Publisher's Synopsis
In the 1790s the sculptural decoration of many French cathedrals was destroyed, and monastic churches were stripped of their royal and noble tombs. As a result, modern art historians have remained largely unaware of the link between architectural sculpture and monumental tomb sculpture. Some years ago, Anne Morganstern recognized the hand of a master sculptor who worked at Chartres in the little-known tomb of a nobleman. This connection prompted the author to investigate the relationship between the two. In High Gothic Sculpture at Chartres Cathedral, the Tomb of the Count of Joigny, and the Master of the Warrior Saints, Morganstern offers a new study of the sculptor whom Louis Grodecki associated with a group of stained-glass windows that he attributed to the "Master of Saint Chéron." Morganstern proposes that the windows reflect the designs of the sculptor whom she calls the "Master of the Warrior Saints," whether or not he was their designer. She also shifts the chronological framework associated with the south transept porch back approximately twenty years, a move that has broad implications for scholarly consideration of the development of French High Gothic sculpture.
