Barbara Baert

Touching the Hem: The Thread between Garment and Blood in the Story of the Woman with the Haemorrhage (Mark 5:24b-34parr)

Abstract In this article I start from a particular passage in the New Testament that will touch on biblical threads and paradigms related to textile. Mark 5:24b-34, Luke 8:42-48, and Matthew 9:19-22 tell the story of the healing of the “woman with an issue of blood,” the Haemorrhoissa. This story (and its Nachleben in commentaries and iconographies) pulsates with a delicate energy relating to textile, cloth, and the magical impact of touch. I will firstly investigate upon those textile-related dimensions by situating the passage in what I term its narrative, iconic, and anthropological space. This will finally lead to a hypothesis on the origin of the medieval assimilation of the Haemorrhoissa to the Veronica, the woman who carried the imprint of Christs face.

Revisiting the Enclosed Gardens of the Low Countries (Fifteenth Century Onwards). Gender, Textile, and the Intimate Space as Horticulture

Abstract The early sixteenth-century Enclosed Gardens or Horti Conclusi of the Augustinian Hospital Sisters of Mechelen in Belgium, form an exceptional world heritage collection from the late medieval period. Most Enclosed Gardens have been lost to the ravages of time, with this loss exacerbated by lack of both understanding and interest. No fewer than seven Enclosed Gardens, however, were preserved until the late twentieth century in their original context: the small community of Augustinian nuns in Mechelen. Like sleeping beauties, they remained secluded in the sisters’ rooms as aids to devotion. Their centuries-long slumber has recently given way to a new phase of lively debate and active scholarship, as these popular retables are now considered unique testimonies of female spirituality in the sixteenth century. Their remarkable pictorial vernacular provides new insights into life, thought and devotion in female convent communities. They testify to a cultural identity connected with strong mystical traditions; they are a gateway to a lost world, an essential part of the rich material and immaterial culture of the Southern Netherlands in the early sixteenth century

Stains: Trace-Cloth-Symptom

Abstract A stain is the evidence of something that was. It is a trace. A stain may be something quite ordinary: the ink stain on my index finger; the mark of your fingers on this book. A stain may also be embarrassing: lipstick on a cheek; sweat rings under the arms; a bloody discharge. A stain may be forensically incriminating. A stain may be kept for sentimental reasons. Moreover, every stain has its own particular texture. Texture denotes the consistency of a surface and the sensory, often tactile imprint that is left on it. The stain may be absorbed in the thing that supports it; then again, it may stay on the surface, something separate. Every stain is unique. In this article the author deals with seven factors that make the stain into a powerful model for rethinking the visual: the stain as prototype and prefiguration; the stain as relic; the stain of Veronica; the stain as a psycho-energetic symptom; the stain as pars pro toto for the womb; the stain and le désir mimétique; and finally, the stain as an image paradigm of the residue.

Marble and the Sea or Echo Emerging (A Ricercar) = El Mármol y el Mar o el Surgimiento del Eco (Una Búsqueda)

espanolEn el presente articulo trato los paradigmas artisticos del pensamiento sobre el mar y su formacion en cuatro apartados: (1) el marmol como emulatio del mar ; (2) el fenomeno de los fondos marinos o el espacio psico-acustico ; (3) el eco como paradigma acuatico ; (4) y finalmente, el camuflaje y la fusion matricial. Con este enfoque, se reintegran las maravillas del mar en cuatro ontologias de la imagen. Mediante la busqueda en el substrato de ideas e intuiciones materiales respecto al mar y, de modo mas amplio, en el paradigma acuatico en la teologia, la antropologia y el psicoanalisis, espero poder ofrecer alternativas hermeneuticas para lo que consideramos el arte, la creacion artistica y los sentidos visuales, asi como resaltar algunos de los paradigmas eurocentricos y patriarcales que estan profundamente arraigados. EnglishIn this article I discuss the artistic paradigms for sea-thinking and sea-making in four sections: marble as emulatio for the sea (1); the phenomenon of sea-floors or the psycho-acoustic space (2); Echo as aquatic paradigm (3); and finally camouflage and matrixial merging (4). With this approach, I reintegrate the marvels of the sea in four ontologies of the image. By delving into the substrata of ideas and material intuitions towards the sea and more generally the aquatic paradigm in theology, anthropology and psychoanalysis, I hope to offer alternative hermeneutics for what we consider as art, art-making and the visual senses, and to obelize some of the deeply ingrained Eurocentric and patriarchal paradigms.

