Talk:Marian art in the Catholic Church/Archive 1

Corrections
1. Surely Roman Catholic Mariology is not "based" on the dogmas, whatever number they are, but on Divine Revelation through Scripture and Tradition. Divine Revelation or the presumption of it is, I would think, the basis for the dogmas and for the non-dogma subjects of Mariology.

2. The sources indicated in the article do not say that the liturgy refers to Mary as "ever virgin" since the third century. Check the text of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, to which I have inserted a direct link.

3. The catacombs were burial grounds before the time of Constantine: many of the martyrs are recorded as buried in them. Lima (talk) 12:45, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Response
Hi,

Most of the theological issues you refer to are also in the main articles about those topics. If you do think there are errors, always see the main article first, and if it is a major change, please discuss on the talk page there. And the facts may become clear in that process anyway.

Since this article is not intended as a main discussion of either Mariology or the dogmas, I usually take those facts and references from the main articles. So please discuss on the main article first with the people who watch those pages.

A clear exampole of this was the change you made regarding the number of dogmas had a clear reference in the main article about Mediatrix and I had to make it more prominent there. It was also clearly mentioned in the Roman Catholic Mariology article. I hope you understand my having to revert those changes.

Regarding the "ever virgin" item, it is in the first sentence of Perpetual virginity of Mary page. The 2nd reference I had inserted there did not have it, but I corrected that and added a reference from Univ of Dayton as well.

Regarding Roman Catholic Mariology being purely based on scripture, that was a key point in the Roman Catholic Mariology article. The idea of sensus fidelium makeing Roman Catholic Mariology different from the usual theological approaches is a key issue. If you disagree with that please discuss on the talk page for Roman Catholic Mariology first which would be the natural forum for that discussion.

In this article I have tried to obtain the theology from the main pages, and discuss a link to art. Issues regarding the theology are best discussed on thos emain pages. However, issues relating to the interaction of art and Mariology are best suited for discussion here.

However, your edits did tell me something: "I have not made my points clearly enough" and I need to rework sentences for more clarity. I will try to do that in a day or two. For instance, based on was probably too strong and I will soften that. I am still developing this article, so please make comments once it is more stable. Thank you. History2007 (talk) 17:19, 29 June 2008 (UTC)
 * If "most of the theological issues are also in the the main articles about those topics", please leave them there, and talk here about art, not theology. And anything you say here about either art of theology must be supported with reliable external sources: you can't quote Wikipedia in support of Wikipedia statements.
 * Does "perpetual virginity" mean no more than virginity at the moment of the Annunciation? Of course not.  So by what right do you censor out the references to representations in art of the Salome story?  They do exist.  They are Roman Catholic Marian art.
 * On what grounds do you censor the sourced view that the Marian dogmas can be said to be three rather than four? Nobody denies that they are usually said to be four.  But NPOV demands that that articles should not ignore other views.
 * I am sure you did the following in good faith, but it could give the opposite impression. You presented as "EWTN on the Fifth Marian Dogma" what is not an EWTN document but only a petition by a group that calls itself Vox Populi Mariae Mediatrici, and you presented a Zenit (not Vatican) report about a letter signed by some cardinals that says nothing about a "fifth" dogma as "Vatican News on the Mediatrix Petition as 5th dogma to the Pope".
 * Please remedy at least these matters. For the moment, I will only put back the Salome information.  I will look at the article again tomorrow.  Lima (talk) 19:24, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Please watch your blood pressure buddy, you are getting worked out over an ongoing article. Calm down, this is stil in development. As to what right, it would have taken too much effort to deal with your right & wrong edits alltogether. It was clear that you had not read the main articles. Believe me that there are only 4 dogmas and there many references, if you do a web search. I just picked two of them. And Zenith is a major Catholic agency and the reference again came from Wikipedia. I do not really want to get overworked on these minor issues. I had to summarize some of those facts here to provide continuity.

