Last updated • 13 min readFrom Wikipedia, The Free EncyclopediaChampmol in 1686. The cottage-like hermitages of the monks can be seen surrounding the main cloister, with the Well of Moses in the middle.Philip the Bold and his wife kneel in the portal of the monastery church. Claus Sluter and workshop.Each of the choir monks had one of these paintings in his hermitage, probably as the only decoration. Cleveland Museum of Art.
The Chartreuse de Champmol, formally the Chartreuse de la Sainte-Trinité de Champmol, was a Carthusianmonastery on the outskirts of Dijon, which is now in France, but in the 15th century was the capital of the Duchy of Burgundy. The monastery was founded in 1383 by Duke Philip the Bold to provide a dynastic burial place for the ValoisDukes of Burgundy,[2] and operated until it was dissolved in 1791, during the French Revolution.
Called "the grandest project in a reign renowned for extravagance",[3] it was lavishly enriched with works of art, and the dispersed remnants of its collection remain key to the understanding of the art of the period.[4]
Founding
Purchase of the land and quarrying of materials began in 1377, but construction did not begin until 1383,[5] under the architect Druet de Dammartin from Paris, who had previously designed the Duke's chateau at Sluis, and been an assistant in work at the Louvre. According to James Snyder his work at Champmol was "a somewhat conservative modification of the Late Gothic buildings of Paris".[6] A committee of councillors from Dijon supervised the construction for the Duke, who was often elsewhere.[5] By 1388 the church was consecrated, and most construction probably completed. The monastery was built for twenty-four choir monks, instead of the usual twelve in a Carthusian house,[2] and two more were endowed to celebrate the birth in 1433 of Charles the Bold.[7] These lived semi-hermitic lives in their individual small houses when not in the chapel. There would also have been non-ordained monks, servants, novices, and other workers.
When founded, Champmol was "two arrow shots" outside the city gates,[8] but is now inside the modern city boundaries. At this time the city had about 10,000 inhabitants and was the largest in Burgundy proper, though smaller than the cities of the territories in the Netherlands recently inherited by the Duke through his wife. But Burgundy was held more securely than the often turbulent cities in the north, and represented the senior title of the dynasty.[9] Over sixty members of the CapetianHouse of Burgundy, whom the Valois had succeeded in 1361, only two decades earlier, had been buried at Cîteaux Abbey to the south of Dijon. Champmol was intended to rival Cîteaux, Saint-Denis, where the Kings of France were buried, and other dynastic burial places.
Somewhat in contradiction to the Carthusian mission of tranquil contemplation, visitors and pilgrims were encouraged, the expenses of hospitality recompensed by the Dukes. In 1418 Papal indulgences were granted to those visiting the Well of Moses, further encouraging pilgrims. The ducal family had a private oratory overlooking the church (now destroyed), though their visits were in fact rare.[10] The ducal accounts, which have fortunately survived, show major commissions for paintings and other works to complete the monastery continuing until about 1415, and further works were added after that at a slower rate by the Dukes and other donors.
The accounts for Champmol have survived in sufficient detail that Martin Warnke[11] synthesized from them a view of the emerging status of court artists, and "the autonomous consciousness of art and artists"[12] that would distinguish the world of art in the Early modern period.
The Valois dynasty of Burgundy had less than a century to run when the monastery was founded, and the number of tombs never approached that of their Capetian predecessors at Cîteaux – indeed there would hardly have been room in the choir of the church, where the monuments were.[13] Only two monuments were ever erected,[14] both in the same style with painted alabaster effigies with lions at their feet and angels with spread wings at their heads. Underneath the slab the effigies rested on, unpainted small (about 40cm high) "pleurants" or mourners ("weepers" is the traditional English term) were set among Gothic tracery.[15] These were described by Johan Huizinga in The Waning of the Middle Ages as "the most profound expression of mourning known in art, a funeral march in stone".[16]
The tombs of the Dukes, now moved to the "Salle de Garde" of their palace in Dijon.
