Ekaterina Rikota
Lomonosov Moscow State University, Russia
The Valley of the Loir is a region in central France situated in the northern part of the Loir-et-Cher department in close proximity to the city of VendÔme, formerly attributed to the dioceses of Chartres and Le Mans. Within one part of the river, on the spot less than 50 km long, fragments of Romanesque wall painting are present in more than 20 churches. Such a high concentration of art in the region was caused by the many routes of pilgrimage from the north crossing the Loir river.
The subject of this research are the little-known to Russian art historians monuments of wall painting of the 12th century, among which the most intact and significant are Saint-Gilles in Montoire, Notre-Dame in Areines, Saint-Julien in Douy, Saint-Jacques-des-Guérets and Saint-Julien in Poncé-sur-le-Loir. Interest in this issue is due to the fact that both the region as a whole as well as individual art ensembles are not studied enough. The greater number of frescoes were discovered by the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th centuries. By that time, owing to the efforts of the first restorers and enthusiasts, the most substantiated and complete studies had been carried out and published.
Our investigations, based on the stylistic and iconographic analysis of the 12th century wall paintings of the Valley of the Loir and neighbouring lands, make it possible to unveil certain common trends in the development of arts in the region during the century. Synthesis of the stylistic borrowings from traditions of Carolingian and Ottoninan art, with influences introduced by foreigns painters, leads to an immensely authentic result. Iconographic schemes, usually drawn from Early Christian sources, acquire new intonations and unconventional forms, often distant from their origins. The second task of this research, of no small importance, is comprehension of the phenomenon of the existence of arts on the background of vita rustica. The relatively fully intact state of certain painting cycles makes it possible to study the problem of compiling programmes that meet the requirements of both parish and pilgrims.