“Chi ha toccato i miei vestiti?” La guarigione della donna con l’emorragia fra testo, immagine e tabù nella cultura visiva del primo medioevo*

Nel periodo paleocristiano nasce un’iconografia della guarigione della heamorrhoissa, ovvero della donna emorragica (Marco 5:24b-34 par). Nel passaggio dal testo all’immagine si sprigiona un’energia profonda che riguarda il tatto, lo sguardo e lo spazio. Le caratteristiche iconografiche diventano sensori di vasta portata. La donna emorragica diventa dopotutto, nella cultura visiva del medioevo, la figura esemplare per meglio comprendere i tabu riguardanti l’utero in rapporto con la magia e i tabu sul sangue.

The embroidered antependium of Wernigerode, Germany: Mary Magdalene and female spirituality in the thirteenth century

is one of the oldest embroidered cloths (as distinct from tapestries) of this size in Germany (94 143 cm) (Figs 1a d). It is stylistically dated to c.1250 . The size and shape of this cloth make it likely that it served as an antependium. The hands that carefully worked the virgin linen with silk thread had two biblical scenes in mind: Luke 7 : 36 50 and John 20 : 11 18 . On the left, we see Mary Magdalene at the home of Simon the Pharisee. The scene is festive; drapes decorate the ceiling of a typical contemporary castle. According to the Gospel, a woman who was known in the town as a sinner had anointed the feet of Christ, washed them with her tears and dried them with her hair. A lock of Mary Magdalene’s hair is draped elegantly around the foot of Christ on the fabric. Luke 7 : 50 says »And he [Christ] said to the woman, Thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace« (dixit autem ad mulierem fides tua te salvam fecit vade in pace). The banderol bears the last three words of this verse: VADE IN PACE. Besides the host, Simon, who is depicted here wearing a typically Jewish headdress, Luke also mentions fellow guests (v. 49), who are here, most exceptionally, represented by two female figures. By way of comparison, I refer to an illustration in the Psalter of the Cistercian convent of Wöltingerode, Harz, from 1220 , where the guests are male (Fig. 2). A tower with a double doorway divides the composition in two. The Noli me tangere motif on the right offers a compact »snapshot« of Christ forbidding physical contact. Mary Magdalene is reaching and stretching out her hands towards Christ who is holding the vexillum in one hand and making the gesture of blessing with another as in the opposite scene while pointing to a cloud. His left foot is also moving away from her. The scene is similar to a contemporary illustration in the Semeca Missal (Fig. 3).

Seth of de terugkeer naar het paradijs: bijdragen tot het kruishoutmotief in de Middeleeuwen

Summary1. Literary sourcesIn the closing days of his life Adam sends his son Seth to Earthly Paradise in order to find the soothing Oil of Mercy. However, Seth receives a twig from the Tree of Life to be planted on Adams grave. The Jews will use the wood for the construction of Christs Cross (Jacobus de Voragine, Legenda Aurea, end 13th century).In 1962 Esther C. Quinn publishes the first monograph on the Seth-personage in the context of the Legend of the Crosswood. In 1977 A.F.J. Klijn studies the Seth personage as it appears in the commentaries on Genesis, in the apocrypha of the life of Adam, in gnostic writings. While the Jewish apocrypha already considered the Seth-personage as a new Abel and a new Adam, patristics also typified him as a forerunner of Christ. Created after the image of Adam, he also was the pivot in the apocrypha on the life of Adam and Eve after the Expulsion (Jewish Vita Adae et Evae (70 B.C.) and the christian Gospel according to Nicodemus (beginning 5th century). Two motives fr...