Yoko Ono said “the spirit of art is to express the truth”. But is art always true?

Learning objectives To investigate the Reformation and the effect of the reformation on Christian Art. To evaluate the purpose of religious art with regards to propaganda. To reflect on how much religious art may have a similar purpose today. Learning outcome To produce a teaching aid that will help enable revision, on Religious Propaganda.

What do you understand by the term Reformation?

The Reformation? To understand what went on with the Reformation, first you need to complete the Christianity time line. You may find this difficult, so you need to work well as a group to complete the task.

Why complete the Time-line? This provides you with some simple background of where Christianity had been, and where it was headed before we look in more detail at what occurred during the ‘Reformation’

It’s clear to see that there are two significant changes in Christianity. The first was called the Great Schism when the Orthodox Church and the Catholic church split and went their separate ways. The second is what is known as the Reformation, when some Christians, lead by Martin Luther protested against certain aspects of the Catholic Church, earning the name Protestants. With Henry VIII’s help, the Church of England was formed.

The Reformation? Your Second task is to complete arrange the information on Henry VIII into the correct order. Why? The full effect of the Protestant activity was not truly felt until the reign of Henry VIII and understanding some of his history can help us understand the reasons surrounding the changes.

But what was the Reformation? From the time line we know that the ‘church’ started off in... Again, we can see that the Orthodox Church broke away in... Then we have the Catholic Church established in the West. It is not until... that breaks begin to occur in the Catholic Church and other denominations are formed. We also know that Henry VIII also played a big part in these changes.

But how did that final section occur? What was the Reformation? Basically, what I want you to understand by this concept, is that the Reformation, basically means, in the UK, the reformation, or reforming, of the Church and State. We went from a strongly Catholic country, with the Pope as the head of the Church, to Protestant with the King as head.

The English Reformation Quickly then: – The English Reformation was really enabled by the desire of Henry VIII to divorce his wife Katherine of Aragon and marry Anne Boleyn. – Due to the Catholic belief that divorce was wrong, the Pope rejected Henry VIII’s wish and so Henry decided to do it himself. – He made himself head of the English Church and declared divorce to be legal. – But it is still not as simple as that!!!

The English Reformation The vast majority of English people were annoyed at how the Catholic Church appeared to use them as a source of money. – You had to pay to get married – You had to pay to have your child baptised, and if you didn’t he or she could not go to heaven. – You had to pay to bury someone in consecrated ground, if you didn’t the devil took their souls!

Henry’s Threat Henry VIII was made Supreme Head of the Church by an Act of Parliament in 1532 but the country was still Catholic, all that had changed was that the Pope no longer had any power. However, many of the country’s rich and influential were Catholics, and the most wealthy were the monasteries where the monks lived. This made them a threat to Henry.

So what did he do? Henry’s action towards the Monasteries still scars the landscape today. He decided to shut down all the monasteries, the idea being they were to dissolve away like sugar does in hot liquid, leading to the term ‘Dissolution’.

Dissolution Henry needed the dissolution to appear legal, so that it would be backed by the public. So he sent government officials to check up on what the monks were doing.

But how does any of this relate to Religious Art? If you remember from our earlier work on the didactic purpose of Religious Art, Pope Gregory argued that art was a tool for education to the masses who could not read. This was no less true for the Protestants. They needed to use art to spread a message to the people of England and ensure their thoughts and opinions were accepted. Look around the room for two people you have not worked with before. (working in 3’s)

Propaganda through Art during the Reformation In your three’s, look at the prints by German Protestant Lucas Cranach in front of you. They are based on Martin Luther’s ideas and principles. Complete the 12 steps task. Analysis task: – What messages is the artist/art giving? – What do you think an ordinary English person would think of them? – What do you think of them? Are they successful in sending out a particular message? Are they too complicated? – How do you think they helped the Protestants?

Sharing your thoughts Analysis task: – What messages is the artist/art giving? – What do you think an ordinary English person would think of them? – What do you think of them? Are they successful in sending out a particular message? Are they too complicated? – How do you think they helped the Protestants?

Propaganda through Art during the Reformation Now compare the artwork produced by Lucas Cranach, to the five other pieces. In your three’s, prepare a teaching aid you can use for revision later. It should: – Define the purpose of propaganda in religious art, think; why it is there, what it is trying to do, who is it trying to reach? – Explain what is going on in all the artwork. – Explain why Religious propaganda was necessary in the Tudor period.

Art during the Reformation What is important to recognise, is that most art before the Reformation tended to have some religious connotations. Whether it was symbolism or other wise. The belief that it should represent God’s work in the world. However, some Protestant’s saw this as flawed, believing that since God created everything, then everything they painted, sculpted, etc, was a reflection of God’s work. So there was no need for any Religious connotations. This meant there was a large shift in artworks after the reformation, with more focus on private lives and individual work.

However... The Catholic Church did not merely allow for this character assassination. Instead it launched a counter attack known as the Counter-Reformation. The Great Inquisition in Spain came about due to a Papal desire to keep all to the ‘true faith.’ Although originally aimed at Jews, with the outbreak of Luthernism, the focus fell on would be Protestants. In England the only re-emergence of Catholicism as a strong power was the short reign of Queen Mary, Henry VIII’s eldest daughter, who as a Catholic sought to return the country to the ‘true faith.’ This ended with her death, and the succession of Queen Elizabeth I.

The Artwork!!! You have two pieces of artwork. One is Protestant Reformation Art, the other Catholic Counter Reformation. Work out which is which, explaining why. Read through the information on the sheet about the artwork: – What do you notice? – Why has the work been done in that particular way? – Is there a true difference

Why does it matter? What is the point? For our unit we are looking at the Nature and Purpose of Religious Art – in other words what and why. To understand Religious Art today, it is sometimes better to look back to the past and see how it came to exist the way it does today. We focused on the major shift caused by the Reformation, now we need to consider it’s influence today!

Religious Propaganda today Is there such a thing as modern Religious Propaganda? For your homework, I would like you to research modern Christian Propaganda. An example would be the American Minister and the Qur’an issue. If you have any concerns about this homework, please come and see me in private.

Learning objectives To investigate the Reformation and the effect of the reformation on Christian Art. To evaluate the purpose of religious art with regards to propaganda. To reflect on how much religious art may have a similar purpose today. Learning outcome To produce a teaching aid that will help enable revision, on Religious Propaganda.