The St. Ethelflaeda Diptych at Romsey Abbey
Photograph: N.G. Howe
The diptych at Romsey Abbey, by the late Chris Gollon,
depicting their Patron Saint and former Abbess, St. Ethelflaeda is a marvellous
and thought-provoking piece of devotional art. It borrows from the conventions
of both history painting, the highest form of academic art, and from caricature,
at the other end of the spectrum. The artist’s influences, are most certainly
the beautiful Norman Abbey of Romsey, where she was Abbess during the 990s, and
the legends which arose up about her.
The diptych
is sympathetic to its location in the south nave aisle of Romsey Abbey, one bay
west of the Old Abbess’s Door. Chris Gollon has skilfully blended soft tones,
which compliment and blend in with the stonework around the painting. The
left-hand panel depicts the Abbess Ethelflaeda in a nun’s habit, holding a
pastoral staff across her. Light emits from her fingers, whilst in her right
hand she is holding an open book of Psalms, which she is in the process of
reciting. This image conflates the two best known “Legends of St. Ethelflaeda”,
that of her reciting the Psalms whilst standing in the River Test, and of her
reading the scriptures in the Abbey by light emanating from her fingers, owing
to the candles having suddenly blown out. The right-hand panel adds to this, as
it depicts a pillar candle on a stand, which has recently been extinguished, as
evidenced by a small pillar of smoke rising from the wick. Light radiates back
from Ethelflaeda, penetrating the darkness and casting a shadow behind the
candle stand.
When
looking at the painting, one is immediately drawn to the light shining forth
from the region of her hands, the fingers of which are deliberately elongated,
in the manner of caricature. Another striking feature of the portrait is the
elongated and twisted neck, again borrowed from caricature conventions. In this
instance, in common with the fingers, Gollon is not suggesting that the real
life Ethelflaeda had overly long fingers, or a giraffe-like neck, but seeks to
draw attention to particular points which the artist wanted to get across. In the
case of the fingers, to demonstrate, beyond doubt, the source of the light she
is reading from. With the neck, the aim is to convey two, possibly conflicting,
emotions. In the portrait, Ethelflaeda’s face is a picture of focus and
concentration, clearly nothing is going to distract her or prevent her from
completing the task in hand, reciting the psalms from 1 to 150. It is clear
that she has been there for some time, as the book is open somewhere towards
the middle. Having been stationary for quite some time, potentially for several
hours, she is likely to be in some discomfort. The challenge facing Chris
Gollon was, therefore, how to convey that discomfort without breaking the look
of sheer concentration upon her face. The answer was to indicate or infer some
small movement, without moving from the spot where she was stood. Her hands
were already taken, owing to the light emanating from them due to the
conflation of the two legends. Accordingly, Gollon sought to indicate
Ethelflaeda’s discomfort via a slight twist to the neck, which has been
elongated so as to draw attention to this, and, therefore, highlight the
discomfort being felt by the Abbess due to her dedication recital of the
Psalms, whilst glued to one spot.
Another
feature of the painting which has caused some controversy is the cropped hair
of the Romsey Saint and her austere look. This debate has not been aided by the
lack of iconographic tradition surrounding St. Ethelflaeda. Indeed, the Abbey’s
seal contains a stylised image of a nun. The black habit she is sporting is
entirely consistent with the Benedictine foundation of the Abbey at Romsey.
Meanwhile, most nuns of the period would have had cropped hair, for similar
reasons that monks had tonsures cut into their hair, as a mark of their calling
and the fact that they had left vanity behind them. Had Chris Gollon painted
her with a wimple, then her hair would have been concealed, and, therefore,
would not provide a talking point, however, to have done so would have covered
her neck, thus made displaying her discomfort all the more challenging. The
lack of a wimple, could also be a nod to the fact that, according to her
legend, Ethelflaeda would recite the Psalms in the River Test in a state of
undress.
Like so
much of Chris Gollon’s work the St. Ethelflaeda Diptych is a piece which one
needs to study for some time, in order to tease out all that the artist has
sought to convey to his audience, rendering him a thought provoking artist.
Clearly a style which draws from both high art and caricature, is not going to
be without its critics, but the key here is that Gollon’s devotional work makes
the viewer think and encourages them to delve deeper into the back story, be it
a particular passage of scripture or the legends of a saint.
This diptych was painted for the Romsey Abbey
leg of Chris Gollon’s national touring exhibition Incarnation, Mary & Women from the Bible in 2016. Each panel
measures 59”x20” (150 x 51cm) and is Acrylic on Canvas.
