RIHA Journal (Nov 2013)
PATHOS – the bodies of Christ on the Cross. Rhetoric of suffering in wooden sculpture found in Portugal, twelfth-fourteenth centuries. A few examples
Abstract
In Portuguese medieval art, freestanding wooden sculptures representing Christ on the Cross are among the less studied typologies. For this reason, it is important to discuss and question some of the most representative works of aesthetic values and/or iconographic models that characterised this European production between the twelfth and fourteenth centuries. The option for the Christus patiens typology is justified by the fact that it includes a large number of sculptures, some still requiring analysis and reflection, with the possibility of bringing to light new elements through fresh comparisons or using laboratory-based findings. The examples analysed here demonstrate the existence of artistic models reflecting the importance offoreign formal and iconographic references, which in turn raise the issues of the import and/or reinterpretation by Portuguese sculptors of these ideas, and of the itinerancy of foreign sculptors through Portugal, locating this corpus within an international historiographical discussion.