Wait a few days until I have finished my edits on the other two sections on Apparitions and Mother of God and then I will add balance to it overall. Your point about Salome was relevant, but then John thinks there is too much theology, but I will try to merge your point into the text in a day or two. Thanks History2007 (talk) 20:43, 29 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I have sympathy with Lima from the theological point of view, but from the art-historical pov the doubting-midwife legend "which was sharply repudiated by western doctors of the church" is in fact pretty rare in Western, ie Catholic, art as opposed to Byzantine art, only appearing with any frequency "during the 8th and 9th centuries...[when] art in the Roman sphere of influence under the Greek and Syrian popes was entirely dominated by eastern influence" (page 64, G Schiller, Iconography of Christian Art, Vol. I,1971 (English trans from German), Lund Humphries, London, ISBN 853312702). One example is at Castelseprio, also cited by Schiller, and though in Northern Italy, almost certainly by a Greek artist.  Given the rudimentary level of this article it is an extremely obscure point to be making - in fact it is not mentioned (for this reason) in the far more detailed Nativity of Jesus in art (correction - I see it is, but very briefly).   Johnbod (talk) 21:56, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, whether that reference remains or goes can of course be discussed. But I think Lima's point that Nativity deserves a mention in this article is valid (from my pov) so I made a subsection for it, so it can get populated with whatever is eventually deemed relevant. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 22:49, 29 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Oh dear - look what a mess you have made of it! - misleading both doctrinally and art-historically! Johnbod (talk) 00:44, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks to History2007 for not reverting out of hand and instead taking some account of another editor's observations.
 * The additions I made were not about Jesus' Nativity as such: they were about the inclusion of Salome in pictures and sculptures of the Nativity. At a certain stage she ceased to appear in Western representations (though not in Eastern), but the examples given show that she continued to appear until at least the fourteenth century.  And surely Giotto, Duccio etc. are considered Roman Catholic.  Lima (talk) 04:42, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The two midwives bathing the baby are shown, as you say decreasingly often, until the late Middle Ages, but they have no theological significance - the legend of the doubting midwife is what we were talking about. Johnbod (talk) 11:57, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I am unsure what you mean by theological significance. Also whether Salome was originally described as a midwife, as the other woman certainly was.  Whether Salome was or was not a midwife, the inclusion of the two, even if only shown bathing the infant, was surely a reference to the story that dates back to the second century - or do you disagree?  The representation of Salome on the Ravenna throne could scarcely be more explicit while still showing Mary fully clothed.  Such representations of Salome with her hand withered, as today in some Eastern icons, continued in the West as late as Roger Campin’s Nativity (c.1420).  I suppose that even this degree of explicitness began to be considered indecent, leading to showing the two women, who were still included in the picture as witnesses to what they had discovered, at a later occupation (bathing the infant), and finally, in the West, to their elimination from pictures of the Nativity, with the result that in the West the story is now little known.  But it was still known in the seventeenth century (cf. Midwiving Subjects in Shakespeare's England By Caroline Bicks 2003, p. 69), by which time Salome was certainly believed to have been a midwife.   Lima (talk) 13:01, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Salome was certainly one of the two midwives, though as Schiller explains her name became confused in the West, and by the High Middle Ages she was generally taken to be identical with Mary Salome. I certainly would disagree that the inclusion of the 2 midwives bathing the child was a reference to the doubting midwife legend, given the disapproval of the Western church of this part of the story - for example Salome is not a Western saint. The Campin is a late exception; the doubting midwife & miracle of the withered hand were in the Golden Legend and so not unknown to well-educated late medieval audiences. His depiction should be seen as part of the iconographical experimentation of of Early Netherlandish painting, rather than a traditional element; it was probably derived from religious drama.  The midwives were much more persistent in religious drama than painting, as they were useful for comic relief and covering the stage management of the birth itself.  But the prominence they are being given in this article is just silly. Johnbod (talk) 13:33, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * It seems to me that we really agree. From the second-century (the time of what the article calls the Nativity of Mary) to late medieval times (as you say) the story of the midwife and Salome (or, if you prefer, the two midwives) was widely known.  They were familiar figures not only to the well-educated but also to ordinary people, since, as you rightly mention, they appear in medieval plays, as well as in widely read books such as the Golden Legend.  You surely don't think that those who looked at Nativity paintings with the two midwives in it would not associate them with the familiar story.  Or that the artists who put them in, even if only showing them occupied at washing the child, included them as the only merely ornamental figures unconnected with any familiar story.  By the way, Salome is included in the Western list of saints, as is correctly mentioned in the Wikipedia article on her (I have just added a confirming source).  Of course, the Church does not say that what is recounted of her outside the canonical gospels is true.  But I don't know when the Western Church is supposed to have begun to show "disapproval" of the familiar non-canonical story about her.  Since the author of the Golden Legend was an archbishop, I suppose it must have been after the thirteenth century.  The supposed disapproval might even be exactly what I referred to above when speaking of a supposed notion that the story was indecent.  Lima (talk) 14:22, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * See the Schiller quotation above. You would be hard put to find an example between the bronze doors at Hildesheim (ca 1015) and the Campin, I think. There were exhaustive cycles of illustrations of the Life of the Virgin in the intervening centuries, one taking 53 scenes just to reach the Annunciation, but they do not show the legend, nor do either of the bathing midwives seem to have anything wrong with their arms in the conventional depictions.  It is a question of WP:UNDUE when this article so far only intersects with the main traditions of depicting Mary at haphazard intervals.  Mary Salome is a Western saint, but Salome the midwife was not, for the many centuries before their personalities were merged by most Western opinion (at which point Salome became the non-doubting midwife in fact - in the Golden Legend "Zebel" is the doubting one, following the "Zelami" of the Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew, which was the important source used in the West ("Zelomi" in the online translation in ext links at the article). Schiller's "sharply repudiated by western doctors of the church" clearly refers to a period before the 8th century, though I don't know who she has in mind.  The Golden Legend was never taken seriously by theologians, and always regarded with a certain distaste by the serious, despite its huge popularity. Johnbod (talk) 14:38, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I still can't imagine that the artists and viewers of the Nativity scenes failed to attach the familiar story to the two midwives in the picture (whatever their names), any more than they failed to attach another familiar story (a canonical one this time) to the shepherds. Johnbod sees no difficulty is taking the two women to be story-less ornaments.  It seems we must leave it so, each with his own idea.  By the way, of course there would be nothing wrong with the arms of the washing midwives: according to the original story, Salome (the original name) was healed when she lifted up the infant.  Lima (talk) 15:32, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The shepherds story was shown, and Campin's midwife shows her cured arm. But in the vast majority of Western depictions nothing to do with this part of the legend is shown (nor in fact in the Eastern). Of course various meanings were attached to the bathing midwives - Christ's acceptance of his human nature, prefiguration of his baptism etc - but these only come after the scene has been in use for several centuries & are clearly ex post facto. Johnbod (talk) 15:47, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * If the meanings you mention are clearly ex post facto, what was the "ante factum" reason for including the midwives? I think that there had to be a reason, something more than than merely filling up the picture with a touch of colour, that in fact the two midwives were already associated with events at the Nativity.  You disagree.  Why don't we just leave it at that?  Lima (talk) 16:59, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * As it is the section is highly misleading, but then so is the rest of the article at the moment. OR speculation as to what was in the minds of the people in 6th century Palestine who originated the depiction with the midwives (over a century after the Pope declared the sources apocryphal) is neither here nor there.  I am not editing the article at all for the moment, so let it stay. Johnbod (talk) 18:35, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Thank you, Johnbod. The topic clearly merits the single five-line paragraph (not a section) that is devoted to it.  I would say that it merits much more than that.  It is admitted that the Salome story was sometimes represented complete with some indication that the hand (or arm - χείρ can mean either) involved was withered and then healed; and it is admitted that the story was a familiar one right up to late medieval times.  Surely more than enough for five lines.
 * That the story was apocryphal is of no importance. The story of the presentation of Mary as a child in the temple is also non-canonical, and there are abundant representations of that in Western art - Western Marian art.  It would be almost impossible to count the legends about saints and sinners, angels and devils, stories of the Cross etc. that Western religious art worked on.
 * It would, though Schiller & other scholars have a good try. But some are much more important than others. The Presentation of Mary remains a feast of the church, and its representation was therefore encouraged, just as the midwives were discouraged. There will be over a thousand images of one, not yet mentioned in the article, for each of the other, which therefore has undue prominence, and will do until the article reaches a large multiple of its current size.  Johnbod (talk) 00:34, 1 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I now see that when Molanus effectively put an end to the midwives in the Counter-Reformation, he appears unaware of the doubting midwife story, which he would certainly have objected to - see quote at his article. And he was someone who had writtern on C15 art in his local histories. Johnbod (talk) 11:31, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
 * History2007 has asked me to add to this article. I do not at all feel like attemptng it, because the field is too vast.  Roman Catholic Marian art would cover far too many areas.  I have just mentioned Mary's presentation in the temple.  And what about the stories of how Anne and Joachim came to become her parents?  What about the Tree of Jesse representations?  What about the Mother of Graces (perhaps I remember wrongly the name of the presentation of Mary with her cloak sheltering a multitude of men and women, clergy and lay and religious)?  What about representations of her as Mother of Sorrows?  What about ...  I had better stop.  Lima (talk) 19:37, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Life of the Virgin, Tree of Jesse, Our Lady of Sorrows, all have articles of varying quality, though Virgin of Mercy only has Madonna della Misericordia (painting),

