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GLASS, STAINED
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See also:GLASS, STAINED . All coloured glass is, strictly speaking, " stained " by some metallic See also:oxide added to it in the See also:process of manufacture. But the See also:term " stained glass " is popularly, as well as technically, used in a more limited sense, and is under-stood to refer to stained glass windows. Still the words " stained glass " do not fully describe what is meant; for the glass in coloured windows is for the most See also:part not only stained but painted. Such See also:painting was, however, until comparatively See also:modern times, used only to give details of See also:drawing and to define See also:form. The See also:colour in a stained glass window was not painted on the glass but incorporated in it, mixed with it in the making—whence the term " pot-See also:metal " by which self-coloured glass is known, i.e. glass coloured in the melting pot.
A See also:medieval window was consequently a patchwork of variously coloured pieces. And the earlier its date the more surely was it a See also:mosaic, not in the form of tesserae, but in the manner known as " See also:opus sectile." Shaped pieces of coloured glass were, that is to say, put together like the parts of a See also:puzzle. The
nearest approach to an exception to this See also:rule is a fragment at the See also:Victoria and See also:Albert Museum, in which actual tesserae are fused together into a solid slab of many-coloured glass, in effect a window See also:panel, through which the See also:light shines with all the brilliancy of an See also:Early See also:Gothic window. But apart from the fact that the See also:design proves in this See also:case to be even more effective with the light upon it, the use of See also:gold See also:leaf in the tesserae See also:con-firms the presumption that this See also:work, which (supposing it to be genuine) would be See also:Byzantine, centuries earlier than any coloured windows that we know of, and entirely different from them in technique, is rather a specimen of fused mosaic that happens to be translucent than part of a window designedly executed in tesserae.
The Eastern (and possibly the earlier) practice was to set chips of coloured glass in a heavy fretwork of See also: Stained glass was primarily the See also:art of the glazier; but the painter, called in to help, asserted himself more and more, and eventually took it almost entirely into his own hands. Between the See also:period when it was glazier's work eked out by painting and when it was painter's work with the aid of the glazier lies the entire development of stained and painted window-making. With the eventual endeavour of the glass painter to do without the glazier, and to get the colour by painting in translucent See also:enamel upon colourless glass, we have the beginning of a form of art no longer monumental and comparatively trivial.
This See also:evolution • of the painted window from a patchwork of little pieces of coloured glass explains itself when it is remembered that coloured glass was originally not made in the big sheets produced nowadays, but at first in jewels to look as much as possible like rubies, sapphires, emeralds and other See also:precious stones, and afterwards in rounds and sheets of small dimensions. Though some of the earliest windows were in the form of pure See also:glazing (" leaded-See also:lights "), the addition of painting seems to have been customary from the very first. It was a means of rendering detail not to be got in lead. Glazing affords by itself See also:scope for beautiful See also:pattern work; but the old glaziers never carried their art as far as they might have done in the direction of See also:ornament; their aim was always in the direction of picture; the See also:idea was to make windows serve the purpose of coloured See also:story books. That was beyond the art of the glazier. It was easy enough to represent the drapery of a See also:saint by red glass, the ground on which he stood by See also:green, the See also:sky above by See also:blue, his See also:crown by yellow, the See also:scroll in his See also:hand by See also: When the pieces of painted glass were afterwards glazed together and seen against the light, the design appeared in the brilliant colour of the glass, its forms See also:drawn in the See also:uniform See also:black into which, at a little distance, leadwork and painting lines became merged. It needed solid painting to stop out the light entirely: thin paint only-obscured it. And, even in early glass, thin paint was used, whether to subdue crude colour or to indicate what littleshading a 13th-See also:century draughtsman might See also:desire. In the See also:present See also:state of old glass, the surface often quite disintegrated, it is difficult to determine to what extent thin paint was used for either purpose. There must always have been the temptation to make tint do instead of solid lines; but the more workmanlike practice, and the usual one, was to get difference of tint, as a See also:pen-draughtsman does, by lines of solid opaque colour. In comparatively colourless glass (See also:grisaille) the pattern was often made to stand out by See also:cross-hatching the background; and another See also:common practice was to coat the glass with paint all over, and scrape the design out of it. The effect of either proceeding was to See also:lower the See also:tone of the glass without dirtying the colour, as a smear of thin paint would do. Towards the 14th century, when Gothic design took a more naturalistic direction, the desire to get something like modelling made it necessary to carry painting farther, and they got rid to some extent of the