Pettinati-­‐Longinotti

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Betti Pettinati-Longinotti
Advisor, Hannah Barrett
Group 2
March 31, 2011; revised 4/4/11

Stained Glass as an Art

As a young artist some thirty years ago, I regret that I did not research more thoroughly

the discipline and practice of stained glass. After my apprenticeship in a small studio for college

credit, I launched my vision of developing on the medium as an art form, autonomously outside

of the commission, outside of the installation. I wish I had read writings by the renowned

stained glass designer, John Piper.

There is a great gulf fixed between any craft and art. It can be leaped, but anyone

leaping it must do so with a clear vision and stout heart. Stained glass is a great leader-astray

for anyone who works at it, artist/designer and craftsman alike. Its color and form are eccentric.

Stained glass possesses a splendid and proper discipline of color, form and line through

refractive-light. However, much of this gets forgotten (Piper 8).

This was my instinct after my apprenticeship in stained glass and a double-major in

painting as an undergraduate. The connection for me was not something I was ever taught.

However, my instinct as a painter is still something I follow within my glasswork. All artists need

their references and lighthouses to follow. In this paper, I am investigating painters and fine

artists who found a voice in the medium of stained glass. Of course the most obvious and

prominent of all are Marc Chagall and Henri Matisse. Since their documentation is more

prevalent, I will devote my discourse to those less obvious artists who have only recently

become a part of my research and discovery.

Albrecht Dürer

In all the years that I have worked in stained glass I never knew that Albrecht Dürer was

engaged in stained glass art. Of course I always knew he was a printmaker, but I was

previously unaware of his work in stained glass. The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in
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Boston has a window that Dürer painted, but I was unaware when I visited, as the area to view

the window more closely was barred off, not allowing the viewer to read the label with any detail.

In1496, Dürer made drawings for twelve stained glass panels narrating the life of Saint

Benedict. Appropriately, they were made for the Benedictine abbey of Saint Aegidius in

Nuremberg. Each design prominently displays the arms of the families who paid for the panels,

which were probably created to celebrate a marriage.

Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528) began to rethink stained glass as early as 1492 and brought

his new vision for the medium to fruition in 1515. In stained glass as in painting, engraving, and

woodcut design, Durer transformed the art of his father’s generation through a heightened

awareness of nature, dynamic use of line, and heroic vision of mankind associated with the

humanistic revival of classical art and literature (Butts 341)

Alfred Manessier

In 1941, Alfred Manessier took part in the famous exhibition, Twenty painters of French

tradition (Braun Gallery, Paris). He converted to the Catholic faith in 1943, following a brief stay

in the Soligny Trappist monastery. Manessier became increasingly interested in the abstraction.

He was a co-founder to the Salon de Mai (Paris) in 1945. His art was presented abroad where

exhibitions were devoted to the young French painting (Toronto, Dublin, Stockholm, and

others.). Manessier’s first personal exhibition took place in the Gallery Jeanne Bucher (Paris) in

1949; there the artist exhibited paintings and lithographs. Several exhibitions followed in France

and abroad, in both museums and galleries.

Perhaps there are in his art, profane works of landscapes inspiration, and sacred works of

spiritual inspirations. However, the first ones illustrated the artist’s communion with the Creation,

in a pantheistic extension of the faith. As a painter and a Christian, he was affected by

everything in this world.

The artist expressed himself through various techniques, stained glass windows (over

200), tapestries, and monumental works of animation, paintings, and works on paper. A
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thoughtful man, an inner artist, an adventurer of mind that evolved resolutely towards

dematerialization of the narrative, he was one of the great painters of the “Ecole de Paris” and

of the second half of the twentieth century. Manessier raised the issue of the spirituality in the

contemporary art (Bechtler Museum of Modern Art 116). The spiritual aspect of Manessier’s

work is something with which I have a deep kinship with, as a believer within a professed order,

and an artist of painting and glasswork.

Evie Hone

The works of Evie Hone were described by critics as ‘Cubist’ and ‘in the modern

manner’, and there can be no doubt that Hone was a pioneer of abstract painting in Ireland. She

revolutionized the thinking about art. The stained glass windows of Chartres Cathedral and the

work of George Rouault stimulated Hone’s interest in this art form.

Evie Hone produced over 150 small stained-glass panels and a number of oils and

watercolors. Her art belongs to the medieval tradition of stained glass, with its strong coloration,

heavy symbolism and brilliant technique. Hone’s work bridged the arts and crafts movement of

Michael Healy, and Wilhemina Geddes and painters, such as Patrick Pye and Patrick Pollen,

who were deeply influenced by her work (Curran 129-131).

