page_title: French art
section_title: Carolingian art
hierarchical_section_title: French art / Historic overview / Medieval period / Carolingian art
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: Le tympan central du narthex (1140-1150), ouvert pour la sortie de la messe. Basilique Sainte-Marie-Madeleine de Vézelay.
context_page_description: French art consists of the visual and plastic arts originating from the geographical area of France. Modern France was the main centre for the European art of the Upper Paleolithic, then left many megalithic monuments, and in the Iron Age many of the most impressive finds of early Celtic art. The Gallo-Roman period left a distinctive provincial style of sculpture, and the region around the modern Franco-German border led the empire in the mass production of finely decorated Ancient Roman pottery, which was exported to Italy and elsewhere on a large scale. With Merovingian art the story of French styles as a distinct and influential element in the wider development of the art of Christian Europe begins.
  France can fairly be said to have been a leader in the development of Romanesque art and Gothic art, before the Renaissance led to Italy becoming the main source of stylistic developments until France matched Italy's influence during the Rococo and Neoclassicism periods and then regained the leading role in the Arts from the 19th to the mid-20th century.
context_section_description: Carolingian art is the approximate 120-year period from 750 to 900—during the reign of Charles Martel, Pippin the Younger, Charlemagne, and his immediate heirs—popularly known as the Carolingian Renaissance. The Carolingian era is the first period of the Medieval art movement known as Pre-Romanesque. For the first time, Northern European kings patronized classical Mediterranean Roman art forms, blending classical forms with Germanic ones, creating entirely new innovations in figurine line drawing, and setting the stage for the rise of Romanesque art and, eventually, Gothic art in the West.
  Illuminated manuscripts, metalwork, small-scale sculpture, mosaics, and frescos survive from the period. The Carolingians also undertook major architectural building campaigns at numerous churches in France. These include, those of Metz, Lyon, Vienne, Le Mans, Reims, Beauvais, Verdun, Saint-Germain in Auxerre, Saint-Pierre in Flavigny, and Saint-Denis, as well as the town center of Chartres. The Centula Abbey of Saint-Riquier (Somme), completed in 788, was a major achievement in monastic architecture. Another important building (mostly lost today) was "Theodulf's Villa" in Germigny-des-Prés.
  With the end of Carolingian rule around 900, artistic production halted for almost three generations. After the demise of the Carolingian Empire, France split into a number of feuding provinces, lacking any organized patronage. French art of the tenth and eleventh centuries was produced by local monasteries to promote literacy and piety, however, the primitive styles produced were not so highly skilled as the techniques of the earlier Carolingian period.
  Multiple regional styles developed based on the chance availability of Carolingian manuscripts as models to copy, and the availability of itinerant artists. The monastery of Saint Bertin became an important center under its abbot Odbert (986–1007), who created a new style based on Anglo-Saxon and Carolingian forms. The nearby abbey of St. Vaast (Pas-de-Calais) also created a number of important works. In southwestern France a number of manuscripts were produced c. 1000, at the monastery of Saint Martial in Limoges, as well as at Albi, Figeac, and Saint-Sever-de-Rustan in Gascony. In Paris a unique style developed at the abbey of Saint-Germain-des-Prés. In Normandy a new style arose in 975. By the later tenth century with the Cluny reform movement and a revived spirit for the concept of Empire, art production resumed.
caption: Central tympanum of the narthex of the Vézelay Abbey in Vézelay, 1140–1150
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