Saints in the Museum Context

Louis Comfort Tiffany and Studio, Window Depicting St. George and the Dragon (ca. 1880s-1920s)

To start thinking about the Tiffany window, I would open the floor for people to take a look at the piece and reflect on it for a few minutes before voicing some of their ideas. Because this is very early in the tour, the goal is to maintain a “conversation” approach to our early interactions, helping people get comfortable with one another and voicing their opinions about the art in a more casual environment, as suggested by Burnham and Kai-Kee.1 Things that participants might notice are the flag George carries, the dragon in the corner, the way the glass is shaped or the amount of color coming through. These become opportunities to share information about the story of St. George’s fight with the dragon, the symbolic connection to the flag of Great Britain, or Tiffany’s innovative processes, depending on what direction the conversation moves. At this point, there are no major goals for the ways the conversation will develop, and the guide is primarily providing further insight into the details that are interesting participants.

After this develops for a few minutes and people become more comfortable, the tour would transition into a storytelling activity directed around the object. In this activity, participants will write a story about when/how this object was made, who it was made for, what it may have been used for, and how it ended up in GMOA. After having a few minutes to write their story, there will be an opportunity to share some aspects of what they wrote down. It will be important to share this window’s actual story, such as how it was made by Tiffany’s studio for George Foster Peabody’s home at Lake George, how it was donated to the University, and became part of GMOA’s collection when its original building was torn down for the Law School.3 This, however, also becomes an opportunity to discuss the many other places to which Tiffany’s windows were sent. For instance, the guide could introduce the Coffin Memorial Window in St. Peter’s Chapel on Mare Island, CA as an example of how these windows were often sold to churches and cathedrals. This window is especially well suited as a point of comparison because it looks remarkably like the window in GMOA’s collection, so it is easy to see the diverse spaces Tiffany’s windows ended up in, even ones that are similar. One could also keep the St. George theme and share how some of these windows were sold directly to universities, such as the St. George window at Princeton University. 

An activity exploring the ways objects find their ways into museums is an important aspect of a tour that considers religious art in the museum context as many of these objects started out as devotional pieces and now function in slightly different ways. Beginning our tour with this mindset prepares participants to consider the ways that all of the devotional objects that we are about to explore are somewhat “out of place” now that they are in a museum. This stop will end with a reflection on this idea, summarizing the various contexts mentioned as part of their stories to prepare us to consider the ways other works of art show up in new ways once they enter the museum. The next piece we are going to look at is a painting, and so something that we are more likely to associate with museums, but this question of context is important to keep in mind going forward.

Unknown, Icon of the Mother of God of the Sign with Saints (1875)

At this point, we are going to turn to our third of five pieces, this Russian Orthodox Icon depicting a host of saints alongside Mary the mother of Jesus and a baby Jesus. This icon introduces a third medium for religious art, being a tempera painting on a wooden panel. Unlike our previous two objects, this is a piece one is more likely to expect in any ordinary home, although they are also quite common in church buildings. Questions to begin discussion include asking people to voice what associations they have with icons, such as in what contexts they have seen them before or what activities they usually see around icons. These questions are directed towards bringing in a replica icon that visitors might touch as a way of discussing the ways that devotees relate to icons through prayer, which might include touching or kissing the icon as part of their veneration. Such an activity engages visitors in a non-discursive, embodied response that brings them closer to the object, and connecting them with the emotional experience associated with an icon.6 Moreover, this piece seems most appropriate for an activity such as this, because of all the pieces on the tour, this is one that would consistently be touched as part of religious practice. Since this tour is directed towards helping visitors consider the ways religious objects enter and are reimagined in the museum, this becomes an opportunity to physically transcend the barrier that develops around religious objects when they enter a museum. 

Associated with this idea is the way that icons connect the spheres of heaven and earth, so if there is time, I would like to discuss the ways that this icon represents that idea through its visual elements. A possible transition is discussing the ways people interact with icons, and what those interactions are meant to convey about the close relationship between heaven and earth, mediated in these works of art. This particular icon visually shows this idea with the bottom half (including the two saints on horses) has a more three-dimensional quality, with the mountains and city in the background. As you look higher on the icon, moving towards Mother Mary, the piece becomes flatter, with a plane gold field in the background, which represents the divine vision of heaven. Thus, there is a movement from earth to heaven (and vice versa) in the piece itself, a movement that the icon is also mediating for the devotee.7 This then becomes a good moment to conclude discussion of the icon, summarizing the importance of the saints and art such as this in mediating relationships between heaven and earth within the Orthodox and Catholic traditions. The next piece in the tour is also something you would expect to find in someone’s home, but is associated more with Protestant practices, and so people relate to it in a slightly different manner.

Unidentified Staffordshire pottery, John Wesley in the pulpit with black robe (ca. 1830–70)

This is our fourth for this tour, and it is a piece of pottery from the Staffordshire area of England, which mass produced a wide collection of pieces such as this one depicting a number of figures, incorporating a number of themes including religion, politics, or just general figurines. While religious figures were a common theme, including figures of Jesus, King David, or even recent bishops, no figure was as popular as John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, who is depicted here standing in his pulpit. Wesley was a Protestant Christian, a branch that separated from Catholicism and the Orthodox Church in 1517, and one of the primary differences in how these different Christians relate to religious art. For Catholics or Orthodox Christians, religious art plays a role in mediating the relationship between heaven and earth, as we saw with the icon we just looked at. Protestants move away from this idea, instead thinking of art as a reminder of religious themes or a manifestation of their faith, so it operates more as a symbol than having any mediatory function. In that mindset, this piece would likely sit upon someone’s mantlepiece, reminding them of Methodist values, and serving as a sign of their Methodism to anyone who visited their home. Wesley is likely such a popular figure during this time because Methodism is still a new branch of Christianity when Staffordshire pottery was popular, so new converts would have been drawn to images of Wesley to mark them as part of this new movement. 

To better connect with this idea, this stop will include a chance for visitors to design their own Staffordshire pottery (either a drawing or a description) that they would like to include in their home that conveys something about them, like Wesley figurines did for the Methodists. Such a practice allows visitors to make connections between the piece as a religious object and what images might play a similar role in their life. Moreover, it lets them give a personal meaning to their encounter with Wesley pottery in connection with whatever figurine they design, a key component in crafting an aesthetic experience, as proposed by Carole Henry.8 After visitors created their own pottery, there will be an opportunity for some to share as they feel comfortable. So far, we have focused on predominantly modern pieces, with the oldest work being from the 1600s. Christianity has been making art from its early beginnings though, and our next stop is going to return us to those beginnings, and particularly the way Christianity and its saints interacted with Greco-Roman religious traditions, which played an important role in shaping our notion of the saints.