My father came to Rome when he was a young man and conducted a boys choir in Vatican City. When I was little, I was so proud of him for this. I would always pay attention when he would say something about Rome, and his stories from this place most likely influenced my decision to spend time in Rome. My father is a devout Catholic, and he named me after St. Teresa of Avila.
Bernini sculpted St. Teresa and his sculpture is located near Piazza della Republica on Via Orlando. It is inside a chapel called S. Maria della Vittoria. My Italian class is on Via Nazionale and the bus I take to school passes Via Orlando. I have gotten off at Via Oralando several times to peek inside this unassuming chapel at Bernin's adaptation of St. Teresa. The sculpture is truly beautiful and Barbara Grizzuti wrote, "If one is going to put one's love for the Baroque to the test, the place to go is Santa Maria della Vittoria."
I have been researching this sculpture and St. Teresa of Avila. I had thought that this sculpture was fairly unknown and that I had happened upon it because it had something to do with my namesake. However, last week I saw the film, Angels and Demons. Santa Maria della Vittoria and Bernini's sculpture of St. Teresa were focused on in the movie. AWESOME. I loved the film by the way. It's really imaginative, but to see this movie in Rome was amazing. I walked out of the theatre and was 20 steps from Piazza del Popolo.
After watching the film, Angels and Demons, I decided I needed to write a blog post about the sixteenth-century writer and mystic, Teresa of Avila. In her autobiography, Teresa speaks of a beautiful angel appearing at her side:
"In his hands I saw a great golden spear, and at the iron tip there appeared to be a point of fire. This he plunged into my heart several times so that it penetrated to my entrails. When he pulled it out, I felt that he took them with it, and left me utterly consumed by the great love of God. The pain was so severe that it made me utter several moans. The sweetness caused by this intense pain is so extreme that one cannot possibly wish it to cease, nor is one's soul then content with anything but God. This is not a physical, but a spiritual pain, though the body has some share in it - even a considerable share. So gentle is this wooing that takes place between God and the soul that if anyone thinks I am lying, I pray God in His goodness, to grant him some experience of it."
Bernini himself was an extremely devout Catholic. There is no reason to think that Bernini had anything other than good intentions in depicting Teresa's story, however, for many viewers, it was impossible to see St. Teresa's "ecstatic" transformation through spiritual eyes. A French cleric in the 18th century confessed, "I feel within myself, if I may say so, a kind of mental blush." The French painter (and I am a big fan) Vigee LeBrun met the sculpture with the harshest criticism. She found Teresa's expression to be so "scandalous that it cannot be described." President De Brosses has the most blunt interpretation as he spouted, "If this is Divine Love, I know all about it."
Post-Revolutionary French visitors were inclined to see the work in a more sympathetic light. Stendhal, the 19th century French writer, in his journals on Rome acknowledged the technical perfection exhibited by Bernini. He wrote, "Has the Greek chisel produced anything to equal the head of St. Teresa?" However, Stendhal added, "It's a great shame that these statues can so easily convey the idea of profane love."
Today, there is little scandal surrounding this sculpture. I, of course, love that this work can be viewed either as sacred or profane, and I feel it only ads to its mystique. While looking at some of St. Teresa's writings, it is quite obvious that she was engaged in a great love affair with God.
In Rome and a Villa, a novel of sketches of Roman life written between 1948 and 1951, Eleanor Clark says this about the Ecstasy of St. Teresa:
"There was a time when this piece was considered in a dreadful taste and there is certainly some amusement in one's liking it now, but it is hard not to, when its candor is so engaging, its rapture so true to the writings of the mystics, the talent so great and all Rome around to cushion the blow. The smile of the angel as he poises his golden arrow is one of the best smiles in sculpture."
No comments:
Post a Comment