May 22, 2006

Global Seminars & Invited Speaker Series

BRINGING ART AND HERITAGE CLOSER

Reading and understanding the work of art

Dr. Soledad de Silva y Verástegui

Doorway of Santa María la Real de Sanguesa. Detail.
 

The lecturer tried to expose her own method of approaching and making art understandable to students of Art History at the University and that has as goal recreate, without pretending to reach all of them because the creations of the human spirit always contain some mystery, the factors of very varied character that contributed in the gestation of the artistic works of our past. final tries to answer all the questions and queries that the contemplation of our heritage raises in today's spectator: Who commissioned this work, which artist was entrusted with its execution, for whom was it made and for what public was it intended, for what purpose was it made, what does it represent and what is its content and message, what impact did it have on a spectator of that time, and what was its impact on a spectator of that time? All these questions are presented on the occasion of three concrete examples: the statue-column of Judas Iscariot of the front of the Navarrese Church of Santa María la Real de Sangüesa, the Romanesque sepulchre of Santo Domingo de la Calzada and the Gothic altarpiece of the Tower of Ayala in Quejana (Alava).