The Carving of Guy of Gaunt: A Modern Day Transi Tomb Sculpture: Guest Post by Sculptor Eleanor Crook

Friend of Morbid Anatomy and future Artist in Residence Eleanor Crook--an amazing sculptor and waxworker--is currently crowdsourcing a project to carve a new wooden "transi," or type of tomb sculpture popular in late Medieval Europe which depicts the rotting body cadaver in the grave below. She is doing this project in tandem with Dr. Christina Welch of Winchester University in England, a researcher and cataloger of historical transi.

Following, in Eleanor's own words, is a brief history of the transi, and a description of her proposed project; to find out more, watch the video above or click here. You can support this very worthy project by clicking here. For a recent post on one of the most famous historical transis--that of René de Chalon--click here.

The Carving of Guy of Gaunt: A Modern Day Medieval Cadaver Tomb and a Transi for Everyone 
Guest Post by Sculptor Eleanor Crook

The most morbid and anatomical tomb statues  ever made were the Transi tombs of late Medieval Europe. (“Transi” in Latin means “I have passed over.”) Wealthy aristocrats and high-ranking churchmen arranged for their grave monuments to show them in death as an emaciated, naked corpse in a funeral shroud, with a skeletal grimace leering in the face of mortality (see image above).

The exact meaning of so graphic an image of death on the monuments of the powerful has been shrouded (sorry) in mystery for five centuries, but is now the subject of a scholarly study by Dr Christina Welch of Winchester University in England. She has visited, photographed and catalogued the Transis and compared them with what is known about late Medieval Catholic beliefs about the Afterlife, and will shortly be publishing her fascinating findings. She has invited me, an anatomical and morbid sculptor (known to some of you in Morbid Anatomy through my workshops and exhibitions over the last few years)  to join in the research by carving a new Transi in wood, a Transi for today and for us all.

The physical presence of the Transis is amazing; they are neither altogether alive nor altogether dead, and their anatomy is surprisingly accurate and lovingly carved, given a society where nakedness was shameful and clothing far from revealing. Their racked ribs heave upwards as though for a last breath; the veins stand out on their harrowed limbs, necks and temples. Their hollow eyes are often partly open, their mouths agape in a final agony. Although they depict specific historical figures, they stand in for any of us with our mortal body, our fear of what comes after, our vulnerable and failing flesh. Speaking as one who has worked in medical museums and dissection rooms, I truly believe they were carved from first hand observation of deceased persons by the sculptors as nothing else explains the astonishing realism – at a time when the sculptures of the living were still rather formalised and generalised. More lifelike than the living?  I would say so.


 
Some of the Transi tombs are like bunk beds – the idealised person shown laid in state above, the shrivelled corpse lying directly below like a bad conscience, raising questions about the soul, purgatory and the idea of bodily resurrection on the Day of Judgement.



They were often painted in lifelike ( deathlike) colours with blue veins and coloured skin. Some patrons commissioned them while they were still alive: one well known Bishop delivered his sermons from a pulpit right above his own completed Transi, which must have been a sobering experience for his flock and for him too.



British Transis are rare: Originating in late 14th century France, the first monument in England was that of Archbishop Henry Chichele (c.1364-1443), which was constructed around 1425 (almost twenty years before his death) and is in Canterbury Cathedral. The English carved cadaver memorials date from between c1425 to 1558. However, in art history they have not received the attention they deserve, inexplicably passed over despite their powerful appeal. Readers of the Morbid Anatomy Blog will be surprised to hear that many Transis are tucked away , forgotten and dusty in their local churches and cathedrals, their true meaning a mystery to most and their uncompromising gruesomeness  out of step with contemporary church sensibilities, given the British tendency to brush death under the carpet. Christina plans to publish a book on these neglected and little known monuments to mortality, with photographs and a chapter on techniques , and reinstate them as an important contribution to the art of the memorial.

And my Transi wood carving? I have long been fascinated with the matter of the body and how it can support life one moment and then become an inanimate object, a corpse, the next. I have had experience of dissection and autopsy, studied anatomy and drawn skeletons and specimens for years, all leading up to the  point where I can hew a universal image of bodily mortality from real sources and using the accumulated knowledge and fascination I  - and all readers of this blog no doubt - have. I learned wood carving at a traditional school in the Austrian Alps where the Catholic Church still requires wooden painted saints. Bellow is my carving of the head of St. Edmund , an early Christian martyr who lost his head to Vikings (but the head kept calling out to his faithful followers!)



