How to
Distinguish Saints in Art by Their Costumes, Symbols, and Attributes – Major
Arthur de Bles (1925)
Our modernity prevents
us from understanding the meanings and messages behind most of the christian
artwork used as the foundation for western fine art. A visit to any large
museum will expose one to dozens, if not hundreds, of exquisitely painted
images, each one portraying moments in the lives of christian deities, saints,
and martyrs. From a time when reading itself
was kept from many of the common people, these images helped to foster
religious beliefs and feelings in those who viewed them. Despite widespread illiteracy, the people who
viewed these artworks understood them based on their communal knowledge of the
life stories of Jesus, his family and friends, his followers, and the many
saints and martyrs upon which the stories and legends of the christian church
rest. This great book helps explain and
instruct on how to look at these artworks to better understand them and the
times in which they were created.
This is a reference
work, and because of that, it is not something that most people would read
straight through. I am not most
people. I adore reference books. The more data the better! Arthur de Bles worked on this material for a
long time. This is evident in the
exhaustive and engrossing information contained within. Not only does the author explain in detail
the specific visual cues and symbols utilized in religious paintings, but he
immerses the reader in the times these paintings were created.
The first distinction
that Arthur de Bles shares is between the two main types of christian religious
art. The first kind is “narrative.” These images describe specific moments from
the Bible, including the many apocrypha books, as well as historic events relating
the lives of the people from the Bible and the many saints and martyrs that
followed. For example, a painting which
shows Joseph and Mary being turned away from shelter, and having to rest and
birth Jesus in a manger, is a narrative painting. The details included would correlate, at least
in the artist’s or patron’s mind, with the actual events described. The Bible tells of how a group of shepherds
saw the bright star signaling Jesus’ birth, and went to pay homage. There are many paintings showing this “adoration
of the shepherds,” and they include sheep, the shepherds, a manger/stable, and
the holy family.
Other examples of
narrative religious painting may show the martyrdoms of early christians. For example, many paintings show the crucifixion
of St. Peter, who, as the legend says, was crucified upside down in deference
to Jesus, who was crucified the “normal,” way.
Paintings such as these helped to share the stories from christianity with
the general population, many of whom could not read, not to mention the many who
were not ALLOWED to read the Bible because the Roman Catholic church loved to
keep regular people ignorant and subservient to their sacerdotal lackeys. In fact, in many of the poorer nations, Roman
Catholics today continue to provide church services in Latin, in order to keep
the parishioners from actually understanding what is happening, thereby
remaining in awe of the priest and his fancy mumbo-jumbo. Pathetic.
The other type of
christian religious painting is the “devotional” one. In these artworks, the purpose is not to tell
a historical tale, or to describe events.
Devotional artworks are meant to be understood internally, as visual
representations of the goodness of the saints, martyrs, religious figures,
etc. Paintings of Mary, holding the
infant Jesus, surrounded by angels, saints, and other representations of the divinity,
are innumerable. In these artworks, the
intent is to strengthen the religious ardor of the viewer, by symbolically
portraying the goodness of someone such as Mary or John the Baptist, or by
symbolically rendering the strength of will and faith needed to endure the
horrible tortures and deaths of the christian martyrs. Devotional images are meant to inspire
religious fervor, as opposed to the narrative religious paintings which seek to
instruct on facts and details.
Once de Bles describes
these types, he divides the rest of the book into sections detailing
specifically the visual clues and symbols used in art for the holy family, and
the prophets and saints in the Bible.
Other sections explore the symbols and imagery used to depict the many saints
and martyrs of the early christian church.
Each topic is heavily illustrated and annotated, allowing the reader to
seek these artworks out in person, or to look for further resources with which
to study these pieces of art history.
One thing that Arthur
de Bles makes perfectly clear, is how few of these artworks were created
because the artist themselves was a deeply religious and devotional person
whose personal faith insisted that they paint religious pictures. Most of the tens of thousands of paintings
and images included in this book were commissioned by either churches, religious
orders, wealthy bishops, or rich and powerful men seeking to curry favor with
the “Lort,” or to at least look like devout, faithful christians. It is an old trick, covering and surrounding oneself
in the symbols and images of faith, all the while ignoring the actual commandments
of that faith and behaving like a fucking waste of humanity.
In a very real sense,
every religious image is propaganda, selling the idea that the faith depicted
is the one that is true and real, to the exclusion of the others. Images of martyrs cannot help but inculcate
an ignorant, illiterate population into admiring the martyr’s devotion and faith,
and, in return, to consider themselves as beneath these saints, as someone
nearly irredeemable whose soul can only be saved by the intercession of some
priest or church. It is the oldest scam
in the word, and differs not at all from a tribal shaman covering themselves in
dung, ingesting psychoactive substances, and scaring the general crap out of
their tribe, all to make sure they behave and fall in line with whatever the
shaman/priest wants the people to believe.
The idea that a “picture is worth a thousand words” is very true, and it
is used to this very day by despots, tyrants, and wastes of humanity in order to
control the people with fear.
Books such as these, crammed
full of information, are invaluable.
They provide us with a means to understand the past, while allowing us
to learn the details which those in power seek to keep from us. Information is freedom. Knowledge is freedom. Ignorance is the easiest way to keep someone
enslaved. Always look to see who is out
there seeking to educate and inform, and who is out there trying to
indoctrinate and control. This is the
easiest way to differentiate good from evil in this world.
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