Of Pagans and Strange Correspondences

I have this fabulous drawing board that my boyfriend's father dug out of his garage.  It is painted scrap wood, 3/4" thick and approximately 19"x20".  I was itching to start a new painting, but before doing so I wanted to deal with this ~6"x3" scrap of watercolor paper that had been taped to the board for months.  I no longer remember whence it came, but watercolor paper is precious, so I obviously felt that sticking it to my drawing board would make sure I used it.  Well, I finally did.

For years I have wanted to paint some detail from one of the few extant pages of the Belleville Breviary, which was illuminated by the great 14th-century Parisian miniaturist, Jean Pucelle.  Given that the project before me involved using a small slip of paper simply to avoid throwing it away, I felt the time may have arrived to pay my homage to Monsieur Pucelle. 

On the bottom of the breviary's December page appear two figures, one haloed and one not, and they stand beside a pile of tumbling down bricks.  

The fabulous Michael Camille tells me that the haloed figure is an apostle and the non-sanctified individual is the prophet Zachariah. Zachariah holds a banner that says, "I will raise up thy sons." (Zachariah 9:13).  In echoed answer to this Old Testament scripture, the apostle's banner bears the words, "Resurrection of the flesh, life eternal," which are the last two articles of the Apostles' Creed.  And each man holds a brick from the destroyed Temple, which is at their right.  

The point Pucelle sought to make with this image concerns proving a correspondence between the Old and New Testaments.  Medieval theologians put a lot of sincere thought and textual analysis into finding passages from the Old Testament that seemed to correspond to, indeed to presage, passages from the New Testament.  As it is with language, "facts" and history: you find what you seek, the question asked is the question answered, and medieval scholars found proof after proof that the New Testament was somehow prefigured by and foretold in the Old Testament.  Personally, I like to think about this medieval project of correspondences by reference to reader response theory; in order to reflect that much of the meaning we take from a text derives from us as readers rather than from the text itself.

At any rate, I loved this delicate image, but was not a huge fan of the scriptural meaning with which Pucelle had endowed it.  I knew I wanted to change the meaning of the image, while preserving the image.  I guess that makes my project similar to the medieval theologians about whom I just spoke.  I derived meaning from elsewhere and imposed it on the painting.  But I did so after I had almost completely finished the painting.  Here are a couple of sketch and early process pictures taken when I still had no idea who these figures would become for me.  (The leafy border design is certainly inspired by Pucelle,  but is my own composition.)

 

Finally, I began to concoct my own game of correspondences.  Scholar after medieval scholar would read and admire the works of pre-Christian (a.k.a. pagan) authors and yet they would tread a careful path in discussing their admiration for or mimicry of said authors.  The writings of classical poets predated Jesus, just as did the Old Testament, but medieval scholars seldom played the same game of correspondences with classical literature that they did with the Old Testament.  They could less readily sanctify it by imagining that it actually prefigured Christian scripture. 

For one thing (and I am being very general here), classical writings came from a wildly different spiritual and cultural milieu whereas, to Christian minds, the culture of the Old Testament spawned and was subsumed by the culture of the New Testament.  For another, many of the social values and basic assumptions about the world represented in classical literature directly conflicted with the mores and teachings of medieval Catholicism.  These disparities did not, in every case, keep medieval scholars from seeking correspondences between pagan writers and Catholic scripture, but the relationship between pagan and Catholic thought remained a sticky one often approached with trepidation by medieval writers.  At least until the great Thomas Aquinas tackled Aristotle, many medieval scholars happily read classical authors but did not talk very much about them, unless it was to caution against letting the beauty of classical poetry blind one to the errors of pagan viewpoints.  

One such author was the renowned bishop, Saint Gregory of Tours.  Like any sufficiently educated man of his day (not to mention one from an august family, who was certainly being groomed for high positions), Gregory would have read mostly scripture and Christian authors, but likely would have been exposed to a number of classical non-Christian authors as well.  He certainly read one of the more popular pagan authors of the Middle Ages, Virgil.  

As I began to think about these two men, Gregory and Virgil, I considered the opera magna for which each became primarily known; the Aeneid on the one hand, and the Historia Francorum on the other.  Virgil's Aeneid recounts the legendary heroic, tragic and divinely sanctioned adventures of Aeneas from the Trojan War to his ultimate founding of Rome.  Whether written to praise or criticize Augustus, the Aeneid certainly celebrates Rome herself.  Gregory's Historia Francorum chronicles events from the Creation through the Christianization of Gaul and the reigns of Frankish kings, whom Gregory himself knew.  Again, like Virgil with Augustus, if Gregory's relationships with the Frankish kings were not always untroubled, in the Historia he ultimately seeks to praise Gaul herself.  