but this article seems to prefer not to use or link to these and many other articles on the subject, which are easy to find through the categories. Johnbod (talk) 00:34, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Comment on a vast topic
Lima's comment that the topic is too vast reminded me of the Breton fisherman's prayer:


 * Protect me oh Lord for my boat is so small
 * My boat is so small and your sea is so wide

While Lima is right about a vast field, let us remember that most Breton fishermen survive and do catch some fish. So if the article focuses only on a few key topics (and says so with links to other places) then it will have some benefit to some readers. That was why I only focused on the topics of the main dogmas and doctrines, and avoided other issues. It will help some people get a collection of images in one place that would have been spread all over Wiki-commons. History2007 (talk) 21:47, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Recent changes
John, I found your new text to be educational and interesting. It certainly gave good new information. I kept almost all of your text, but I shuffled it around a little, for a couple of reasons. First, there was nothing in the Mother of God section, and you already had that all in the Early veneration, so I moved that. The Christ and Mary section that was empty looks good now, but seems to dense. I will try to lighten it up later. The section on Immaculate Conception was getting very long and I found the art history text you had interesting in its own right, so I made a section for it, which I hope you will expand a lot. In general, I think the less than sophisticated reader (in art history) such as myself, will find it very hard to digest a really long section on the Immaculate Conception if it has all the dogma, and all the artistic items in one big chunck. I realy think the art history items deserve their own space so they can gow, so I made a section for that and suggested that it should be expanded.

Another point is that this article seems to assume that all the Catholic in Mexico created no art - I think they did. So I think just making it all European is not complete. But I see no good sources in Wikipedia where South American Marian art is mentioned.

And I think in general, eventually there needs to be an article called History of Marian art that deals with non-Roman Catholic issues, since there are Islamic depictions, and non-Roman depictions, etc. That article then will avoid almost all theology and focus on Marian art history. But given that this article is in a Mariological series it needs to be kept simpler, more rudimentary (pronounced digestible) from an artistic viewpoint. But it would be interesting to have the History of Marian art article as an art historical item by itself at some point.

Anyway, thanks for the new text you provided. History2007 (talk) 10:30, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Firstly, as you keep emphasising above, the article is still evolving, and certainly has not taken its final shape yet. The subject of this article is art, otherwise it is redundant to the many Mariological articles already existing. Equally there is no place for an article called "History of Marian art that .... will avoid almost all theology and focus on Marian art history." as the theology and the art history are either the same or very closely linked. The Western art, which means the Catholic art since there is effectively no separate Protestant artistic tradition, is a very proper subject for an article, as is that of the Orthodox tradition. Given the nature of theological content already supplied by you, I find it surprising you think my additions giving problems of digestibility. The arrangement by doctrine is useful but cannot be the whole story. Many significant aspects of Marian art do not fit easily into it, and there is a need for the chronological overview you began to be continued. It may well be that a "mother of God" section is not needed, as this is the fundamental doctrine that affects all the art, and cannot be as esily compartmentalized as say the Assumption. It might be better just to say so at the start. I see no point in dividing the Immaculate conception section. I have also introduced, as they were necessary, a number of references to scripture. I don't think there was a single one in the article before, which, as Lima points out at the top of the page, is a serious ommission. This seems to be the case with all the articles in the series, and is an equal problem there. Apart from anything else, this plays straight into the hands of the extreme Protestant POV, but also distorts the nature of Catholic Mariology in art and in general, for as soon as one looks in detail at artistic imagery and historical texts, scriptural references abound (and ones to Papal statements are in fact few). But what do others think? Johnbod (talk) 12:54, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Development
Ok, so let us look at these things:

