Such attitudes began to change in the late Middle Ages, particularly following the example of Saint Francis in the thirteenth century. Francis taught that the entire world was God’s divine creation, and our bodies were made in God’s image and were thus divine. This began a moderation of Augustine’s prudish teachings about human bodies that led to the more naturalistic imagery of the fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries. Subject matter remained focused on religion, but was increasingly illusionistic. The Italian painter Giotto was the most famous technical innovator in this regard, but the Limbourg Brothers, working for the Dukes of Burgundy in France, showed a greater degree of realism in their subjects.
In this period when Europe was rarely interested in sexual subjects, India saw erotic art on a scale never rivalled before or since. At a time when Judeo-Christian taboo reigned over sexuality in European art and society, India, by contrast, took a radically unrestrained approach to sexuality, as evidenced by the free exploration of sexual positions in the Kama Sutra and the presence of erotic art on a scale never rivalled before or since. Later, during the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the Chandela Dynasty of rulers in central India built dozens of temples at Khajuraho that prominently featured groups of figures in an enormous variety of sexual positions. While the specific purpose of these figures remains unclear, many varieties of Hinduism revered sexuality as sacred; some devotional acts involved worship of the linga, a stylised penis. These Hindu sculptures are among the most famous and explicit examples of erotic art of any time.
94. Anonymous, Adam and Eve with the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil (miniature from the Codex Aemilianensis), 994. Real Biblioteca de San Lorenzo, Escorial (Spain).
95. Anonymous, Vrikshadhirudhakam, Kalinga, Konarak, Orissa, Mid-12th century. Stone. Private Collection.
96. Anonymous, Torso of Apsara, Kiradu, Rajasthan, 11th century. Stone. Sardar Museum, Jodhpur (India).
97. Anonymous, Linga within a Ring, 11th century. Silver, h: 27.5 cm.
98. Anonymous, Erotic Posture, Vishvanath Temple, Upper Band of the North Wall, c. 950. Sandstone. Khajuraho (India).
99. Gislebertus, Eve’s Temptation (Lintel from the North Portal of the Saint-Lazare Cathedral, Autun), c. 1130. Limestone, 72 × 131 cm. Musée Rolin, Autun (France).
100. Nino Pisano, La Madonna del Latte, c. 1345. Polychrome marble, h: 91 cm. Museo Nazionale de San Matteo, Pisa (Italy).
101. Giotto (Giotto di Bondone), Hell (detail from Last Judgment), 1304–1306. Fresco, 1000 × 840 cm. Capella degli Scrovegni, Padua (Italy).
GIOTTO (Giotto di Bondone)
(Vespignano, 1267 – Florence, 1337)
His full name was Ambrogiotto di Bondone, but he is known today, as he was in his own time, by the contraction, Giotto, a word which has come to stand for almost all the great things that art has accomplished. In his own day Giotto’s fame as a painter was supreme; he had numerous followers, and these Giotteschi, as they were styled, perpetuated his methods for nearly a hundred years. In 1334, he designed the beautiful Campanile (bell tower), which stands beside the cathedral in Florence, and represents a perfect union of strength and elegance, and was partly erected in his lifetime. Moreover, the sculptured reliefs which decorate its lower part were all from his designs, though he lived to execute only two of them. Inspired by French Gothic sculpture, he abandoned the stiff presentations of the subjects as in Byzantine styles and advanced art towards more realistic presentation of contemporary figures and scenes so as to be more narrative. His breakthrough influenced subsequent development in Italian art. His significant departure from past presentations of the Maestà, starting around 1308 (in Madonna di Ognissanti), brought to it his knowledge of architecture and its perspectives. However, the disproportion of subjects in the presentation is a device intended to rank the subjects by their importance, as was done in Byzantine icons.
Thus, architect, sculptor, painter, friend of Dante and of other great men of his day, Giotto was the worthy forerunner of that galaxy of brilliant men who populated the later days of the Italian Renaissance.
102. Anonymous, Illuminated Manuscript. Middle Ages.
103. Memmo di Filippuccio, The Bedroom, c. 1318. Museo Civico, San Gimignano (Italy).
104. Anonymous, The King Wenceslas and the Bathers (miniature from the Bulle d’Or of the Emperor Charles IV), 1400. Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna (Austria).
105. Anonymous, Adam and Eve and Sodomites, from the Bible moralisée, 13th-14th century. Manuscript. Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna (Austria).
106. Anonymous, Illuminated Manuscript. Middle Ages.
107. Guyart des Moulins, The Historical Bible, volume one, illustration to the Book of Daniel (Susanna and the Elders in the Garden), Paris, Third quarter of the 14th century. Parchment, 45.5 × 31.5 cm.
108. Anonymous, Young Nun Gathering Penises. Illuminated Manuscript.
109. Bartholomeus Anglicus, Book of the Properties of Things (De proprietatibus rerum), Paris, c. 1400. Herzog-August-Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel (Germany).
110. Arnolfo di Cambio, Sickman at the Fountain, sculpture fragment. Marble. Galleria Nazionale dell’Umbria, Perugia (Italy).
111. Anonymous, Adam (from the south-side of the Notre-Dame Transept, Paris), c. 1260. Polychrome stone, h: 200 cm. Musée national du Moyen Age, Thermes de Cluny, Paris (France).
This statue of Adam is one of the rare nudes of medieval art. Larger than life-size, this statue originally decorated the exterior of Notre-Dame in Paris. Paired with Eve, it was part of a Last Judgment scene. The nudity of the figure recalls classical prototypes, and the s-shaped pose and sinuous body of Adam owes a particular debt to fourth-century B. C. E. sculptors such as Praxiteles and Lysippos. The soft, unmuscled body, however, does not reflect the classical ideal. Most of the human sculpture of the Middle Ages was clothed in long robes, and a sculptor would have had little opportunity to study the nude. Despite the lack of precedent, however, the sculptor of this piece has captured the human body in detail, showing the anatomy below the surface, especially on the figure’s torso.
112. Filippo Calendario, The Original Sin, 1340–1355. Marble. Palazzo ducale