I see, probably because I seek it, some correspondence between the scope and spirit of the Aeneid and of the Historia Francorum.  I decided immediately that I had painted, not an apostle and Zachariah, but Gregory of Tours and Virgil.  Now I had to figure out what they were saying to each other.  That is, to put on their banners?  A college Latin professor made sure that the opening lines of the Aeneid occupy a readily accessible portion of my memory: arma virumque cano, "I sing of arms and men".  It places the reader directly in a world of battle and conflict and proceeds to tell the reader how the forces of destruction can also act as forces of creation.  Empires fall so that empires may arise.  Obviously this line would grace Virgil's banner.  

Imagine my delight when looking to the opening of the Historia Francorum, I found these words: scripturus bella regum, "I am about to write of the wars of kings".  I had certainly found my correspondence.  Gregory, too, immediately places his reader in a place of conflict and, as we know, he ultimately shows his reader how such conflict created a powerful kingdom.  Struggle and battle do not merely destroy, but also generate.  Additionally, both authors draw attention to themselves as narrators right away: "I sing..." and "I am about to write..."  I love this early somewhat unselfconscious insertion of author's self into narrative.  I know the conceit figures in most medieval works, but here the practice comprises shared ground between the ancient and medieval.  So I finally had text for my banners.  I knew what my figures were saying to each other.  They were discoursing on states and men, on war and power.  It also became an easy stretch to imagine the pile of bricks as the ruins of Troy, for growth is predicated on destruction.  And, in good medieval fashion, I labeled my figures as well.

 

This most difficult problem solved, I set about creating an appropriate frame for the piece.  I procured some birch balsa wood, stained it, and mounted the painting.  I then decorated the frame with an original design. I  thought the whole thing came out quite nicely and I loved the mental journey its creation occasioned for me.

 

For more arts and crafts, visit The Celery Museum's Etsy page.

    

Of Sweet and Sour Perfection

Oh my, my, my but we made something tasty a few nights ago.  Running low on almost everything, Nick and I took a quick trip to the French Market, brought home a red pepper and some jalapeños, and sliced up our reserve block of tofu.  Using an improvised blend of a couple of recipes from the book Chinese Vegetarian Cookery by Jack Santa Maria, we made an astoundingly good sweet and sour tofu.  Here's how.

I pressed and sliced an extra firm block of tofu into triangles and marinated them in 3 tablespoons of sherry that had 1 teaspoon of salt in it.  After letting that soak for about 20 minutes, I dredged the tofu first in 2 eggs-worth of egg replacer (prepared egg replacer - that is, the powder mixed with the appropriate ratio of  water and whisked really well).  Then I rolled them in flour.

Nick fried these puppies up in enough canola oil to cover the bottom of the pan.

Once golden all over, he drained them.  You will note some darker and some paler triangles.  He was afraid he had burned the first batch, but by the time we ate the tofu smothered in sweet and sour sauce, the really firmly fried dark ones ended up taking the sauce better.

While I had been preparing the tofu, Nick has sliced all the veggies.  We used red pepper, garlic, onion (not pictured -- it got its own bowl, we used so much), jalapeños and some dried black fungus, which had been soaked for about an half hour.  The green onions were for the rice.

While Nick was frying the tofu, I started the rice cooking.  I usually use a little bit of veggie broth along with water.  We save our vegetable scraps and make our own broth, so we always have plenty on hand.  I also add a pat of butter and several bay leaves to the cook water.  I recently procured some "Indian" bay leaves from a local Asian market and find them to be even more fragrant than the kind I am used to using.  They don't look as pretty, being thinner and more easily broken, but their flavor is much better and more intense.

After the rice was going, I began stir frying the veggies.  First the mushrooms, then the peppers and onions.  I let these cook for a couple of minutes and then added the jalapeños and garlic.

When the vegetables were still crispy, I poured in 2 tablespoons soy sauce, 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar, 1 tablespoon sherry, 3.5 tablespoons brown sugar and 3 teaspoons of cornstarch, which had been dissolved in a cup of water.  I stirred all of this very well and let it simmer for about 7 minutes while the sauce thickened.  I gave it all a light sprinkle of salt, but not too much, and tossed it with sesame seeds.