1. We need to add more references to scripture and other sources. No big deal really, just takes time and effort. I can add some, you can add some and others can add some. Feel free to add links and reference pointers. But after a while people will feel it was all reference, so there are natural limits on that. As for papal references, I am not sure if you have seen this page: Marian papal encyclicals and Apostolic Letters, but I added all the papal items I could find in one place there, and it is just a question of pointing to them.

2. History of Marian art has no deadline, no budget and no law requiring its creation - neither does anything else on Wikipedia, of course. My guess is that someone will write that article, this year, next year or in 2027. Time will tell. I bet that new people will come around in 3 years and one of them will start it. Let us bet $1 on that if you like.

3. I looked at the flow again and moved depiction of Immaculate Conception close to the main section, but tried to keep each section in a manageable size. I do think we have a fundamental viewpoint issue here. Let me put it this way: An attorney who is used to looking through legal pages can look at a 40 page contract and get an idea in 10 to 20 minutes. The average person on the street has not trained his/her visual system enough and will find a 10 page contract indigestible. I think you are very familiar with art historical text and feel very at home reading it. My suggestion is to ease up to the level of the average reader. This is not just about sentence structure, but basic vocabulary and general knowledge of the average reader. There was a survey in which they asked high school students "what is Chernobyl?" and most had no idea and one of them thought that it was Cher's last name. That crowd also has little chance of knowing what adduce means. That was the reason I started to ease up on words like adduce in the text because my guess is that 40% of readers don't know what it is and there are easier ways of saying the same thing. As the cognitive load on the reader increases (be it via vocabulary, structure or deductive requirements) their chances of continuing to read plummets. So believe me that I have nothing against adduce, and it makes no difference to my life if it gets used. But I do feel that we are losing readers as we use longer paragraphs, longer sections and heavier words. And "if we are to err, let us err on the side of readability".

4. Based on that reasoning, what is the problem with having sub-sections of a more manageable size? I see none, e.g. having two subsections in Immaculate Conception, actually made your text look better, in my view. It is a nice and clean historical discussion packaged for digestion. If you want to add more scholarly art historical discussions why not use the same template so the average reader gets a rudimentary section upfront and the members of the intellectual community get a scholarly discussion too.

5. Overall, I think given 2 to 3 weeks of slow and gradual improvements, the quality of this article will get to be close to the Wikipedia average. And look at it another way, the fact that this article was started and is there, is better for Wiki-users than having no article at all. In fact, there was no discussion of Marian art anywhere before this. And a series on Mariology absolutely needs an artistic component: my initial reason for starting the article.

I think if you have the time to do it in the next few weeks, a section called Depiction of the Assumption would add value to the article, just as the depiction of the Immaculate Conception ended up being a nice discussion.

Cheers History2007 (talk) 05:53, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
 * My thoughts on the theological/Papal language are exactly the same as yours on the art-historical! For example the current title is surely bound to put the general reader off, and would be better changed to Ambrosius's suggestion. Incidentally "Mariological art" gets precisely 1 ghit, from a scholarly article about the Early Middle Ages. The over-linking and constant repetition of permutations of "Roman Catholic Mari..." had the same effect - I have reduced these somewhat. Btw if you perhaps thought that overlinking somehow boosted the search ratings of the destination article, my understanding is the system does not in fact work that way. If people come to an article about art, they expect to read about art, and will move on within seconds if the article seems to be all about theology.  I am perfectly happy to lose "adduce", which I see you have removed, but I think the problems with readability that remain are more to do with the factors I have mentioned. As you say, the project previously had no real survey of Marian art, and this one has now reached a good standard, and will continue to improve. What would be the point of a different article History of Marian art?  The Orthodox tradition is sufficiently complex to need its own article, and Protestant and Islamic depictions hardly amount to independent traditions, being almost totally dependent on Catholic & Byzantine depictions respectively. Johnbod (talk) 12:28, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Ok, let us do the following:

1. If you and Ambrosius like the previous title (which was also my initial favorite) I say let it be and by tomorrow change it back. So the new tile will be Roman Catholic Marian art as of tomorrow, unless you guys have a better title.

2. Let us forget about History of Marian art, but let us remember that in the end this is inter-disciplinary article that links religion and art, not either a purely theological or purely artistic item. In general, I think many disciplines be they art&religion or physics&biology had been too isolated and much was gained by improving the interaction between physics and biology, e.g. DNA. So I do think it is essential to provide a bridge between fields in a variety of situations.

3. We will gradually improve this article, and I think it will eventually become a resaonable resource for Roman Catholic Marian art.

By the way, I should, in passing mention that I really wish Wikipedia would start to use database management instead of file management, so the images could have been dynamically gathered, just based on simple tags. But maybe they will get to that in 2037 or so. Therefore, I think at the very least the collection of Marian images we have, along with the text that gives it structure and context maybe a useful resource. If you get a chance to do that section on Depiction of the Assumption in a few weeks, then the article quality will go up one level.