See also:ill effect of shading-colour smeared on the glass by stippling it. This not only softened the tint and allowed of gradation according to the amount of stippling, but Iet some light through, where the bristles of the stippling-See also:tool took up the pigment. Shading of this See also:kind enforced by touches of strong brushwork, cross-hatching and some scratching out of high lights was the method of glass painting adopted in the 14th century. Glass was never at the best a pleasant surface to paint on; and glass painting, following the See also:line of least resistance, See also:developed' in the later Gothic and early See also:Renaissance periods into something unlike any other form of painting. The outlines continued to be traced upon the glass and fixed in the See also:fire; but, after that, the process of painting consisted mainly in the removal of paint. The entire surface of the glass was coated with an even " matt " of See also:pale brown; this was allowed to dry; and then the high lights were rubbed off, and the modelling was got by scrubbing away the paint with a dry hog-See also:hair See also:brush, more or less, according to the gradations required. Perfect modelling was got by repeating the operation—how often depended upon the dexterity of the painter. A painter's method is partly the outcome of his individuality. One See also:man would See also:float on his colour and manipulate it to some extent in the moist state; another would work entirely upon the dry matt. See also:Great use was made of the pointed stick with which See also:sharp lines of light were easily scraped out; and in the 16th century Swiss glass painters, working upon a relatively small See also:scale, got their modelling entirely with a See also:needle-point, scraping away the paint just as an etcher scratches away the See also:varnish from his See also:etching See also:plate. The practice of the two craftsmen is, indeed, identical, though the one scratches out what are to be black lines and the other lines of light. In the end, then, though a painter would always use touches of the brush to get crisp lines of dark, the manipulation of glass painting consisted more in erasing lights than in painting shadows, more in rubbing out or scraping off paint than in putting it on in brush strokes. So far there was no thought of getting colour by means of paint. The colour was in the glass itself, permeating the See also:mass (" pot-metal "). There was only one exception to this—See also:ruby glass, the colour of which was so dense that red glass thick enough for its purpose would have been practically obscure; and so they made a colourless pot-metal coated on one side only with red glass. This led to a practice which forms an exception to the rule that in "pot-metal" glass every See also:change of colour, or from colour to white, is got by the use of a See also:separate piece of glass. It was possible in the case of this " flashed " ruby to grind away portions of the surface and thus obtain white on red or red on white. Eventually they made coated glass of blue and other See also:colours, with a view to producing similar effects by See also:abrasion. (The same result is arrived at nowadays by means of etching. The skin of coloured glass, in old days laboriously ground or cut away, is now easily eaten off by fluoric See also:acid.) One other exceptional expedient in colouring had very considerable effect upon the development of glass design from about the beginning of the 14th century. The See also:discovery that a See also:solution of See also:silver applied to glass WQUUd under the See also:action of the fire stain it yellow enabled the glass painter to get yellow upon colourless glass, green upon See also:grey-blue, and (by staining only the abraded portions) yellow upon blue or ruby. This yellow was neither enamel nor pot-metal colour, but stain—the only staining actually done by the glass painter as distinct from the glass maker. It varied in colour from pale See also:lemon to deep See also:orange, and was singularly pure in quality. As what is called " white " glass became purer and was employed in greater quantities it was lavishly used; so much so that a brilliant effect of silvery white and See also:golden yellow is characteristic of later Gothic windows. The last See also:stage of glass painting was the employment of enamel not for stopping out light but to get colour. It began to be used in the early part of the 16th century—at first only in the form of a flesh tint; but it was not See also:long before other colours were introduced. This use of colour no longer in the glass but upon it marks quite a new departure in technique. Enamel colour was finely powdered coloured glass mixed with See also:gum or some such substance into a pigment which could be applied with a brush. When the glass painted with it was brought to a red See also:heat in the See also:oven, the powdered glass melted and was fused to it, just like the opaque brown employed from the very beginning of glass-painting. This process of enamelling was hardly called for in the interests of art. Even the red flesh-colour (borrowed from the See also:Limoges enamellers upon copper) did not in the least give the quality of flesh, though it enabled the painter to suggest by contrast the whiteness of a man's See also:beard. As for the brighter enamel colours, they had nothing like the See also:depth or richness of "stained " glass. What enamel really did was to make easy much that had been impossible in mosaic, as, for example, to represent upon the very smallest See also:shield of arms any number of " charges " all in the correct tinctures. It encouraged the See also:minute workmanship characteristic of Swiss glass painting; and, though this was not altogether inappropriate to