The Mystic Ark: Hugh of Saint Victor, Art, and Thought in the Twelfth Century (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9781107037052)

In this book, Conrad Rudolph studies and reconstructs Hugh of St. Victor's forty-two-page written work, The Mystic Ark, which describes the medieval painting of the same name. In medieval written sources, works of art are not often referred to, let alone described in any detail. Almost completely ignored by art historians because of the immense difficulty of its text, Hugh of Saint Victor's Mystic Ark (c. 1125-1130) is among the most unusual sources we have for an understanding of medieval artistic culture. Depicting all time, all space, all matter, all human history, and all spiritual striving, this highly polemical painting deals with a series of cultural issues crucial in the education of society's elite during one of the great periods of intellectual change in Western history.

Author: Conrad Rudolph
ISBN-10: 1107037050
ISBN-13: 9781107037052
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Language: English
Published: 06/09/2014
Pages: 626
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 3.10lbs
Size: 10.10h x 7.10w x 1.70d
Award: PROSE - Honorable Mention

Review Citation(s):
Choice 12/01/2014 pg. 599