Much has been written about the new
galleries (opened in December 2009). It was said in
Painter's Post that "The
death of Christianity is posing difficulties to curators at the
Victoria and Albert Museum. Apparently, a vast majority of their
European visitors, even Christian ones, don’t understand the displays in their
Medieval and Renaissance Galleries… " - the link was to
this article.
This curator's-eye
video gives a different view.
Here are a few of my favourite things from these galleries. But first, a couple of pages from my sketchbook from the first "creative textiles" course I took at City Lit, in 1992 (after that, I was hooked). The topic was "medieval", and we spent a day at the V&A -

(Coffee, applied in the cafe of course, not in the galleries, makes good "paint" for a background.)

This is the Limoges 13th century reliquary -

St Catherine of Alexandria in prison - a small English alabaster, 15th century -

A lovely ivory, for which I didn't note the details -

Candlesticks and an oliphant (ivory hunting horn) -

Tapestries -

Glass -

Insights, like this treatise on carving - it was done with the bird held in mid-air, usually by young men -

There are headphones with music etc, and various things to touch, including a mitten from a suit of armour.
And to give you an overview, here is just one of the Medieval & Renaissance rooms -
1 comment:
Thank you for the wonderful images and a look at your sketchbook. I have yet to explore the Medieval galleries, I ran out of time(as usual) when I went to see the quilt exhibition a few weeks ago!
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