domestic window panes, the painter was tempted by it'to depart from the simplicity and breadth of design inseparable from the earlier mosaic practice. In the end he introduced coloured glass only where he could hardly help it, and glazed the great part of his window in rectangular panes of clear glass, upon which he preferred to paint his picture in opaque brown and translucent enamel colours. Enamel upon glass has not stood the test of See also:time. Its presence is usually to be detected in old windows by specks of light shining through the colour. This is where the enamel has crumbled off. There is a very See also:good See also:reason for that. Enamel must melt at a temperature at which the glass it is painted on keeps its shape. The lower the melting point of the powdered glass the more easily it is fused. The painter is consequently inclined to use enamel of which the contraction and expansion is much greater than that of his glass—with the result that, under the action of the See also:weather, the colour is See also:apt to work itself See also:free and expose the See also:bare white glass beneath. The only enamel which has held its own is that of the Swiss glass-painters of the 16th and 17th centuries. The domestic window panes they painted may not in all cases have been tried by the sudden changes of See also:atmosphere to which See also: In that respect no new glass can compare with it. There is, however, no such thing as " the lost See also:secret " of glass-making. It is no secret that age mellows. Stained and painted glass is commonly apportioned to its " period," Gothic or Renaissance, and further to the particular phase of the See also:style to which it belongs. C. Winston, who was the first to inquire thoroughly into See also:English glass, adopting T. See also:Rickman's See also:classification, divided Gothic windows into Early English (to c. 128o), Decorated (to c. 138o) and Perpendicular (to c. 1530). These See also:dates will do. But the transition from one phase of design to another is never so sudden, nor so easily defined, as any table of dates would lead us to suppose. The old style lingered in one See also:district long after the new See also:fashion was flourishing in another. Besides, the English periods do not quite coincide with those of other countries. See also:France, See also:Germany and the See also:Low Countries See also:count for much in the history of stained glass; and in no two places was the See also:pace of progress quite the same. There was, for example, scarcely any 13th-century Gothic in Germany, where the " geometric " style, See also:equivalent to our Decorated,-was preceded by the Romanesque period; in France the Flamboyant took the See also:place of our Perpendicular; and in See also:Italy Gothic never properly took See also:root at all. All these considered, a rather rough and ready See also:division presents the least difficulty to the student of old glass; and it will be found convenient to think of Gothic glass as (1) Early, (2) See also:Middle and (3) See also:Late, and of the subsequent windows as (1) Renaissance and (2) Late Renaissance. The three periods of Gothic correspond approximately to the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries. The limits of the two periods of the Renaissance are not so easily defined. In the first part of the 16th century (in Italy long before that) the Renaissance and Gothic periods overlapped; in the latter part of it, glass painting was already on the decline; and in the 17th and 18th centuries it sank to deeper depths of degradation. The likeness of early windows to translucent enamel (which is also glass) is obvious. The lines of lead glazing correspond absolutely to the " cloisons " of Byzantine goldsmith's work. Moreover, the extreme minuteness of the leading (not always either mechanically necessary or architecturally desirable) suggests that the starting point of all this gorgeous See also:illumination was the idea of reproducing on a grandiose scale. the jewelled effect produced in small by cloisonne enamellers. In other respects the earliest glass shows the See also:influence of Byzantine tradition. It is mainly according to the more or less Byzantine See also:character of its design and draughtsmanship that archaeologists ascribe certain remains of old glass to the 12th or the 11th century. Apart from documentary or See also:direct historic See also:evidence, it is not possible to determine the precise date of any particular fragment. In the " restored " windows at St See also:Denis there are remnants of glass belonging to the See also:year 1 ro8. Elsewhere in France (See also:Reims, Anger, Le Mans, See also:Chartres, &c.) there is to be found very early glass, some of it probably not much later than the end of the loth century, which is the date confidently ascribed to certain windows at St Remi (Reims) and at See also:Tegernsee. The rarer the specimen the greater may be its technical and antiquarian See also:interest. But, even if we could be quite sure of its date, there is not enough of this very early work, and it does not sufficiently ..distinguish itself from what followed, to count artistically for much. The See also:glory of early glass belongs to the 13th century. The design of windows was influenced, of course, by the conditions of the workshop, by the nature of glass, the difficulty of shaping it, the way it could be painted, and the See also:necessity of lead glazing. 1The place of glass in the See also:scheme of church decoration led to a certain severity in the treatment of it. The growing desire to get more and more light into the churches, and the consequent manufacture of purer and more transparent. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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