All plated and ready to be delicious.

And the money shot that makes me want to devour it all over again.  Nick is taunting me by eating these leftovers as I type!  The result was scrumptious.  We'll be making this again very soon and inflicting it on some of our friends.

Of Saints and Pilgrims and the V(ogel)-Effekt

I would like to share some pictures of a couple of projects I finished back before the holidays.  I like them both very well.  Both have been listed on The Celery Museum's Etsy page.

Project the First, Bertolt Budgie.

I have been needlefelting for a couple of years now.  I find I am best at, and enjoy most, making animals.  Tiny, tiny animals.  This time I tried my hand at an itty bitty bird, sitting atop a nest.

He also comes with a surprise inside...tiny clay eggs!

Despite the whole egg/nest/mother thing, I made my little felted friend a boy and named him Bertolt after the German writer, whom I greatly admire, Bertolt Brecht.  I don't think Herr Brecht would have minded.  Here's one more picture of Bertolt from a different angel.

Project the Second, St. James the Pilgrim.

I once took a Medieval Cities course in grad school.  My how I loved that class.  And my final project entailed creating a presentation about a specific city in the Middle Ages.  I and a fellow grad student gleefully chose Santiago de Compostela as our topic.  (I say "gleeful" because the two of us both studied medieval/early modern religion and spirituality - researching a pilgrimage site sounded like fun to us.)  My friend covered the city proper and I examined the pilgrimage route to the city.  I would just post a link about the place, but oh it's just too much fun to think about it, so here's my own little history lesson.

Santiago de Compostela lies in the northwestern corner of Spain in the region known as Galicia.  In the 9th century, some fortunate monks discovered what they believed were the remains of the apostle James.  The Pope (Leo III, as far as I can tell) and Charlemagne agreed, and a pilgrimage site was born.  Throughout the Middle Ages, Santiago de Compostela drew an enormous number of pilgrims to its shrine of St. James.  In fact, only Rome and Jerusalem eclipsed Santiago de Compostela as more popular pilgrimage sites.

A map showing the various smaller routes converging on the main northern camino to Santiago de Compostela:

As a lover of art, one of the things that really intrigued me as I delved further into study of the pilgrimage, is the dual aspect of St. James' iconography.  Saints typically appear in Catholic art bearing an item or items, which identify them.  If the saint was martyred, for example, they will be depicted holding the instrument of their martyrdom.  Iconography in general comprises its own fascinating topic - maybe I'll write about that at some point - but for now, I will stick with St. James.

St. James' iconography pertains not to his death, but to his (legendary) actions.  And not just one action at that, but two.  A few saints are groovy enough to possess two sets of iconography, two aspects, which pertain to two ways in which they are understood within the religion.  St. James is one of these guys.

His first, and to me disturbingly bellicose, aspect is as St. James Matamoros, the "Moor-Slayer".  In 854, so the story goes, the Iberian Muslim army and a small group of holdout Christians engaged in the battle of Clavijo.  St. James appeared and fought along with the outnumbered Christians.  Even though this battle may or may not have occurred, it makes sense the story would have proliferated to the point of creating an iconographic persona for St. James.  The Christian "Reconquista" of Spain from the Muslims lasted hundreds of years and cost innumerable lives.  It destroyed the most advanced society in Europe at the time and ended with such celebrated hate-filled zealotry as the Spanish Inquisition and the expulsion of Jews and Muslims from Spain.  It is a sad and depressing story, but for Christians of the period, I guess it was inspirational.  At any rate, they seemed to require an inordinate number of heroes and proofs that God was on their side.  So this St. James story fed right into their propaganda requirements.

Note the serene expression on James' face as he tramples a man beneath his horse's hooves.  Ugh.

The second aspect of St. James, and the one I appreciate most, is St. James as Pilgrim.  In a genius stroke of temporal manipulation and disregard for historic plausibility, germane to the Middle Ages, St. James is depicted as a medieval pilgrim to his own shrine.  He carries a walking stick with a gourd bottle, wears sturdy leather boots, a wide-brimmed hat, and also sports the scallop shell associated with the Santiago de Compostela shrine and, more generally, with Galicia.  (Competing stories exist as to why the scallop shell became associated with James.  You can read about them here.)  It must have seemed like an especially good idea during the Middle Ages to mark oneself as a pilgrim while on the road.  One would travel through numerous towns and be almost wholly reliant on locals for lodging and food.  I imagine townspeople, including monks, would be much likelier to open their doors to a pilgrim (and his money) than to any other sort of stranger.  At any rate, I quite like this image of St. James.