Cheers History2007 (talk) 16:42, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I think, if only from the "marketing" point of view - ie attracting as many readers as possible - I would prefer something simple like Mary in Western art, which would not affect the contents, except that a sentence or two should be added saying Protestant depictions (really mostly from the C19) were the same as Catholic ones, but simpler, and mostly in NT scenes. But Roman Catholic Marian art is a big improvement, & I can live with that. I can add to the Assumption shortly, although there is not all that much to say.  I think the article is shaping up nicely but there are many important topics to add. The individual celebrated statues: Black Madonna], Essen, Montserrat & the Virgin of Ocotlán, Lagos etc need a section. Johnbod (talk) 20:18, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Ok John, I think we are converging towards some form of path that may make a reasonable article. Given that you can live with Roman Catholic Marian art and Ambrosius also prefered that as he had said before, let us all say let it be and I will just go back to that.

Regarding key sections on Virgin of Ocotlán, Lagos, etc. that you mentioned, I would find those educational, because as I said I felt all the art in South America needed some mention. I will appreciate your help in getting those sections together.

And given the title Roman Catholic Marian art, let us remember that Rome was not built in one day and this article does not need to either. So we can just add those sections as you find time.

Thanks History2007 (talk) 20:54, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Art historical facts
Yes, this article needs a lot of work - any problems in terms of church history are dwarfed by the art-historical ones with the current text. Johnbod (talk) 16:15, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

I would appreciate corrections on the art historical facts. Could you please list some of them on the talk page here so I get the basic ideas in what you think the major ones are. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 17:19, 29 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The main problem is there are next to no "art historical facts". The article mainly consists of theology, punctuated by the occasional statement along the lines of "well there was lots of art about that", and a random example every so often. I wouldn't try to improve this, as the whole article will need at a radical rewrite at some point. I feel the same way about humanities articles as (from your user page) you do about science ones. Johnbod (talk) 18:04, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes, my user page does refer to that phenomenon. Yet Wikipedia is still progressing. What would help is if you list the types of art history fact that may be useful. I think this article has cause rage for Lima and depression for you. My apologies to both of you. But I think with suitable fixes it will become a good article, and I am still working on it.


 * I should perhaps ease up on theology. Although some mention of it needs ot be made to link the two topics. Interdisciplinary articles need some material from each else they will not link the topics.


 * There is need for more art, and that just takes time now.

My plan is to finish the remaining two sections first, then look at teh whole thing, reduce the theology and increase the art.That may cure both the rage and teh depression, but perhaps only mildly so. So pleas ehave patience while it progresses. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 21:07, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Latest deletions
John, I do not really see teh reason for the latest round of text deletions. The article has been stable for months and you made several other edits to it yourself. Why did the intro suddenly become "unencyclopedic"? What changed this week, rather than the last few months? Pleas eprovide detailed reasons for why that text is incorrect, and in each case, I am sure I will be able to provide plenty of furthe references to support it. Your repeated link removals from the next section were fine, but this major deletion at the top is not reasonable to me at all. Thanks History2007 (talk) 18:45, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, I'll leave it for now, but I thought we both saw this as work-in-progress (see yours above). Dropping by to check a watchlist change I removed some stuff I've not been happy with for some time. Once you've said "The Blessed Virgin Mary has been one of the major subjects of Christian Art, Catholic Art and Western Art for many centuries." there's no need to add: "Literally hundreds of thousands of pieces of Roman Catholic Marian art covering a range of Marian artistic topics have been produced, from masters such as Michelangelo and Botticelli to humble peasant artists.[1]", and it is "works" not "topics" that are produced, & so on.  Some time I'll devote some time here, but will raise removals here first.  Johnbod (talk) 20:12, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Ok John, as old time co-editors, let me give you my real (and totally unjustified) motivation for wanting more text at the top. Too much deletion on the top, will throw off the formatting. There, I said it, although It is hard to admit! Some of the text on teh top was your anyway, and I have no objection to reworking teh text and improving the article, provided it is not a decapitation of the introductory section. In general, there is no doubt that the quality of this article received a boost from your art-related information. And it gets over 3,000 hits a month, and growing - so it s a good idea to improve it. But let us do it gradually, and as improvements rather than mass deletions. Now, apart from text changes, how can this article be improved? I thought your selection of Perpetual Help as the image upfront was very nice, because I did not know of that icon before. So what else can be use to seriously improve it? History2007 (talk) 22:39, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
 * OK, good point - I've done the same myself. At some point I can pot the art history development for a lead para & we can trim up the section. I'm also working intermittently on Madonna (art) (or is it Madonna and Child?) & here have only got the main story "Mother of God" to 800AD. But I'm not sure whether here or one of the others should be the main article - very likely not here, but a section on the later history is needed. And so on. The "cult" images need a bit of generalizing about, & the galleries better captions, some balancing & trimming. I may well take Madonna forward before returning here. Johnbod (talk) 00:08, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

Gallery now too large
It just is - I haven't checked the file size/loading time, but I imagine it will bust the limits. I suggest it is copied to Wikipedia as a gallery page there (using just the commons images, no doubt most) before being trimmed here. Johnbod (talk) 04:03, 1 February 2009 (UTC)


