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A LECTURE ON STAINED GLASS
BY
PROFESSOR R. ANNING BELL
R.A., R.W.S.
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Published at The Royal College of Art Students’Common Room, South Kensington, S.W.7; andprinted by George W. Jones at The Sign of TheDolphin in Gough Square, Fleet Street, London.Copyright. All Rights Reserved.
A LECTURE ON STAINED GLASS, DELIVEREDIN THE ROYAL COLLEGE OF ARTSTUDENTS’ COMMON ROOM, BY PROFESSORR. ANNING BELL, R.A., R.W.S., ONTUESDAY, 31ST JANUARY, 1922.
My subject of Stained Glass is a verywide, vague, large sort of subject, andof course it is quite impossible to talkabout it in any thorough way in thecourse of an evening. You want to writebooks about it. I thought it would be interestingto you, perhaps, to talk aboutthe more recent variations and changes,the evolution in the use of glass. Thefact that this modification in StainedGlass is very largely the work of artiststrained in this College should interest you particularly.
Stained Glass, commonly so-called—it is a misnomer, for itis really coloured and painted glass—is one of the three greatChristian decorative arts: Mosaic, Stained Glass, Fresco. Theyare in sequence, roughly speaking, but they overlap. First, Mosaicin the earlier ten centuries. It began about the 4th century andwent on to the Renaissance, when its character changed. You thenget Stained Glass, overlapping it about the 12th century; and thethird great Christian art is Fresco Painting, which flourished fromthe 14th century onward, following a long and slow developmentfrom a very early period.
These three seem to be the main arts through which the expressionof the Christian religious scheme, its story, and its emotionhave been conveyed—Sculpture has found expression in allreligions. They have a considerable sympathy in the fact thatthey all demand plain surfaces, flat or curved, and are all closelyassociated with architecture. Each of them also has been so important,so dominating, that it has affected the architectural treatmentof the buildings which it was designed to adorn.
Coloured and painted glass is the outstanding decorative treatmentof the Gothic period—the age of the cathedrals. The earlieststained glass which we know is, I believe, of the 10th or 11th century,and there are but few examples existing now. The great periodruns from about 1200 to 1550 or so in its full vigour. That is[Pg 4]the big cycle of stained glass; it went on living after that, and isreviving, I am glad to say, nowadays; but those centuries showedits highest and fullest development. It was then that the conditionsof life and architecture allowed its completest opportunity ofexpression. After that it was adapted—with a much simpler treatment,with far less colour, with more painting on clear glass—todomestic decorative work, and you will see a good deal of Continentalwork of a very pleasant and attractive type of the 16thand 17th centuries.
The practical function of stained glass is comparable with thatof mosaic. Mosaic is an enrichment of the shadow. Buildings designedfor mosaic usually have quite small windows, low downin the big domes or sparsely set in the side walls, and it is the mosaicenrichment of shadow, vaguely lit by reflected light fromthese windows, which gives it its highest beauty. The peculiarcharm of mosaic depends largely on the gold treatment of thebackground, which is infinitely more attractive when s