Southern apse from Pedret
| Southern apse from Pedret | |
|---|---|
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| Artist | Circle of the Master of Pedret |
| Year | End of 11th/beginning of 12th century |
| Type | Fresco transferred to canvas |
| Location | Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya, Barcelona |
The Southern apse from Pedret is a fresco painting which was acquired during the 1919-1923 campaign of the Junta de Museus. The artwork originated from the southern apsidiole of the Church of Sant Quirze de Pedret and is currently exhibited in the Romanesque Art collection at the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain.
At the end of the eleventh century, the Romanesque mural painting of northern Italy arrived in Catalonia with a spread similar to that of Lombardic Romanesque architecture. The work of Italian painters, then, accompanied the architecture and soon had important repercussions.
The clearest example of this Lombardy-related painting is the Sant Quirze de Pedret ensemble, which stylistically comes close to the paintings of Sant Pere in Àger, Santa Maria in Àneu, and Sant Pere in El Burgal, and to those of Saint-Lizier in Couserans (France), preserved in situ.
The church at Pedret, located in the Pyrenees, was thought to have been elaborately decorated (even without a written history of worshippers) since it was located on the roads connecting Berga, Bagà, and Cerdanya, thus it may have been an important location. Scholars agree that the church's original architecture was Visigothic due to specific construction elements such as the horse-shoe arches, which divide the nave and give entrance to the apses, as well as the insulation of the apses themselves. However, an additional description of Mozarabic has been given as well to describe the architectural style. Various theories on the age of the frescoes have been presented taking into account stylistic trends of the tenth through the twelfth centuries AD and renovations that took place on the church during those time periods as well. The Museum where the frescoes currently reside dates them to be from the end of the eleventh century to the beginning of the twelfth. Due to the fresco's age, it is probable that the Southern apse from Pedret is one of the oldest of all Catalan Romanesque wall paintings.
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