Object Annotation #4

Subject/Style/Context

Classen

Brazinski and Fryxell

Baert

Wauters

Questions

This ‘Enclosed Garden’—a northern phenomenon often characterized as a tray/case for a relic or biblical fragment with ornamentation of flowering and vine motifs achieved by beads or paper—was created in the early to mid-sixteenth century in Mechelen, Belgium. Within the included picture, the work’s establishment as a triptych is solidified; Its two doors unfold to reveal an elaborately rendered Virgin and child flanked by depictions of Saints Augustine (left), Saints Anne (right), and Elizabeth (right). There is no question of which aspect of the work is emphasized, as the materiality of the central Virgin and child draws the viewer in.. Evoking the biblical Garden of Paradise, the Enclosed Garden was originally a personal devotional device for women during this period; specifically cloistered women.

Classen’s discussion of the smell as an active agent of stratification—-utilizing perceived ‘good’ and ‘bad’ smells to other those that do not align with physical, social, and moral norms of any given period— applies to a conversation surrounding the Enclosed Garden and its engagement with the olfactory. Women’s other-ness in male-dominated society has dynastics associations with nature, as a parallel can be understood between the way in which the gendered stratification of society is predicated on the perception of the dominating group and the devaluing—-othering—- of nature based upon human perspective.(146) But while the non-conformist values of deigned “immoral” women (I.e prostitutes, witches, etc.) aligned their person with an animality and inherently “bad” smells, the religious women who would create and utilize these Enclosed Gardens for veneration of the divine would emit a sweet, virtuous smell that would be reflected within the scent of the included relics.(143)

Brazinski and Fryxell’s exploration into the olfactory as a confirmation of reality within the context of medieval Christian relics is a theme that extends into the early to mid-sixteenth century with the pervasiveness of Enclosed Gardens within private devotion.(7) Often utilizing relics within its central panel, the smell associated with these saintly objects acted as a symbol—indicating their proximity to God and creating a physical manifestation of the divine that the viewer could interact with on a personal level. (2-3) The smell also confirms the reality of the divine to the viewer; the sweet, virtuous scent of the relic validating the saint as a vessel of divinity and situating a model of virtue for the viewer to emulate.

Baert utilizes this article to confirm the importance of smell and taste within the generation and confirmation of divine knowledge within visual depictions of the biblical Noli me Tangere; her argument contemplates the role of “the garden” as a common iconographic setting used to allude to the reception and sharing of higher knowledge and the olfactory's position as confirming sense to this reality. (140-142) The Enclosed Garden’s simultaneous engagement with the visual and olfactory through its three-dimensional figures adorned with wax, textiles, and small relics act as the perfect setting for the development of a distinctly feminine sensitivity; one that depicts a quest for the divine within a framework of the primitive, female epistemological methodology. (144) This divine is found and confirmed within the devotional object and its affirmation of virtuous scent as it is understood within this period.

Wauters ruminates on the olfactory experience of medieval churches, specifically the Church of our Lady in Antwerp, and the intervention of devotional objects in the transformation of its “smellscape.” (20) While the author focuses upon the implications that these smellscapes have on public worship, Enclosed Gardens—like the one pictured—function on a more personal level; the close proximity of a relic’s virtuous fragrance enacting a transformation of the spiritual status of its viewer. (34) Spurred by devout prayer and the use of relics this metamorphosis of virtue manifested both internally—through the fortification of the spirit—and externally— through the emittance of a sweet odor known for its relationship to the divine. (34) Yet, just as the modified smellscape of the Church of our Lady in Antwerp depends upon the olfactory quality of religious items, the Enclosed Garden is a necessary catalyst in this transfiguration of the viewer from human to saintly in virtue.

Questions

• How does the smellscape that Wauters describes change as the evaluation shifts from that of a church that encompasses the religious well-being of a city to devotional objects, such as the Enclosed Garden, that are designed with personal veneration in mind?

• How would the relic’s virtuous smell or lack thereof be amplified or dulled by this singular viewer? How does Shusterman’s idea of intentionality play into the viewer’s experience with the object? Is it the audience's expectation of the smell within the prescribed routine of worship that confirms the perceived sweet “virtuous” scent of relics like those present within the Enclosed Garden?

• How would objects like the Enclosed Garden draw upon Staar’s idea of memory as an intrinsic part of aesthetic experience? How would the viewer’s memory of how other saintly relics smelled inform their engagement with private devotional objects like the Enclosed Garden? Could their memory be corrupted by the heavy fragrance of a church’s smellscape?