Philip the Bold died in 1404, and his wife Margaret III, Countess of Flanders, the following year. She had decided to rest her remains with those of her parents in Lille, and Philip had been planning a single monument for himself for over twenty years, having commissioned Jean de Marville in 1381. Work did not begin until 1384, and proceeded slowly, with Claus Sluter being put in charge in 1389. At the Duke's death in 1404, only two mourners and the framework were complete; John the Fearless gave Sluter four years to finish the job, but he died after two. His nephew and assistant, Claus de Werve took over and finished the sculptures in 1410. The effigies were painted by Malouel.[17]
John expressed a wish for his own tomb, this time a double one with his Duchess Margaret of Bavaria, to resemble that of his father, but nothing was done, even after his death in 1419, until 1435, and in 1439 de Werve died without having managed to find suitable alabaster. In 1443 a Spaniard, Jean de La Huerta, was contracted, and sent drawings for the effigies. He completed most elements, but not the effigies, before leaving Dijon in 1456. Yet another master was brought in, and the monument finally installed in 1470, by which time Philip the Good was himself dead. He seems to have made no provision for a monument for himself, and had initially been buried in Bruges, where he died. His son Charles the Bold had the remains brought back to Champmol after some years, but no monument was ever planned. Charles himself was relocated from Nancy to Bruges by his great-grandson Charles V in 1558.[18]
The second tomb repeats the design of the first, but with their execution spanning almost a century, stylistic differences can be seen, although some of the "pleurants" of the second tomb copy those of the first exactly.[19] It is recorded that Philip the Good had a portrait of himself placed in the choir, where there were already those of the previous two Dukes. None of these are believed to have survived in the original, but surviving portraits may be copies of them.
After the Revolution, and the sale of the monastery, the tombs were carefully moved to Dijon Cathedral in 1792, as their historic importance was recognised. But in the following year the cathedral was converted into a Temple of Reason and the effigies were vandalised, so that what are now seen are reconstructions. Many elements, including ten "pleurants", were removed by genteel looters.[19]
Gallery of the tombs
Philip the Bold, with the "Retable of the crucifixion" behind
Melchior Broederlam, Annunciation and Visitation (1393–1399), left panel of a pair; (Dijon, Musée des Beaux-Arts)The Last Communion and Martyrdom of Saint Denis, by Henri Bellechose, 1416. Louvre
There are very important sculptures by Claus Sluter and his workshop on the church portal, including kneeling figures of Philip and his Duchess.[20] The lower parts of the Well of Moses (Puits de Moise) survive, including six life-size figures of the Old Testament prophets who foretold the Messiah, most of the rest having been destroyed, apparently more by weathering than the Revolution.[21]
In Dijon museums
Most items are in the Musée des Beaux-Arts, including its site in the former palace of the Dukes. The fragments from the Well of Moses and other similar pieces are in the Archaeological Museum. The following are only the main works in Dijon:
Two painted and gilded carved wood retables, that are almost the only remaining works by the Flemish sculptor Jacques de Baerze, and also the only complete Netherlandish carved altarpieces before the late 15th century. The outer panels of the larger are the only surviving paintings by Melchior Broederlam, and highly important works for tracing the development of Early Netherlandish painting. Broederlam also painted and gilded the carvings by de Baerze.[22]
The tombs (in fact always cenotaphs) of the Dukes of Burgundy; the museum has the tombs of Philip the Bold and his son John the Fearless with his wife Margaret of Bavaria. The effigies are 19th-century reconstructions, from old drawings and prints, of the originals which were destroyed in the Revolution. About ten of the "pleurants" are also copies of originals liberated or lost.
The funerary crown of Philip the Bold, in brass and glass.[23]
The head and torso of the crucified Christ from the Well of Moses.[24]
The Retable of Saint George, an early-15th-century painted altarpiece, probably donated by one of the monks, whose donor portrait appears at the foot of the crucified Christ.[25]
One of the crucifixions from the two hermitages added in 1433.[26]
Two altarpieces by Charles-André van Loo, which replaced older works (one the Retable of Saint George) in 1741.[27]
Louvre, the Martyrdom of Saint Denis by Henri Bellechose, the tondo of the Pietà by Jean Malouel, and one of 24 paintings of the crucifixion for the monks' hermitages by Jean de Beaumetz, all of which are the best known works of each artist.[28]
Gemäldegalerie, Berlin, a large Madonna and Child, only rediscovered in 1960 and now on loan to the Gemäldegalerie, is attributed to Jean Malouel[30] It is believed the Berlin picture was one wing of a diptych for Champmol, opposite a portrait of John the Fearless.[31]
Cleveland Museum of Art, the only other one of the 24 paintings by Jean de Beaumetz to survive,[32] and four "pleurant" figures from Philip's tomb.[33]
After the death in 1477 of Charles the Bold, Burgundy proper was recovered by force by France; the Kings, still descended from the Dukes via the Habsburgs and other routes, continued to support and occasionally visit the monastery. There was slight damage in the siege of Dijon in 1513 and in the French Wars of Religion, but essentially the monastery remained in its 15th-century state until it was decided to update it in the 1770s. The altarpieces of Saints Denis and George had been replaced by new paintings by Charles-André van Loo in 1741; both the new paintings are now in the Dijon museum.[37] Remodelling in the 1770s involved the destruction of some medieval parts, but greater destruction followed the French Revolution. The monastery was suppressed in 1791, and on May 4, five days after the monks departed, the buildings and land were bought by Emmanuel Crétet (1747–1808), later to be Minister of the Interior under Napoleon with the title Comte de Champmol. He destroyed large parts of the buildings and the church.[38] In 1833 the estate was bought by the local département as a mental asylum, and many new buildings erected.[39]
Today the buildings house a psychiatric hospital, and "aller à la chartreuse" is a local phrase for developing a mental disorder. The Sluter sculptures can be seen by visitors, and many of the contents are in the Dijon museum, with the tombs and carved retables housed in the former Palace of the Dukes.