I swear I'm working up to the point at which I actually make something.

One evening, several years ago, I found myself at a sushi dinner where I was served scallops on a shell the size of my hand, fingers and all.  The shell was flat and smooth and particularly well suited, so thought I, to serving as a canvas.  I was still in the midst of my research on the Santiago de Compostela pilgrimage route, so I pocketed the shell (after devouring the scallops on it, of course) with some vague idea of painting an image of St. James on it.  Well, I have carried this lovely shell around for over 5 years, and just before Christmas I finally, finally, finally fulfilled my vision!

To my surprise and delight, the shell took pencil very well, so I was able to do a pretty complete sketch before painting.  Such sketches both serve as my safety net while painting and are simply a fun part of the process for me.  Some painters do not enjoy drawing, but I sure do.

Under the circumstances of being limited to acrylic paint, I quite like how he turned out.

 

Wonderfully, the pilgrimage route to Santiago de Compostela is still traveled today.  I hope to take it myself one day.  Not for religious reasons, but for the history of it.  The route, which winds across northern Spain, passes through numerous old medieval towns which have their own shrines and churches and such.  I would make sure to wear a scallop shell.

Book: Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

I came to my reading of Watchmen with pretty high expectations.  I steered clear of the film until I could take in the book, having heard what an original, complex and downright groovy graphic novel this is.  I guess I would call Watchmen original and complex, and for that matter groovy.  And yet, I didn't love it the way I wanted to love it.  It did not seem immediate or very relevant.  I disliked the female characters and the book's handling of gender.  Every once in a while the over-earnest writing (especially for Rorschach) elicited an eye roll from me.  And then it struck me Watchmen was published over 20 years ago.

I tried to cut it some slack and decided I would probably most effectively understand and appreciate the book within its context.  That is, within the context of the historical moment of its publication, as well as within the context of the tradition of graphic novels and what was expected of them when Watchmen was published.  Essentially, I got the feeling that so many tropes of modern superhero literature had been introduced and even created by Watchmen, that if one didn't take care to remember this, one might fall into the error of thinking it hackneyed.  Like believing Shakespeare wrote in clichés, when in fact he originated language that would become, through acceptance and use, clichéd.

The main plot line of Watchmen unfolds against and becomes intertwined with the eruption of a nuclear scare between the United States and the Soviet Union.  The U. S. President at the time of this occurrence (1985ish) is still Richard Nixon.  We learn that he ushered through a constitutional amendment to allow him to run for more than two terms.  Even though nuclear armament, and the threat of its use in an alternate historical 80s, comprise the very specific atmosphere within which the larger questions of heroism and altruism develop, these questions still resonate today.  We no longer fear all out nuclear war (even though we probably should), now we fear terrorism.  In any event, there still exists a phantom-like hostility out there, which leads us to gauge the balance of our safety with our freedom and to imagine heroes capable of offering us the former while protecting the latter.  Perhaps because Moore envisions superheros as real personalities, because he questions vigilante justice and what would draw an individual to pursuing it, do we today portray superheros the way we do - as flawed and somewhat frightening humans who exercise power many of us wish for, many of us distrust, but few of us would truly want.  Just as with contemporary superhero films, Watchmen maintains interest in both the effect of vigilante justice on the psyche of the superhero/vigilante and its effects on the public those superheroes/vigilantes purport to protect.

In addition to this theme of moral ambiguity, Watchmen achieves complexity with its interesting structure.  The main narrative (and illustration, in this case) alternates both with different formats, news clippings, book excerpts, etc., and with a parallel narrative or story-within-a-story of "The Black Freighter".  (Aside:  The Brecht fan in me really appreciated this homage.) 

Altogether a work of ambitious scope and intellectually interesting questions, I ultimately appreciated Watchmen mentally much more than I did emotionally or aesthetically.  I think that for its emotional and aesthetic impact to reach me, I would have had to read it in the 80s, when it all seemed fresh.  But that's my failing,  I think, and not really the book's.

Oh, and Dr. Manhattan is a f&*%ing badass.

For more book reviews visit My Goodreads Page.

