Sacred Silver and Stained Glass Gallery, Victoria and Albert Museum, London
The Sacred Silver and Stained Glass Galleries, which opened in November last year, are the latest piece in the great jigsaw puzzle that is the Victoria and Albert Museum's (V&A) FuturePlan, the rolling redevelopment that aims to clarify the museum's layout and reveal the original architecture of its building, while also redisplaying the collections.
At a cost of £1.6m, this long narrow gallery of religious art did not come cheap. But only a killjoy would object, so glorious does the stained glass now look.
This hasn't always been so in the V&A: for years it has been denied the natural light that coloured glass needs to look as its makers intended. Daylight now floods the gallery, illuminating the panels of saints, martyrs and Christ.
The panels that are displayed in the windows are supported by elegant black steel frames (designed by jeweller Wendy Ramshaw), which echo the shape and lead work of an arched church window.
Found between the National Art Library and the Silver Galleries, the new gallery forms an extension or introduction to the latter depending on which direction you come from. The fact that the museum has dispensed with window blinds in the new gallery is another welcome feature, as it provides glimpses of the garden below and helps you orientate yourself.
Such is the visual impact of the stained glass, it is easy to forget for a moment that the gallery is also dedicated to sacred silverwork. But sitting high on top of a showcase containing reliquaries at one end of the gallery is a replica of the large medieval shrine of Zadar in Croatia to remind you of that fact.
A sequence of showcases presents objects in the context of the beliefs they reflect - Catholicism, Judaism - and looks at how and why pieces were used. Each case has an illustrated introductory text panel.
One of the first, the Crucified Christ, explores the cross as the central symbol of Christianity and the focus of veneration, displaying 15 crosses and figures of Christ dating from 1100.
This display is echoed by a selection of altar and processional crosses from across Europe. The oldest was made in about 800, probably in Milan, and is copper and silver on iron, set with gems and enamels.
The well-thought-out layout means you can also see the reverse - an important detail since both sides were meant to be seen by the congregation. The crosses are testimony to the importance of the early church's patronage of silversmiths and jewellers.
The Catholic Church in counter-reformation mode lavished money and material on religious art and images so it is no surprise to find Spanish silver here and in the Silver Galleries nearby.
Many artefacts in the new gallery are from the WL Hildburgh bequest. Hildburgh was passionate about Spanish art and a generous donor. His Christmas and birthday presents to the V&A from 1924 to 1955 amounted to some 500 pieces of metalwork.
The gallery also benefits from a number of long-term loans from churches across the country. St Peter's at Kingerby in Lincolnshire has lent a chalice and paten decorated with hearts, clasped hands and the engraved initials of the bride and groom, which celebrates their wedding in 1639. (Incidentally, for readers looking for somewhere to tie the knot and impress the relatives, the V&A is now licensed for weddings.)
The museum has not been pedantic about the gallery's content, so a few pieces of textiles, a design on paper for a stained glass window and even the odd piece of ceramic are included. Methodists will be pleased to see a 'love feast' cup, a modest piece of Staffordshire pottery used in the shared meals that John Wesley imported to Britain from America in the 1730s.
The gallery explores the sacred use of silver in Judaism as well as Christianity, and includes a richly embroidered Torah mantle made in the Netherlands. This is accompanied by an audio point, one of two in the gallery. Both are spoken captions, and extended versions of the written one in the case, which is a missed opportunity.
In the first quarter of the 12th century, a German monk, who adopted the pen name Theophilus, wrote a description of the techniques of making stained glass. Since then the basic methods have hardly changed. A 'silent' video shows how glass is cut and lead shaped to create a piece of stained glass.
While techniques have been constant, as an artform stained glass suffered a couple of centuries aping easel art after the glory of the middle ages was brought to a violent end by the Reformation. In England, Puritan rectors and Oliver Cromwell's roundheads enthusiastically 'rattled' many windows, reducing them to fragments.
The broadly chronological arrangement of more than 150 panels, which wrap around the gallery on its window side and over and above the showcases opposite, show how the fortunes of stained glass rose and fell and were then revived in the 19th century.
The earliest piece, a fragment from the border of a window, dates from 1140 and comes from St Denis in Paris. Other works are arranged by period and nationality.
In a cathedral, whether Chartres or Canterbury, you need a pair of binoculars and a guidebook to appreciate the details of a great window. The pleasure of this new gallery is that you can get close to the objects, particularly the glass. This allows you to study how anonymous artists of the middle ages, and modern artists such as John Piper and Harry Clarke, worked with glass and lead with such skill.
Clarke's The Apparition of the Sacred Heart, 1927, with its multiple layers of acid-etched flashed glass, is outstanding. Sadly, Clarke died at 41, as a direct result of working with acid.
The gloom of the V&A's permanent galleries began to lift when the Silver Galleries opened, a fact that has been somewhat overshadowed by the success of the British Galleries. Sacred Silver and Stained Glass confirms that the museum's revival is going well.
