Sur la Meuse. Portails des XIIIe et XIVe siècles (Maestricht, Huy, Dinant)

Little taken into account by art historians, the sculpted portals of the Maestricht collegiate church (bergportaal, end of the 12th century - 2nd quarter of the 13th century), Huy ("Bethleem") (1350s), and Dinant (southern and western porches) (years 1340) are, however, extraordinary and, therefore, particularly interesting ensembles. The northern portal of the SainteCroix collegiate church is only known by some remnants (1340s), but was/is without a doubt also very interesting. Historiography (unfortunately mostly local) has long sought to integrate these sets into the great history of Gothic portals at any cost by presenting these "mosan" portals as more or less successful offshoots of French portals. That missed the point. Their original architecture and the unique management of iconography of the "mosans" portals testify rather to the capacity of the master builders and sculptors who were solicited by the sponsors of this region of the Empire, to transform or, more exactly, to distance themselves from the French models. Even later in the 19th and early 20th century a completely different type of adaption has been made at the “mosan” portals than in France of the same time. The lecture will be taking the results of the most recent studies into account which were conducted on portals in in the context of the conservation treatments applied to them.