 * I have to agree. It has structure but too many images. The main problem, of course is the lack of a good category search tool, but given the current Wiki-limitations, your suggestion may be a good way. But let me get to it in a day or two. I have to think how to arrange it nicely. Do you have an example of an existing "gallery page"? The problem is that nowhere in Wikipedia is there a good separation of the adoration of the magi from the shepherds images, etc. And commons is spelled (m-e-s-s) really, because many of the images on this page had to be gathered from various other subcategories, e.g. the Titian Madonnas are just hidden out there in commons. But, there is no doubt that this page needs some sort of diet... Let me think of a nice way. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 04:16, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
 * This is an example (not necessarily a model) . I think it is fairly easy to set up a page, copy the gallery across & edit it a bit if needed. Then include it in the category - in fact this will probably be where a search takes you first. No rush... Johnbod (talk) 04:21, 1 February 2009 (UTC)


 * That is a Wikimedia gallery. Above you said Wikipedia gallery. My real goal is to avoid the mess that exists within the classification system in Wikimedia. My idea is to set up a separate Wikipedia page of some type... I am not sure how yet. Ideas? The other problem is that the galleries within pages in Wikipedia usually remain neat and stable but those in Wikimedia are really dynamic and get messy very soon. History2007 (talk) 04:28, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
 * The "galley" pages on commons seem pretty stable to me - obviouysly things are added to the by category pages all the time. "Gallery" pages on WP are all but banned. Johnbod (talk) 20:12, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Update: After some thinking, I realized that the main issue is the compuational bottlenecks for both computers and humans to digest all those images. The typical solution in these cases, is to use distributed computing, where the effort is spread among multiple resources. So I tried that and farmed out a large portion of the images to the suitable pages, e.g. Annunciation, Queen of Heaven, etc. and kept only a small number of images for each topic. It seems to work well in all cases that were tried. The use of those galleries makes those pages look better anyway. The only remaining subsection is the largest, i.e. the Madonnas. I left a note on that talk page, and unless there are exceptional reasons, it may all work out nicely. And in fact it makes more sense to have galleries on the suitable pages anyway. History2007 (talk) 20:06, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Hmm I think we have enough Madonnas on those pages already. Johnbod (talk) 20:12, 2 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Actually, Madonna_(art) has 4 paintings, 5 statues (one of them outside a museum) and 3 engravings. I think the gallery on the main Wikipage for Madonna at least deserves a few top class artists, say a Botticelli, a Titian, a Raphael, and a Bouguereau to convey the sense of time, etc. But, 50 images will probably overload that page. So I think I should just copy about 10 to 12 high quality artists of the Raphael class there, and then create the dreaded Wiki-media gallery with the rest of the images. Then there will be a much more manageable number of Modonnas on this page, perhaps grouped by century to convey the sense of time again. I will experiment with that to see what happens. In any case, there should be less images on this page, and what needs to happen is to find a place to park them where they will not be cluttered with the typical Wikimedia situation. I will try it anway. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 00:49, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Ok - though I would say maybe 6 more "art" ones, & 4 "popular" cult statues & other images, for a more rounded view. Johnbod (talk) 02:56, 3 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Ok, fine. I will add the art ones and please add the popular ones - I am not sure where to get those. But we should somehow inform the reader about the distinction, perhaps by some sort of section separator in the gallery. By the way, do all those Coronation images really belong on that Madonna page? History2007 (talk) 03:40, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

blue robe
First of all, I think the interested reader gets a lot out of this interestivg article as it stands. Thank you for writing it, whoever you are! I came here, among other, to find out more about the origins and tradition of the colour blue of Mary's garment in art, but I found nothing apart from Francisco Pacheco's quote which doesn't explain it either. Would very much appreciate this addition to an otherwise wonderful article. 80.219.8.3 (talk) 22:09, 4 January 2010 (UTC)


 * I don't know off hand. Let us wait to see John has an explanation, if not I will do a search and try to see if I can figure it out in a few days. In fact it is not just blue, I have seen specific color combinations in statues that seem to repeat. I have not really seen a Madonna statue in green or gray for instance, although Madonna del Granduca has a green element to it as a painting. I have seen many statues in red and blue (with gold) as well as blue and white. And the presence of a child seems to influence colors, as well as the country of origin, but I have not built formal statistics for it. It would hence be interesting to see what John thinks. Cheers. History2007 (talk) 22:36, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I think it was typically red in very early Western paintings, and black in Byzantine works, but became standardized in the West as blue at some point in the late Middle Ages. Lapis lazuli, the best blue pigment, was and is extremely expensive and so prestigous, but beyond that I'm not aware of a rationale for the change. Perhaps they just found it suited. Johnbod (talk) 03:48, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Aha, thanks to both of you. I now did find something under Madonna (art): "Paying for such a work might also be seen as a form of devotion. [...] Even more precious is the bright blue mantle colored with lapis lazuli, a stone imported from Afghanistan." I guess I expected a more semiotic answer, but thanks again! 80.219.8.3 (talk) 17:29, 6 January 2010 (UTC)


 * ''The following discussion has concluded. Please do not modify this section. Result of discussion: No merge.

Redirect/Merge to Madonna (art)
I redirected this page to the older and broader article Madonna (art), but was reverted. The AfD and Speedy Keep didn't discuss these two articles, but compared the current article to Roman Catholic Mariology.

