CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2013
| Author | Kónya, Anna |
|---|---|
| Title | The Virgin Mary, the Apocalyptic Horsemen, and the Tree of Jesse: The Wall Paintings of the Parish Church in Altana (Alzen, Alcina) |
| Summary | This thesis analyses the wall paintings of the parish church in Alţâna, which provide a rare example of coherent and extensive sanctuary decoration in Transylvania from the second third of the fourteenth century. A comprehensive approach is applied to the study of the wall paintings, involving the examination of their historical background and architectural context as well as problems of style and iconography. The analysis shows that the iconographic program in Alţâna is complex and elaborate, the selection of images and their arrangement in the space of the sanctuary, the various interconnections, and the exclusiveness of some of the iconographic themes imply careful planning and a learned background. In contrast, the artistic quality of the images and the simple, sparing treatment of the compositions reduced to the essentials bespeak local standards. Several aspects of this program deserve attention: the large Mariological cycle comprising at least fifteen scenes, a subject appearing relatively rare on fresco cycles north of the Alps, the complex use of the Tree of Jesse iconography and the presence of Apocalypse representations uncommon in monumental art. The decoration of the sanctuary in Alţâna revealed in 2007 belongs to a significant body of wall paintings discovered recently in Transylvania, which has not been researched yet. Their examination is important as it adds to the fragmentary picture about artistic development in the region and can also enrich knowledge about culture and standards of education in late medieval Transylvania, in this case demonstrating how the means of expression of provincial art could be coupled with erudite ideas and an elaborate conception. |
| Supervisor | Szakács, Béla Zsolt |
| Department | Medieval Studies MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2013/konya_anna.pdf |
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