Papers by Josefa Westerman
Attributed to Master Heinrich of Constance, a sculpture of the Visitation from the convent of St.... more Attributed to Master Heinrich of Constance, a sculpture of the Visitation from the convent of St. Katharinenthal in the Lower Rhine Valley (ca. 131020) portrays Mary and her cousin Elizabeth with two quartz cabochons inserted into their torsos, rock crystal representations of their wombs, which nurture the fetal Christ and John the Baptist. These crystals make the Visitation a strikingly unique devotional object in the eyes of the modern viewer, but when considered in the context of the fourteenthcentury German Dominican convent, they also provide insight into the devotional practices of their users, cloistered nuns. In this thesis, I explore the nature and function of this unique object of devotion in the context of the Katharinenthal convent specifically in addition to the wider Middle High German spiritual milieu, particularly Rhenish Mysticism. I take a multidisciplinary approach to the study of this medieval artwork by making use of a wide range of sources: works from this same period found at Katharinenthal and other convents around the Rhine valley, theological treatises concerning the Incarnation (and, therefore, the Marian womb) the visionary accounts of Henry Suso and other Rhineland mystics, and the work of such medieval art historians as Jeffrey Hamburger, Caroline Walker Bynum, and Jacqueline Jung. Jung in particular describes the bodies of Mary and Elizabeth in the Visitation as “exuberant,” “thrusting the evidence of [their] virtues outward toward beholders and rendering them visible through the body’s materiality rather than through any internal motifs.” (“Crystalline Wombs and Pregnant Hearts,” p. 234). In this thesis, I use Jung’s analysis of the sculpture as a starting point to propose a new, though not mutually exclusive, model for interpreting the function of these crystal wombs.
In the first main section of the thesis, I examine the convent of Katharinenthal itself, a highly enclosed and communal female monastic environment, together with many of the surviving devotional objects from the convent around 1300 that formed Katharinenthal’s visual and material culture. The following section examines in closer detail the crystal wombs of the Visitation, considering both their theological connotations and their significance to medieval perception of the female body. The final section addresses the devotional function of Mary and Elizabeth’s crystal wombs by placing the Visitation within the context of both late medieval Eucharistic theology and Rhenish mysticism. I conclude that the Visitation’s crystal wombs functioned as meditational foci, serving as “windows” into the visionary experience. These wombs, with their emphasis on transparency and interiority in their enclosed, conventual context, ultimately serve as a catalyst for mystical union with the divine.
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Papers by Josefa Westerman
In the first main section of the thesis, I examine the convent of Katharinenthal itself, a highly enclosed and communal female monastic environment, together with many of the surviving devotional objects from the convent around 1300 that formed Katharinenthal’s visual and material culture. The following section examines in closer detail the crystal wombs of the Visitation, considering both their theological connotations and their significance to medieval perception of the female body. The final section addresses the devotional function of Mary and Elizabeth’s crystal wombs by placing the Visitation within the context of both late medieval Eucharistic theology and Rhenish mysticism. I conclude that the Visitation’s crystal wombs functioned as meditational foci, serving as “windows” into the visionary experience. These wombs, with their emphasis on transparency and interiority in their enclosed, conventual context, ultimately serve as a catalyst for mystical union with the divine.
In the first main section of the thesis, I examine the convent of Katharinenthal itself, a highly enclosed and communal female monastic environment, together with many of the surviving devotional objects from the convent around 1300 that formed Katharinenthal’s visual and material culture. The following section examines in closer detail the crystal wombs of the Visitation, considering both their theological connotations and their significance to medieval perception of the female body. The final section addresses the devotional function of Mary and Elizabeth’s crystal wombs by placing the Visitation within the context of both late medieval Eucharistic theology and Rhenish mysticism. I conclude that the Visitation’s crystal wombs functioned as meditational foci, serving as “windows” into the visionary experience. These wombs, with their emphasis on transparency and interiority in their enclosed, conventual context, ultimately serve as a catalyst for mystical union with the divine.