Motherhood and Meaning in Medieval Sculpture ― Representations from France, C.1100-1500

What can medieval sculptural representations of women tell us about medieval women's experiences of motherhood? Presumably the work of male sculptors, working for clerical patrons, these sculptures are unlikely to have been shaped by women's maternal experiences during their production. Once produced, however, their beholders would have included women who were mothers and potential mothers. Building on theories of reception and response, this book focuses on interactions between women as beholders and a range of sculptures made in France in the twelfth through sixteenth centuries in order to provide insight into women's experiences of motherhood. These interactions show motherhood to have been a transformative and an ambivalent experience for medieval women as it brought together empowerment and subordination, intimacy and separation, joy and grief, life and death, salvation and suffering. Marian Bleeke is Associate Professor of Art History, Cleveland State University.