Caroline Worthington is the curator of art at York Museums Trust
Project data
Cost: £1.6m
Main funder: The AH Whiteley Family
Gallery designer: John Ronayne
Screens for stained glass: Wendy Ramshaw
Lighting: VBK Lighting
The Sacred Silver and Stained Glass Galleries, which opened in November last year, are the latest piece in the great jigsaw puzzle that is the Victoria and Albert Museum's (V&A) FuturePlan, the rolling redevelopment that aims to clarify the museum's layout and reveal the original architecture of its building, while also redisplaying the collections.
At a cost of £1.6m, this long narrow gallery of religious art did not come cheap. But only a killjoy would object, so glorious does the stained glass now look.
This hasn't always been so in the V&A: for years it has been denied the natural light that coloured glass needs to look as its makers intended. Daylight now floods the gallery, illuminating the panels of saints, martyrs and Christ.
The panels that are displayed in the windows are supported by elegant black steel frames (designed by jeweller Wendy Ramshaw), which echo the shape and lead work of an arched church window.
Found between the National Art Library and the Silver Galleries, the new gallery forms an extension or introduction to the latter depending on which direction you come from. The fact that the museum has dispensed with window blinds in the new gallery is another welcome feature, as it provides glimpses of the garden below and helps you orientate yourself.
Such is the visual impact of the stained glass, it is easy to forget for a moment that the gallery is also dedicated to sacred silverwork. But sitting high on top of a showcase containing reliquaries at one end of the gallery is a replica of the large medieval shrine of Zadar in Croatia to remind you of that fact.
A sequence of showcases presents objects in the context of the beliefs they reflect - Catholicism, Judaism - and looks at how and why pieces were used. Each case has an illustrated introductory text panel.
One of the first, the Crucified Christ, explores the cross as the central symbol of Christianity and the focus of veneration, displaying 15 crosses and figures of Christ dating from 1100.
This display is echoed by a selection of altar and processional crosses from across Europe. The oldest was made in about 800, probably in Milan, and is copper and silver on iron, set with gems and enamels.
The well-thought-out layout means you can also see the reverse - an important detail since both sides were meant to be seen by the congregation. The crosses are testimony to the importance of the early church's patronage of silversmiths and jewellers.
The Catholic Church in counter-reformation mode lavished money and material on religious art and images so it is no surprise to find Spanish silver here and in the Silver Galleries nearby.
Many artefacts in the new gallery are from the WL Hildburgh bequest. Hildburgh was passionate about Spanish art and a generous donor. His Christmas and birthday presents to the V&A from 1924 to 1955 amounted to some 500 pieces of metalwork.
The gallery also benefits from a number of long-term loans from churches across the country. St Peter's at Kingerby in Lincolnshire has lent a chalice and paten decorated with hearts, clasped hands and the engraved initials of the bride and groom, which celebrates their wedding in 1639. (Incidentally, for readers looking for somewhere to tie the knot and impress the relatives, the V&A is now licensed for weddings.)
The museum has not been pedantic about the gallery's content, so a few pieces of textiles, a design on paper for a stained glass window and even the odd piece of ceramic are included. Methodists will be pleased to see a 'love feast' cup, a modest piece of Staffordshire pottery used in the shared meals that John Wesley imported to Britain from America in the 1730s.
The gallery explores the sacred use of silver in Judaism as well as Christianity, and includes a richly embroidered Torah mantle made in the Netherlands. This is accompanied by an audio point, one of two in the gallery. Both are spoken captions, and extended versions of the written one in the case, which is a missed opportunity.
In the first quarter of the 12th century, a German monk, who adopted the pen name Theophilus, wrote a description of the techniques of making stained glass. Since then the basic methods have hardly changed. A 'silent' video shows how glass is cut and lead shaped to create a piece of stained glass.
While techniques have been constant, as an artform stained glass suffered a couple of centuries aping easel art after the glory of the middle ages was brought to a violent end by the Reformation. In England, Puritan rectors and Oliver Cromwell's roundheads enthusiastically 'rattled' many windows, reducing them to fragments.
The broadly chronological arrangement of more than 150 panels, which wrap around the gallery on its window side and over and above the showcases opposite, show how the fortunes of stained glass rose and fell and were then revived in the 19th century.
The earliest piece, a fragment from the border of a window, dates from 1140 and comes from St Denis in Paris. Other works are arranged by period and nationality.
In a cathedral, whether Chartres or Canterbury, you need a pair of binoculars and a guidebook to appreciate the details of a great window. The pleasure of this new gallery is that you can get close to the objects, particularly the glass. This allows you to study how anonymous artists of the middle ages, and modern artists such as John Piper and Harry Clarke, worked with glass and lead with such skill.
Clarke's The Apparition of the Sacred Heart, 1927, with its multiple layers of acid-etched flashed glass, is outstanding. Sadly, Clarke died at 41, as a direct result of working with acid.
The gloom of the V&A's permanent galleries began to lift when the Silver Galleries opened, a fact that has been somewhat overshadowed by the success of the British Galleries. Sacred Silver and Stained Glass confirms that the museum's revival is going well.
Caroline Worthington is the curator of art at York Museums Trust
Project data
Cost: £1.6m
Main funder: The AH Whiteley Family
Gallery designer: John Ronayne
Screens for stained glass: Wendy Ramshaw
Lighting: VBK Lighting