Notes
↑ Drawing by the architect Aimé Piron, afterwards engraved (Bibliothèque municipale, Dijon).
↑ Sherry C. M. Lindquist, "Accounting for the Status of Artists at the Chartreuse de Champmol" Gesta41.1, "Artistic Identity in the Late Middle Ages" (2002:15-28 p. 15)
↑ Some works formerly at Champmol and documentation, were assembled for the exhibition "Chartreuse de Champmol", Dijon, 1960, with a catalogue containing essays by scholars of the calibre of Millard Meiss and Colin Eisler.
1 2 Vaughan, 202. The complex and unwieldy bureaucratic structure, providing "a rare view into artistic production at a major centre" (p 15), was analyzed from copious surviving accounts by Sherry C. M. Lindquist, "Accounting for the Status of Artists at the Chartreuse de Champmol" Gesta41.1, "Artistic Identity in the Late Middle Ages" (2002), pp. 15-28.
↑ Snyder, 70. The Berlin Madonna is described in detail in: Gelfand (1994), pp. 41-47. The work was originally published, attributed and proposed as half a diptych in: Meiss, Millard, and Colin Eisler. "A New French Primitive." The Burlington Magazine 102 (1960): 234 ff. (not seen). Gelfand (p.44) prefers the theory that a portrait of Philip the Bold sighted there in 1791 was the companion to the Berlin Madonna.
Claus Sluter was a Dutch sculptor, living in the Duchy of Burgundy from about 1380. He was the most important northern European sculptor of his age and is considered a pioneer of the "northern realism" of the Early Netherlandish painting that came into full flower with the work of Jan van Eyck and others in the next generation.
Philip II the Bold was Duke of Burgundy and jure uxoris Count of Flanders, Artois and Burgundy. He was the fourth and youngest son of King John II of France and Bonne of Luxembourg.
Henri Bellechose was a painter from the South Netherlands. He was one of the most significant artists at the beginning of panel painting in Northern Europe, and among the earliest artists of Early Netherlandish painting.
Château de Germolles is situated in Burgundy, now part of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, 11 km west of Chalon-sur-Saône, 30 km south of Beaune, and 135 km north of Lyon. It is the best preserved residence of the Dukes of Burgundy. Built during the second part of the 14th century, this château is important for the history of the region. Furthermore, it is a rare example of such a well-preserved residence in France in the 14th and the beginning of the 15th centuries, when most of the princely palaces of that period have almost entirely disappeared. This exceptional site evokes court life in France on the eve of the Renaissance.
Melchior Broederlam was one of the earliest Early Netherlandish painters to whom surviving works can be confidently attributed. He worked mostly for Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, and is documented from 1381 to 1409. Although only a single large pair of panel paintings can confidently be attributed to him, no history of Western painting can neglect his contribution.
The Well of Moses is a monumental sculpture recognised as the masterpiece of the Dutch artist Claus Sluter (1340–1405–06), assisted by his nephew Claus de Werve. It was executed by Sluter and his workshop in 1395–1403 for the Carthusian monastery of Chartreuse de Champmol built as a burial site by the Burgundian Duke Philip the Bold just outside the Burgundian capital of Dijon, now in France.
Juste or Giusti is the name conventionally applied to a family of Italian sculptors.
Jacques de Baerze was a Flemish sculptor in wood, two of whose major carved altarpieces survive in Dijon, now in France, then the capital of the Duchy of Burgundy.
Jean Malouel, or Jan Maelwael in his native Dutch, was a Dutch artist who was the court painter of Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy and his successor John the Fearless, working in the International Gothic style.
The Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon is a museum of fine arts opened in 1787, in Dijon, France. It is one of the main and oldest museums of France. It is located in the historic city centre of Dijon and housed in the former ducal palace which was the headquarters of the Burgundy State in the 15th century. When the duchy was assimilated to the Kingdom of France, the palace became the house of the King. In the 17th century, it became the Palace of the Dukes of Burgundy following a project by Jules Hardouin-Mansart.
