Ecstasy Of Saint Teresa

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Recommended: Importance of art forms in a society

The arts have always had a central focus in societies worldwide from all time periods as it acts as a reflection of the time, place, ideology and religion in which they dedicate their lives. From the ancient Minoans to the world today, we see art serving a vital role through its psychological and visual effect upon the viewer that communicate messages relative to the artist and their time. This has never been more apparent than in the Renaissance’s revival of ancient Greece and Rome where a revitalization of intellect, art, rationality and science begin to transform society, especially politically and within the dominant religion: Christianity. The church rose to ultimate power as the ultimate patron and messenger of God, which art began …show more content…

St Teresa of Avila (1515-1582) was a Spanish mystic, a Roman Catholic saint, as well as a reformer who wrote vividly about her mystical visions and experience, ultimately leading to her canonization in 1622 by Pope Gregory XV. She wrote specifically about her mystic experience of transverberation, or the piercing of her heart by an arrow of Divine Love. Typical of the Baroque, it was commissioned to communicate a certain set of beliefs, namely her mystical visionary experience (companion 373). In the sculptural work, Bernini shows the figures surrounded billowing clouds and golden rays shining from above, where the angel pierces her heart while Teresa lays in his arms with her head lulling back, her lips apart and her eyes closed, in a seeming expression of ecstasy, where outwardly the viewer can discern her metal state through he frantic drapery, a common way to convey something through the Renaissance (ibid, friedrich, 71). The visual appeal of this sculpture is its greatest feat within the CR propagandist style. It falls within the themes of “saintly ecstasy and agonizing martyrdom” but also further with the opulent flourish, symbolism and awe that adds dynamism a static image (brown). This image gains even more importance when remembering that the concept of martyrdom has always been central to Christianity, and was exploited within the Reformation to relate to the ordinary man (ibid). As Mullet notes, “the depiction of the human agony of the Passion was part of an essential homiletic purpose in iconography”

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