If you would like to be involved in the new Cadaver Tomb, you can , by contributing to our Crowdfunding appeal to pay for the seasoned prepared block of suitable wood and transport of a two – meter high block to my studio and to the exhibitions (I am donating my time and strong right arm for free) -  in return for prints of Christina’s photos of Transis or prints of my drawings of them, depending on contribution. Our appeal is 74% funded at time of writing and I have been overjoyed at the collective excitement at the idea of a new Transi carving, the first in over 500 years: I will be carving it in honour of all of those of us who are bold and proud in facing the mortality of the body and the mystery of the human condition.
Eleanor Crook, Sculptor

To support the carving of Guy the  Gaunt please pledge at
http://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/guy-the-gaunt/

For more information on the Carved Cadaver memorials please visit http://carvedcadavers.wix.com/eccm 

For more information on Eleanor Crook please visit http://www.eleanorcrook.com.



Images, top to bottom:

1. Archbishop Henry Chichele c.1364-1443, Canterbury Cathedral
2. Detail of image 1
3. Transi Tomb of John FitzAlan, 14th Earl of Arundel, at Arundel Castle chapel
4. Unidentified Transi, Hemingbrough, UK
5. Eleanor Crook's carving of St. Edmund
6. Transi of William Parkhouse, Exeter Cathedral

Death's Heads and Tomb Markers of Amsterdam and Leiden

While in the Netherlands last week for the Amsterdam Anatomy Weekend at the Museum Vrolik, I had the time to take in a three wonderful churches: de Nieuwe Kerk ("new church") and de Oude Kerk ("old church") in Amsterdam and, in Leiden, Pieterskerk (or "Pilgrim Fathers' Church"), thanks very much to Bart Grob and his magnificent Museum Boerhaave bicycle.

All of the churches were, on their own, wonderfully captivating spaces, lofty and sober and aglow with that very special Dutch light; they were also, to my delight, filled with dozens of fascinating tomb markers, many of them engraved with fanciful death's heads and other enigmatic images. You can see a few of my favorite examples above, and can view a more complete photoset by clicking here.

Memorial Portrait of Prince Maurice of Saxe-Zeitz (1652-1653), Oil on Canvas, 1653

Memorial portrait of Prince Maurice of Saxe-Zeitz (1652-1653) The portrait shows the seven moths old second-born Prince Maurice after his death. Oil on canvas, circa 1653.

Via Museum Schloss Moritzburg Zeitz; you can find out more here.

Unton Memorial Picture, Oil on Panel, Unknown Artist, c.1596.

The Unton Memorial Picture, oil on panel, by unknown artist, c.1596. Note the wonderful skeleton on his shoulder (click on image to see larger version)!

More on the painting, from the London National Portrait Gallery's website (which houses the peice):

This highly unusual narrative portrait of Unton's life was commissioned as a posthumous commemoration by his widow Dorothy Wroughton, and is recorded in her will (1634). At the heart of the composition is the portrait of Unton, flanked by figures of Fame (top left) and Death (top right), and surrounded by scenes from his life and death. These are (anti-clockwise, starting in the bottom right hand corner): 1. As an infant in the arms of his mother, Anne Seymour, formerly Countess of Warwick, at the Unton house of Ascott-under-Wychwood. 2. Studying at Oriel College, Oxford, where he took his degree in 1573. 3. Travelling beyond the Alps to Venice and Padua (1570s). 4. Serving with Leicester in the Netherlands (1585-6), with Nijmegen in the distance. 5. On his embassy to Henry IV at Coucy La Fère in northwest France, in an unsuccessful attempt to avert a peace treaty between France and Spain (1595-6). 6 On his deathbed, with a physician sent by Henry IV. 7. His body brought back to England across the Channel in a black ship. 8. His hearse on its way back to his home at Wadley House, Faringdon, near Oxford. 9. (centre right) Unton's life at Wadley House, with scenes showing him sitting in his study (top), talking with learned divines (bottom left), making music (above left), and presiding over a banquet, while a masque of Mercury and Diana is performed, accompanied by musicians. From the house his funeral procession leads, past a group of the poor and lame lamenting his death, to : 10. (left) Faringdon Church with this funeral (8 July 1596) in progress, and, in the foreground, his monument with Unton's recumbent effigy and the kneeling figure of his widow. More detailed information about this portrait to be found at www.npg.org.uk/research/programmes/making-art-in-tudor-britain/case-studies/the-portrait-of-sir-henry-unton-c.-1558-1596.php.