Claus or Claux de Werve was a sculptor active at the Burgundian court under Philip the Bold between 1395 and 1439. He was probably born in the Dutch city of Haarlem around 1380.
Jean de Marville was a sculptor who worked at the end of the fourteenth century. He is known for his work on the Carthusian monastery of Champmol for Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy at a time when the Burgundy became a major cultural centre of Europe.
Susie Nash is the Deborah Loeb Brice Professor of Renaissance Art at the Courtauld Institute, London. After studying at the University of Reading she has been at the Courtauld. She is an expert on the art of the Northern Renaissance, specialising in Early Netherlandish painting and illuminated manuscripts and 15th century sculpture. Professor Nash is known for her work on the Chartreuse de Champmol in Dijon, and in particular the Great Cross, or Well of Moses, by Claus Sluter and Jean Malouel, published in a series of three articles in the Burlington Magazine. She is a founder member of the Research Centre for Illuminated Manuscripts and the Courtauld Sculptural Processes Study Group, and a Trustee of the Caroline Villers Research Fellowship.
Antoine Le Moiturier (1425–1495) was a French sculptor. He was born in Avignon into a family of sculptors. His uncle was the itinerant French master Jacques Morel.
The Mourners of Dijon are tomb sculptures made in Burgundy during the late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries. They are part of a new iconographical tradition led by Claus Sluter that continued until the end of the fifteenth century. In this tradition, free-standing sculptures depict mourners who stand next to a bier or platform that holds a body in state. The figures are cloaked in robes which mostly hide their faces.
Jean de la Huerta was a Spanish sculptor of Aragonese origin. Most of his work was produced in the duchy of Burgundy.
Pleurants or weepers are anonymous sculpted figures representing mourners, used to decorate elaborate tomb monuments, mostly in the late Middle Ages in Western Europe. Typically they are relatively small, and a group were placed around the sides of a raised tomb monument, perhaps interspersed with armorial decoration, or carrying shields with this. They may be in relief or free-standing. In English usage the term "weepers" is sometimes extended to cover the small figures of the deceased's children often seen kneeling underneath the tomb effigy in Tudor tomb monuments.
The tomb of Philippe Pot is a life-sized funerary monument commissioned by the military leader and diplomat Philippe Pot for his burial at the chapel of Saint-Jean-Baptiste in Cîteaux Abbey, Dijon, France. His effigy shows him recumbent on a slab, his hands raised in prayer, and wearing armour and a heraldic tunic. The eight mourners are dressed in black hoods, and act as pallbearers carrying him towards his grave. Pot commissioned the tomb when he was around 52 years old, some 13 years before his death in 1493. The detailed inscriptions written on the sides of the slab emphasise his achievements and social standing.
The Tomb of Philip the Bold is a funerary monument commissioned in 1378 by the Duke of Burgundy Philip the Bold for his burial at the Chartreuse de Champmol, the Carthusian monastery he built on the outskirts of Dijon, in today's France. The construction was overseen by Jean de Marville, who designed the tomb and oversaw the building of the charterhouse. Marville worked on the tomb from 1384, but progressed slowly until his death in 1389. That year Claus Sluter took over design of Champmol, including the tomb. Philip died in 1404 with his funerary monument still incomplete. After Sluter's death c. 1405/06, his nephew Claus de Werve was hired to complete the project, which he finished in 1410.
Gelfand, Laura D. (2005), in Sarah Blick, Rita Tekippe, eds.: Y Me Tarde in Art and architecture of late medieval pilgrimage in Northern Europe and the British Isles, 2005, BRILL, ISBN90-04-12332-6
Gelfand, Laura D.(1994); Fifteenth-century Netherlandish devotional diptychs; Origins and function, 1994. Case Western Reserve University.
Jugie, Sophie. The Mourners: Tomb Sculpture from the Court of Burgundy . Paris: 1; First Edition, 2010. ISBN978-0-3001-5517-4
White, John. Art and Architecture in Italy, 1250 to 1400, London, Penguin Books, 1966, 2nd edn 1987 (now Yale History of Art series). ISBN0-14-056128-5
Fliegel, Stephen N., et al. . Art from the Court of Burgundy: Patronage of Philip the Bold and John the Fearless, 1364–1419. Exhibition catalogue. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2004.
Lindquist, Sherry C.M. Agency, Visuality and Society at the Chartreuse de Champmol, 2008, Ashgate, ISBN978-0-7546-6046-0
Monget, Cyprien. La chartreuse de Dijon, 3 vols, Montreuil-sur-Mer, Tournai, 1898–1905
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