Critical analysis of Westminster Abbey

Work of Architecture

Title of work: Westminster Abbey

Artist, date, and medium: The Abbey is the result of the labor of a number of architects. Its construction took centuries, including significant periods of rebuilding. Its most current form dates back to the 13th century.

Location of artwork: Banks of the Thames

Image of work:

Image source: http://static.westminster-abbey.org/assets/thumbnail/0011/39197/Abbey-north-side-72-Westminster-Abbey-copyright.jpg

Iconography

The primary iconography of Westminster Abbey is religious in nature, including depictions of Christ, St. Thomas, and St. Christopher together; St. Faith, and images from the book of Revelation of St. John the Divine. There are also images from the royal family and renditions of "aristocratic and wealthy relatives and benefactors to the building" on the wall ("Art," Westminster Abbey, 2012). A number of famous people are interred in the Abbey, most notably some of England's greatest poets and writers ("Westminster Abbey," Sacred Destinations, 2010).

Medium and technique

Westminster Abbey is primarily a work of masonry. The stonework is also adorned with vermilion and gold. Ruby and sapphire stained glass were used to add color ("Architecture," Westminster Abbey, 2012).

Formal elements

The Abbey is classified as Gothic in its style. Although British, the first architect "was greatly influenced by the new cathedrals at Reims, Amiens and Chartres, borrowing the ideas of an apse with radiating chapels and using the characteristic Gothic features of pointed arches, ribbed vaulting, rose windows and flying buttresses" ("Architecture," Westminster Abbey, 2012). It is "based on the continental system of geometrical proportion" and boasts the highest Gothic vault in England, a height that is intensified by its unusually narrow aisles ("Architecture," Westminster Abbey, 2012). Its "English features include single rather than double aisles and a long nave with wide projecting transepts" and the "elaborate mouldings of the main arches, the lavish use of polished Purbeck marble for the columns and the overall sculptural decoration" ("Architecture," Westminster Abbey, 2012).

Context