18th Century Memorial Locket with Skeleton, Lady and Plaited Hair; Victoria and Albert Museum, London

British made, late 18th century memorial locket depicting a skeleton and a lady; the skeleton is saying "I alone can heal" while taking from the woman a pierced heart. Engraved gold frame, ivory painted in watercolor, and plaited hair. From the amazing Victoria and Albert Museum.

Memorial jewellery, as the museum website explains:

"to honour the dead is one of the largest categories of 18th- century jewellery to survive. Many mourning jewels have inscriptions that record the name and dates of the dead person.

From 1760 there was a new vogue for memorial medallions or lockets. These became especially popular in Britain, though similar work was produced throughout Europe.

The lockets could be bought ready made, and the designs were standardised. Neo-classical motifs of funerary urns, plinths and obelisks joined the more traditional cherubs, angels and weeping willows. Hair was preserved as curls within the locket, or cut up and used to create designs."

 You can find out more by clicking here.

Memorial Skulls of The University Church of Saint Mary the Virgin, Oxford, England

You can find out more about Oxford's University Church of Saint Mary the Virgin church by clicking here. All photos are my own.

"It is a Great Art to Die Well" : Memorial Rings at Oxford's Ashmolean Museum

"It is a great art to die well." --Jeremy Taylor, English clergyman (1613-1667)

The distribution of rings to friends and family in memory of the dead dates back to the thirteenth century.

By the seventeenth century, specially made rings were engraved with the name of the deceased, their age, and the date of death. These 'mourning rings' took on various forms depending on the fashion of the age. Their distribution dwindled in the nineteenth century following the invention of the photograph as an alternative keepsake.

The macabre sixteenth- and seventeenth-century 'Memento Mori' (remember that you will die) rings were intended to remind the wearer of their mortal state in an age ridden with plague, war, and famine.

From today's visit to Oxford's Ashmolean Museum; text drawn from the label accompanying the display. 

This post is dedicated to Karen Bachmann, teacher of our hair art jewelery class at Observatory, who first introduced me to the concept.

"I Do Not Fear Death" or RIP Roger Ebert, In His Own Very Wise Words

I know it is coming, and I do not fear it, because I believe there is nothing on the other side of death to fear. I hope to be spared as much pain as possible on the approach path. I was perfectly content before I was born, and I think of death as the same state. I am grateful for the gifts of intelligence, love, wonder and laughter. You can’t say it wasn’t interesting. My lifetime’s memories are what I have brought home from the trip. I will require them for eternity no more than that little souvenir of the Eiffel Tower I brought home from Paris.

I don’t expect to die anytime soon. But it could happen this moment, while I am writing. I was talking the other day with Jim Toback, a friend of 35 years, and the conversation turned to our deaths, as it always does. “Ask someone how they feel about death,” he said, “and they’ll tell you everyone’s gonna die. Ask them, In the next 30 seconds? No, no, no, that’s not gonna happen. How about this afternoon? No. What you’re really asking them to admit is, Oh my God, I don’t really exist. I might be gone at any given second.”

Me too, but I hope not. I have plans. Still, illness led me resolutely toward the contemplation of death. That led me to the subject of evolution, that most consoling of all the sciences, and I became engulfed on my blog in unforeseen discussions about God, the afterlife, religion, theory of evolution, intelligent design, reincarnation, the nature of reality, what came before the big bang, what waits after the end, the nature of intelligence, the reality of the self, death, death, death.

Many readers have informed me that it is a tragic and dreary business to go into death without faith. I don’t feel that way. “Faith” is neutral. All depends on what is believed in. I have no desire to live forever. The concept frightens me. I am 69, have had cancer, will die sooner than most of those reading this. That is in the nature of things. In my plans for life after death, I say, again with Whitman:

I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,

If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles...

The above is a but a short excerpt from a wonderful essay entitled "I Do Not Fear Death" from Roger Ebert's Life Itself: A Memoir. The essay was published in full on Salon in honor as a sort of memorial to the recently deceased film critic. You can read the entire piece on Salon's website (highly recommended!) by clicking here. Special thanks to Evan Michelson and Allen Crawford for bringing this essay to my attention.