It is absolutely unclear to me from this article what would separate Roman Catholic art related to Maria (the topic of this article) from general art related to Maria (including e.g. Orthodox and Coptic art). If there is nothing clearly separating these, it makes no sense to have two articles on the same subject. So I support a redirect and/or merge of this more limited article to the more general one. Fram (talk) 14:44, 3 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Oppose The Madonna/Madonna and Child, a "portrait"-like single figure, is just one subject in the wider field - see the 2nd para at Madonna. There are also the various narrative subjects covered in Life of the Virgin many with their own articles, and various others. Also one covers only Catholic/Western art, while the other does not.  Both articles are already long & could be much longer. The link on the tags is not set up correctly, btw.  Johnbod (talk) 15:22, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
 * (link to discussion corrected, thanks). From Madonna (art): "Images of the Madonna [...] are pictorial or sculptured representations of Mary, Mother of Jesus, either alone, or more frequently, with the infant Jesus." Which of the many, many artworks in this article would not fit into the description from that page? If "Madonna's" are really a subset of Marianic Art (which I doubt), then we still have the second distinguishing feature of this article, the Catholic perspective. Most sources (even in this article) either discuss Marianic art / madonna's as a whole, or from a general Christian perspective. I don't think that Marianic art in a Catholic (as opposed to Orthodox, Coptic, ...) perspective is really a major topic of study though. If it is, the article should focus on that: a general article for wxhat is common, and a specific article for what is specific, different, distinctive. I fail to notice what makes a Catholic depiction of Maria different from a non-Catholic one (notice that e.g. the very first, prominent picture, Our Lady of Perpetual Help, is originally not a Catholic work of art, but an Greek Orthodox one). Fram (talk) 15:43, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
 * (ec) About half the text illustrations in "Marian Art" are not Madonnas, and the gallery is divided into "not-Madonna" and Madonna sections. This is an entirely conventional distinction. If you look at Cretan school you will see that Cretan artists (occupied by Venice) worked in two different styles, one Western & one Greek, and these could be specified in contracts. This example is probably in Greek style I agree, but that is a reason to keep the Madonna article seperate. If you think the Eastern/Western treatments are so similar they should be taken together, then you are very much mistaken. The English word is "Mary" btw, and "Marianic" is not a word. I agree with History that these points might be made clearer - both articles are a mix of art history (mostly by me) and theology/devotional info (mostly by him). Johnbod (talk) 16:01, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
 * This article relates the art to specific doctrines, some of which are not held in the Eastern Church. And the Lady of perpetual help was selected (by John actually) because it is so widely used, say the Philipines, among Catholics, and in Rome. And Catholics do use Eastern icons, e.g. the Our Lady of Kazan was in the Papal Apartments (no one in Rome wants to talk about how it got there... wink, wink) for a long time and was only recently returned to the Russians. So this article ties art to doctrines. There is room for a very interesting article on how the Eastern Orthodox tie their icons to their liturgy - far more than the Catholics. And they do not use 3D depictions, ONLY 2D flat icons - another point that needs to be explained. They stand in front of specific icons and sing specific Akathists - Catholics do not do that. For them it is a different approach really, one that needs to be clarified. I think you gave me the idea to start that article anyway. There are really big differences in how the Eastern Church uses Marian icons along with Akathists and specific feasts etc. It will be interesting to have, and fun to write. History2007 (talk) 15:54, 3 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Oppose I agree with Johnbod. The Madonna is certainly a subtopic/subset of the larger perspective, and a notable enough item to deserve its own article. Many items in the Life of the Virgin are not Madonna depictions. If as stated "it is absolutely unclear" to a reader what the difference is, then a few sentences about that in the Madonna article may be good to clarify the matter. John, given that you are the expert on Madonna depictions, would you like to add that there? If you are too busy, then I can do it. But the distinction should probably be clarified to the reader and that may resolve the situation anyway. History2007 (talk) 15:33, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Um, the distinction needs to be made here, not there. It is unclear to me what sets this article apart. See my longer reply to JohnBod. Fram (talk) 15:45, 3 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Well, the issue certainly needs to be explained. Either here, or there or partially here and there. If it is not clear to you, it may also be not clear to other readers and that needs some explanation. But not a big deal really. That the Madonna is distinct from "Marian art" can be the subject of a 10 to 1 wager very easily. History2007 (talk) 15:48, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

I've made a few tweaks, but at some point both articles need an overhaul, which will be a huge job I can't undertake just now. I'm not sure how many people would share Fram's perception of the article, so let's see if and how this debate develops. Johnbod (talk) 16:35, 3 February 2011 (UTC)


 * I think your changes clarify things, e.g. in the list of topics, etc. And we have had the sound of silence here for a week, so I think we should WP:SNOW this and move on. History2007 (talk) 23:57, 11 February 2011 (UTC)
 * One week is not long for a merge discussion, and two vs. one is not really close to WP:SNOW at all. The article, whether it gets merged or not, certainly needs a thorough rewrite ("Although Marian art items may at times be viewed from an artistic perspective and sold at auctions, or discussed from an academic viewpoint in the context of art history," is a rather ridiculous statement, when the vast majority of attention to Marian art is from an artistic point of view, not from the impact it may have had on the Catholic church), it heavily overemphasises the role such art played in shaping the Roman Catholic Church, has zero attention for what is different between Marian art in the Catholic Church vs. Marian art is Christianity as a whole (which should basically be the core topic here, considering the rather specific title), ... As it stands, the article starts with very bold claims in the lead, and continues with a mixture of some supported and many unsupported statements (has a whole book been written about the Madonna della Misericordia (Piero della Francesca) in relation to the Catholic Church? Or perhaps mainly as a masterpiece of art?) Fram (talk) 13:37, 12 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Ok, let us wait for more comments. I think it is clear that Madonna and Marian art are different topics, so a merge is not in the cards anyway. But much of this art has been there since the 17th century anyway, so it is used to time. History2007 (talk) 14:39, 12 February 2011 (UTC)


