminster, London, an 11th-Century hall, renovated in the Late-14th-Century with Gothic windows and a wooden
Hammer-Beam roof, and the famous
Conciergerie, former Palace of the Kings of France, in Paris.
In addition to monumental secular architecture, examples of the Gothic style can be seen in surviving Mediaeval portions of cities across Europe, above all the distinctive
Venetian Gothic, such as the
Ca' d'Oro, Venice, Italy. The house of the wealthy Early-15th-Century merchant,
Jacques Coeur, in
Bourges, France, is the classic Gothic bourgeois mansion, full of the asymmetry and complicated detail beloved of the Gothic Revival.
English: Ca' d'Oro façade overlooking the Grand Canal, Venice, Italy.
Photo: 5 July 2011.
Source: Own work.
(Wikimedia Commons)
Other cities, with a concentration of secular Gothic, include
Bruges, Belgium, and
Siena, Italy. Most surviving small secular buildings are relatively plain and straightforward; most windows are flat-topped with
mullions, with Pointed Arches and Vaulted Ceilings often only found at a few focal points. The country-houses of the nobility were slow to abandon the appearance of being a Castle, even in parts of Europe, like England, where defence had ceased to be a real concern. The living and working parts of many Monastic buildings survive, for example at
Mont Saint-Michel, France.
There are many excellent examples of secular
Brick Gothic structures scattered throughout Poland and the Baltic States, most notably
Malbork Castle, the
Gdańsk and
Wrocław Town Halls, and
Collegium Maius, in
Kraków, Poland.
Exceptional works of Gothic architecture can also be found in
Sicily,
Cyprus, especially in the walled cities of
Nicosia and
Famagusta. Also, the roof of the
Znojmo Town Hall Tower, in the
Czech Republic, is an excellent example of Late-Gothic craftsmanship.
English: Malbork Castle, Żuławy region, Poland.
Panorama der Marienburg.
Photo: 14 July 2010.
Source: Own work.
(Wikimedia Commons)
In 1663, at the
Archbishop of Canterbury's residence,
Lambeth Palace, England, a Gothic
Hammer-Beam roof was built to replace that destroyed when the building was sacked during the
English Civil War. Also in the Late-17th-Century, some discreet Gothic details appeared on new construction at
Oxford University and
Cambridge University, notably on
Tom Tower at
Christ Church, Oxford, by
Christopher Wren. It is not easy to decide whether these instances were Gothic Survival or early appearances of Gothic Revival.
In England, in the Mid-18th-Century, the Gothic style was more widely revived, first as a decorative, whimsical, alternative to
Rococo, that is still conventionally termed 'Gothick', of which
Horace Walpole's Twickenham Villa, "
Strawberry Hill", is the familiar example.
Horace Walpole's house, Strawberry Hill, Twickenham, England,
gleaming white in Spring sunshine, soon after restoration.
Photo: 25 May 2012.
Source: Own work.
(Wikimedia Commons)
Polski: Ratusz we Wrocławiu.
Deutsch: Breslauer Rathaus.
Photo: 20 September 2009.
Source: Own work.
(Wikimedia Commons)
In England, partly in response to a philosophy propounded by the
Oxford Movement, and others associated with the emerging revival of 'High Church' or
Anglo-Catholic ideas, during the second quarter of the 19th-Century, Neo-Gothic began to become promoted by influential establishment figures as the preferred style for ecclesiastical, civic and institutional architecture.
The appeal of this
Gothic Revival (which, after 1837, in Britain, is sometimes termed "
Victorian Gothic"), gradually widened to encompass "Low Church", as well as "High Church", clients. This period of more universal appeal, spanning 1855–1885, is known in Britain as "High Victorian Gothic".
The
Houses of Parliament, in London, by Sir
Charles Barry, with Interiors by a major exponent of the Early-Gothic Revival,
Augustus Welby Pugin, is an example of the Gothic Revival style from its earlier period in the second quarter of the 19th-Century. Examples from the High Victorian Gothic period include
George Gilbert Scott's design for the
Albert Memorial, in London, and
William Butterfield's Chapel, at
Keble College, Oxford.
From the second half of the 19th-Century, onwards, it became more common in Britain for Neo-Gothic to be used in the design of non-ecclesiastical and non-governmental building types. Gothic details even began to appear in working-class housing schemes subsidised by philanthropy, though, given the expense, less frequently than in the design of Upper- and Middle-Class housing.
Westminster Hall, in the Palace of Westminster, London,
with its classic Hammer-Beam roof.
Date: November 1808.
Source: Ackermann's Microcosm of London (1808-11);
Author: Thomas Rowlandson (1756-1827)
and Augustus Pugin (1768-1832).
(Wikimedia Commons)
in Westminster Hall, London, 1821.
Artist: Unknown.
(Wikimedia Commons)
The Houses of Parliament, London.
Photo: July 2008.
Source: Own work.
(Wikimedia Commons)
In France, simultaneously, the towering figure of the Gothic Revival was
Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, who outdid historical Gothic constructions to create a Gothic as it ought to have been, notably at the fortified city of
Carcassonne, in the South of France, and in some richly-fortified Keeps for industrial magnates.
Viollet-le-Duc compiled and co-ordinated an
Encyclopédie médiévale, that was a rich repertory that his contemporaries mined for architectural details. He effected vigorous restoration of crumbling detail of French Cathedrals, including the
Abbey of Saint-Denis and, famously, at
Notre Dame, Paris, where many of whose most "Gothic" gargoyles are Viollet-le-Duc's. He taught a generation of Reform-Gothic designers and showed how to apply Gothic style to modern structural materials, especially
cast iron.
In Germany, the great Cathedral of
Cologne and the
Ulm Minster, left unfinished for 600 years, were brought to completion, while, in Italy,
Florence Cathedral finally received its polychrome Gothic façade. New Churches in the Gothic style were created all over the world, including Mexico,
Argentina, Japan, Thailand, India, Australia, New Zealand, Hawaii and South Africa.
Eugène Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc.
und Kunsthistoriker. Porträt von Nadar.
Author: Nadar (1820–1910).
(Wikimedia Commons)
Basilica of Mary Magdalene,
Saint Maximin-la-Sainte, Baume, France.
Photo: December 2003.
Source: Übernahme aus der engl.WP.
This File: 30 August 2005.
(Wikimedia Commons)
France,was begun in 1295.
Building work continued for more than 100 years,
maintaining the 13th-Century style.
As in Europe, the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand utilised Neo-Gothic for the building of Universities, a fine example being
Sydney University, by
Edmund Blacket. In Canada, the Canadian
Parliament Buildings, in
Ottawa, designed by
Thomas Fuller and
Chilion Jones, with its huge centrally-placed Tower, draws influence from Flemish Gothic buildings.
Although falling out of favour for domestic and civic use, Gothic, for Churches and Universities, continued into the 20th-Century, with buildings such as
Liverpool Cathedral, the
Cathedral of Saint John the Divine, New York, and
São Paulo Cathedral, Brazil. The Gothic style was also applied to iron-framed city skyscrapers, such as
Cass Gilbert's
Woolworth Building and
Raymond Hood's
Tribune Tower.
Post-Modernism, in the Late-20th- and Early-21st-Centuries, has seen some revival of Gothic forms in individual buildings, such as the
Gare do Oriente, in Lisbon, Portugal, and a finishing of the
Cathedral of Our Lady of Guadalupe, in Mexico.
THIS CONCLUDES THE SERIES OF ARTICLES ON "GOTHIC".