Patrick Pollen, in the citation above, immigrated to the United States from Ireland in the

early 1980’s, where he lived and worked in Winston-Salem for about a decade. I have a

personal connection to him in that his stained glass windows grace the chapel in which I

presently worship. Pollen served as a mentor artist to me as a young artist, as Evie Hone was

for Pollen. Evie Hone will certainly have her place in my canon, the Uomini Famosi archive I

am forming.

Stanislaw Wyspiański

Polish painter, pastellist, decorative artist, illustrator, writer and theatre director,

Stanislaw Wyspiański was the son of the Kraków sculptor Franciszek Wyspiański (1836–1902)
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and studied at the Kraków School of Fine Arts, primarily under Wladyslaw Luszczkiewicz (1828–

1900) and Jan Matejko (circa 1889). In 1889 Wyspianski and Józef Mehoffer, the school’s most

talented students, were appointed to complete Matejko’s painted decorations for St Mary,

Kraków, a task that prompted Wyspianski’s interest in both decorative painting and stained

glass. In 1890, influencing his work, Wyspianski travelled in Italy, Switzerland, France and

Germany, and also to Prague. The following year he continued his training in Paris, where he

remained with intervals until 1894, studying at the Académie Colarossi under Joseph Blanc,

Gustave Courtois (1852–1924) and Louis Auguste Girardot (b 1858). Wyspianski also worked

independently in Paris. Studying paintings in the museums, he became fascinated with

contemporary art. Through Wladyslaw Slewinski, he met Paul Gauguin and members of the

Nabis.

When I first learned of Wyspiański last semester, I thought it was the work of some

obscure artist from the 1970's or later. I was amazed by the fact that the images are created

with the leadlines, not with paint, something that is quite rare before the1970’s. Of all the

stained glass artists whom I have admired, Wypiański most closely reflects the aesthetics of my

own style. It is serendipity to learn of his work.

Gerhard Richter

A new stained-glass window in Germany’s Cologne Cathedral, which evokes scenes of

technology and science, not faith and the divine, was completed in August 2007.

Contemporary German artist Gerhard Richter designed the 65-foot-tall work to replace

the original, destroyed by bombs in World War II. As a starting point, he used his own 1974

painting 4096 Colors. To the displeasure of the Archbishop of Cologne, Richter disregarded

suggestions to use martyrs of the Holocaust, Edith Stein and Maximilian Kolbe as subjects for

the commission. Richter’s technique for the fabrication of the window did not include leading

the glass. Instead, he used silicon glue to bond the glass rectangles together (Schjeldahl 1-2).
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I found it interesting that the source of the glass used in this installation was not

mentioned in any of the writings I explored. Germany is the leading country for the production

of antique glass. The glass he used is distinctively Lamberts of Germany, a type of glass I most

enjoy using.

In making glass paintings, the creative process is the same as in all the arts. I do not

believe there can be rules for creating a work of art, because the creative process requires

freedom. An artist must have the freedom to be herself. It seems that the artists of today are

obsessed with the desire to be original.

I think that an artist who is completely involved in her work and believes in what she is

doing does not need to search for originality outside of herself. Originality comes from within

the artist; it will inevitably show in her work. However, she must be aware of the need for her

work to have the capacity to reveal to others her feelings and ideas. The use of stained glass in

paintings is closely linked with light, both natural and artificial, which shines through the glass,

communicating the feelings and ideas of the artist. It appears to the observer that the source of

light is in the colored glass, leading to the feeling of being taken into a distant space. Glass as a

material is so rich in radiance that one cannot help but compare it to that of precious stones

(Tryggvado 134).
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Albrecht Durer, 1496, The Self Mortification of Saint Benedict, vitreous painting on glass,
<http://asset3.gardnermuseum.org/collection/browse?filter=artist:3192>
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Alfred Manessier, 1966, Pfingstfenster" Östliches Stirnfenster im Chor der U.L.Frauen-Kirche

<http://www.kirche-
bremen.de/gemeinden/31_unser_lieben_frauen/31_unser_lieben_frauen_manessier_fenster.ph
p>
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Evie Hone, 1946, Chapel window, Jesuit College at Rahan, Tullabeg, Co. Offaly, Ireland.
Today, the piece is in a chapel at Manresa House in Dublin, Ireland.
<http://students.roanoke.edu/groups/IL277CC/green/washing_glass.jpg>
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Stanislaw Wyspiański,1900, Creation window, Kracow Franciscan Church,

<http://www.intofineart.com/upload1/file-admin/images/new21/Stanislaw%20Wyspianski-
985478.jpg>
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Gerhard Richter, 2007, Pixels not Parables, Cologne Cathedral Window,

<http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1147/1334536055_1037d4a999.jpg>
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