Of Holidays, Introversion, Atheism and Baking

It happened again. The holidays hijacked my time and energy and it has been over a month since I posted anything...or made anything...or finished a book.  I realize that this happens to most Americans. Thanksgiving arrives and suddenly there are too many events to plan for, too many folks to shop for, too many visits to make and receive. Yes, I realize many Americans' lives go on hold for the month of December, but I have not talked to so many who seem to resent it as much as I do.

I know a large part of my resentment has to do with Christmas marketing, with the expectation to get a certain amount of gifts, of a certain amount of money, for a certain amount of people. Even while I don't play that game, the consumerism of this holiday disturbs me profoundly and pressures me indirectly. It is everywhere.

Then there is the Christmas expectation that you should see as many people as you possibly can and go to as many parties as there are...and everyone has a Christmas party.  I love my friends and my family and I am never sorry to see or spend time with them, but I would be a damned liar if I did not admit that I find all of that visiting and socializing crammed into one month extremely taxing.  I am an introvert who requires a certain amount of time to myself simply not to feel a little crazy.  This year I started to feel a little crazy.  My bill-payer job had functions galore, from two holiday parties (TWO) to our yearly retreat.  One friend had a sweet swap, where we all got together and traded homemade desserts.  I helped another friend decorate her tree (and drink her martinis).  Nick and I drove to Houston to visit my brother and his lovely family over Christmas proper.  We flew to Chicago and then drove to St. Paul, Minnesota to attend the wedding of a college friend of Nick's.  An extremely good friend of ours flew into New Orleans from Amsterdam and, naturally, we spent as much time with him as we could.  As fantastic as it was to see all of these individuals and spend time with them, stands in direct proportion to how stressed out I gradually became as the month wore on and we still had event after event lined up.  Still, if my greatest problem is that I have an abundance of loved ones in my life, well...I remind myself to shut up, Sara.

That said, I have one more Christmas beef.  I feel uncomfortable about the common assumption that there is something universal about celebrating the birth of a messianic figure specific to one religion. I suppose one could say I am Christian by culture, having been raised in the United States by white anglo-saxon Protestants, but by no stretch of the imagination am I Christian by belief.  I think of the whole holiday as more of a winter festival...the same pagan festival that was coopted by Christians all those centuries ago. The evergreen, the warm spicy flavors of the season, cold-weather vegetables abounding. I can definitely get into a celebration of making it through the winter (especially this winter..brrrrr!) and looking forward to the renewal of spring.  And of course I begrudge no Christian the religious aspect of their celebration.  Celebrate away!  But know that I will, too.  And that not believing in the divinity of Jesus does not make me a bad person or a hater of anybody.  Of course, I realize many Christians don't look that way on non-Christians, but it's alarming how many do.

So, being non-combative and living the oh-so-Christian south, I generally keep my mouth shut on this point, and instead take the opportunity to give gifts to the people I care about most, to visit with friends and family, and, this year for the first time, to bake and bake and bake some more.

My mother baked all the time - pies, cookies, cakes, cinnamon rolls. My brother, very scientific and precise, inherited this talent. I did not.  Until very recently, I primarily had only misadventures in baking.  But this year that all changed.  This year, despite past baking failures, I was determined to make some sweets Nicholas could eat.  It can be difficult enough to buy prepared vegan food in south Louisiana, but finding vegan baked goods down here is near impossible.  So Nick, who has quite a sweet tooth, tends to be omitted from goodies like birthday cake, holiday cookies, etc.  I couldn't let this injustice go on any longer!  So I consulted the all-knowing Isa Chandra Moskowitz and attempted several batches of cupcakes - lemon, coconut and almond are the ones I've tried so far - and they have, without exception, turned out moist and delicious.  I found these results so heartening, I also made batches of chocolate chip cookies and even gingerbread men.

And come to think of it, in the realm of savory baked goods, through many trials and errors I developed a vegan biscuit recipe that I think makes fabulous biscuits.  It turns out all I had to do in order to bake well, is get rid of dairy-based ingredients!  The chemistry gets much simpler and I never have anything fall or turn out too dense or dry.  Like magic.

So I suppose all of this baking has provided a pretty good creative outlet for me over the past month.  Not much else has, and the introvert/creator in me has been feeling very lazy indeed.  But now it is the new year with nothing to distract me from my small pursuit of making things and feeling productive...at least until Mardi Gras.