 * I'll just remark that art history in the last 60 years or so has greatly increased the amount of time it spends relating religious art to theology and general religious trends and history behind it, almost to excess. "Protestant Marian art" is one of those very thin books - there really is very little of it. The title of this article could be "Mary in Western art", so distinguishing the subject from the Orthodox tradition, from which is pretty different, though for a long period very derivative.  Then there are the Copts and Ethiopians.  Eastern Catholic art is I think barely covered here, but could be. Johnbod (talk) 13:52, 12 February 2011 (UTC)
 * An article on "Mary in Western art" would be great! Fram (talk) 08:32, 14 February 2011 (UTC)
 * But that has nothing to do with the merge discussion. While such a topic is certainly worthy of discussion, there are a number of other issues involved therein, e.g. "what about the religious issues in Marian art?" - a key topic this article addresses. And those discussions can take place, once the merge flag has been addressed. I think the merge flag will evaporate away - it is just a question of time. But FYI, doctrines such as the Immaculate Conception are not accepted by all Christians and the discussions therein are subtle, e.g. how are Anglican statues different, etc. But that is another issue separate from the merge. Writing that type of article will require good knowledge of the field and significant effort. And as is, the article on Madonna (art) has had "references needed" flags on it for a while - so knowledgable effort is not overflowing at the moment. It is much easier to type a sentence: "go do it" than obtain the knowledge required and spend the careful effort doing it. History2007 (talk) 12:25, 14 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I do believe that the current article either should be merged to a more general one, or be totally rewritten and renamed (or deleted and rebuilt from scratch). That writing a good or decent article on a subject is hard, is not an argument to keep a poor article on a related subject. We could have a number fo different articles, one eg. about how art is used by the Catholic Church as an object of adoration (with Maria and Jesus, as central figures in the Catholic religion, obviously also central figures in the art); another one e.g. about how the New Testament has been translated into art and paintings; a third one specifically about Maria-related art (this could be the Madonna (art) article, or a slightly larger one); and so on. But the current article? When you see something like Our Lady of Kazan, one has to wonder why a separate article for Marian art in the Catholic Church is needed or warranted. My proposal, if this doesn't get merged, is to rename and refocus it to Marian art in Christianity or just Marian art: the fact that Marian art is now a redirect to the current article is a rather biased and prejudiced redirect, ignoring all non-Catholic Marian art. Fram (talk) 12:57, 14 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Anyway, I think your view has been clear from the start. Was that why you "effectively deleted the article" via a redirect with no discussion whatsoever? Anyway, I will wait for the merge flag to be over, then respond to the rest. History2007 (talk) 13:01, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

This conversation is going round in circles, but I will just point out that of the thematic sections:

- the first two are shared with EO & Protestants, the next 3 are exclusively RC, & the last could include I think a few EO ones, but is mainly RC only. The EO tradition has its own articles, as has been pointed out already. If there were a Protestant tradition of Marian art, that would too. As it is, the virtual absence of such a tradition is covered. Johnbod (talk) 14:58, 14 February 2011 (UTC)
 * 4.3 Mary in the Life of Christ
 * 5 Perpetual virginity
 * 6 Immaculate Conception
 * 6.1 Depiction of the Immaculate Conception
 * 7 Assumption of Mary
 * 8 Queen of Heaven
 * 9 Apparitions


 * I agree with the circular comment, and with the general points you made. A minor point is that I think not all Lutherans and probably not all Anglicans accept Perpetual virginity, and there are variations of belief on several issues, e.g. Latter day saints use "mother of Son of God" and not "mother of God", etc. So the theological situation is somewhat complicated, but I will wait for the merge flag to be over before going into more details. History2007 (talk) 15:25, 14 February 2011 (UTC)


 * The assumption doesn't seem to be exclusively RC though, but also Orthodox and Coptic. Things like the File:Dormition El Greco.jpg or File:Oblachnoe.jpg, from Dormition of the Theotokos: there are differences in interpretation of the Bible, and different sets of books, which account for many minor and some major points of discussion (and a schism now and then), but basically these are the same. Fram (talk) 15:28, 14 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Actually the assumption art approaches are neither the same nor different interpretations of the Bible, for the Bible does not include one word about the death of Mary. But that is again another story. History2007 (talk) 15:59, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

The merge flag was placed on this page a month ago on Feb 3rd and it has just been the 3 of us occasionally talking about other issues and not the merge after the first 2 days, and "the sound of silence" from all others. It is clear that the merge discussion should conclude now with a "no consensus to merge" outcome. History2007 (talk) 13:12, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, it's sad that not more people joined this discussion, but as it stands I am the only one arguing for a merge, and keeping that tag on the article for eternity is not really the best option. If other people come along and believe that the article needs merging, splitting, renaming or refocusing, we can always start a new discussion. Thanks for your patience! Fram (talk) 13:16, 2 March 2011 (UTC)


 * No problem at all. Then please just close the discussion. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 13:22, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

WP: Women's History Assessment Commentary
The article was assessed C-class, for lack of sufficient in-line citations. Boneyard90 (talk) 22:27, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Related
Perhaps those interested in this subject can contribute to Mary Untier of Knots. Bmclaughlin9 (talk) 01:57, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

To many low quality images
I have a rather high tolerance for may pictures, :) but theses are not even good pictures, many of them. I suggest removing at least 50% from the gallery, it will still leave a rather big gallery, even then. Hafspajen (talk) 20:55, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Ask Featured Pictures editor -, what do you think of these galleries? Hafspajen (talk) 20:58, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

At least pack them, and remove some of the worst files Hafspajen (talk) 21:42, 8 December 2014 (UTC)