Devouring Architecture: Ruskin's Insatiable Grotesque

Author(s): Paulette Singley

Source: Assemblage, No. 32 (Apr., 1997), pp. 108-125
Published by: The MIT Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3171411 .
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Paulette Singley is an assistantprofessor
of architectureat Iowa State University
and a doctoral candidate in architectural
historyat Princeton University.
Assemblage 32: 108-125 ? 1997 by the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
110
Paulette Singley
Devouring Architecture:
Ruskin's Insatiable
Grotesque
Despite the perils involved with naming historical origins
- the comfort of a stable beginning, the temptation of
clean chronological divisions, and the promise of positive
progression - the grotesque thrives upon and embodies the
dilemma of beginnings and openings. According to Giorgio
Vasari, who documents its inaugural birth, the grotesque
begins when it emerges from out of the subterranean cav-
erns of Nero's Domus Aurea and breaks into the light of Re-
naissance art theory. Vasari narrates this discovery in the life
of Morto da Feltro:
Morto restoredthe painting of grotesques in a manner more like
the ancient than was achieved by any other painter, and for this
he deserves infinite praise, in that it is after his example that they
have been brought in our own day, by the hands of Giovanni da
Udine and other craftsmen, to the great beauty and excellence
that we see. For, although the said Giovanni and others have car-
ried them to absolute perfection, it is nonetheless true that the
chief praise is due to Morto, who was the first to bring them to
light and to devote his whole attention to paintings of that kind,
which are called grotesques because they were found for the
most part in the grottoes of the ruins of Rome.11
As the aftermath of this momentous birth, extensive scholar-
ship on the grotesque in art and literature has been devel-
oped to such an extent that it would seem possible to
discuss this subject without repeating, ad infinitum, Vasari's
account of its origins.12 The etymon of grotto, buried within
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the grottesque,however, compels the repetition of Raphael's
legendary descent into what has become an archetypal
cave, thereby reconstitutingwhat emerged as a hybrid orna-
mental motif composed of diverse animal, vegetable, and
architecturalfragmentsinto the conundrum of architec-
While
tural origins and the crisis of primaryparturition."3
in
Vitruviuscensures new fashions Roman wall painting as
early as the firstcenturyA.D.- a fashion eventually identi-
fied as the third Pompeiian style - and confirms that the
concept existed well before its incipient discoveryand nam-
ing, the compulsion to repeatthe root meaning, the etymo-
logical trap of grotto-esque,rendersa chthonic descent into
a myth of eternal return:every time we invoke the gro-
tesque we must returnto the cave. In this sense, then, the
grotesque is both a stylistic categoryand the multitude of
bizarrefantasiesreleased when exploring architecture's
psychological underground.
Thus a genealogy of grotesquearchitecturelocates its
Ursprungin Nero's Domus Aurea.It would encompassboth
the wall paintingsand the jewel-encrusted,rotatingdining
hall. The progenyof the Domus would include not only the
more famous examplesof Leonardo'scaves, Michelangelo's
tombs, and Piranesi'scarceralvisions, but also such variants
as the cameraobscura/grottoin AlexanderPope'sgarden,
the scabrousentryto Claude-NicolasLedoux'ssaltworksat
Chaux, or the hollow cavernsof Jean-JacquesLequeu's
"Gothic House."More recent explorationswould involve
such diversearchitecturesas the crookedgrottoesof accu-
mulated detritusin KurtSchwittters'sHannoverMerzbau
or the crocheted tissuesof wire, bone, and beads in Jennifer
Bloomer and Nina Hofer's"Tabblesof Bower."In what
might be construedas a hystericallist of referencesmar-
shaled towarddescribingthe diverseblossomsnestled in
the captivatingvines of the grotesque,MarkTayloralludes to
a number of post-Vasariantheories;JuliaKristeva'sabjection,
Derrida'scryptonomy,Georges Bataille'sinforme,Martin
Singley
Heidegger's"origins,"Immanuel Kant's"sublime,"Sig-
mund Freud'sunheimlich,Mikhail Bakhtin's"carnival,"and
Gianni Vattimo's"weakthought"all explorecavernousmar-
gins of thought that insinuatea grotesquearchitecture.Hav-
ing evolvedfrom a specific term referringto an ornamental
device that allayedthe horrorvacui of Renaissanceartiststo a
vague expressionof somethingthat is fantasticallyabsurdor
even sickening,the grotesque- as demonstratedby the work
of Schwittersor Bloomer - likewisehas the powerto expand
its properboundariesand entirelyto engulf the edifice.
Within the manifold descriptionsof absorption,rupture,
and excess that characterizethe grotesque architectural
body, John Ruskin'setiology of La Serenissimain The
Stones of Venice engages this expansion of meaning from
an ornamentalprogramto a delirious mental state that
produces absurdand sickening artifacts.Ruskin passes into
the body of grotesque architecturethrough an ornamental
mouth on the church of Santa Maria Formosa that speaks
to him of Venice's fall into an "unscrupulouspursuit of
pleasure,"to the extent that the architectureof the Vene-
tian Renaissance
is amongthe lowestand basesteverbuiltby the handsof men,
being especiallydistinguishedby a spiritof brutalmockeryand
insolentjest,which,exhaustingitselfin deformedand mon-
stroussculpture,can sometimesbe hardlyotherwisedefined
thanas the perpetuationin stoneof the ribaldriesof drunken-
ness. (11: 135)14
In the chapter"GrotesqueRenaissance,"found in the third
volume of The Stones,titled "TheFall,"fromwhich this pas-
sage was taken,Ruskinallegorizesthe decline of the Venetian
Republicthroughtwo elaboratelegends buriedwithin the
church:one being its foundationand the otherbeing the
emergenceof the Festivalof the Twelve Maries.Ruskinwrites:
The Bishopof Uderzo,drivenby the Lombardsfromhis bishop-
ric, as he waspraying,behelda visionof the VirginMother,who
orderedhim to founda churchin her honour,in the place
111

wherehe shouldsee a whitecloud rest.Andwhenhe wentout,
the whitecloud wentbeforehim;and on the place whereit
restedhe builta church,and it wascalledthe Churchof St.
Marythe Beautiful[SantaMariaFormosa],fromthe loveliness
of the formin whichshe had appearedin the vision.(11: 137)
He reportsthat the church was consecratedin the mid-
seventh century, rebuilt in 864 and enriched with relics, re-
built again aftera fire in 1105 (or 1175 according to another
source Ruskinmentions) and stood until 1689 when it was
destroyedby an earthquakeonly to be restoredby a rich
merchant named TurrinToroni. Despite conflicting histori-
cal accounts of Santa MariaFormosa'shistory,to Ruskin
"all that is necessaryfor the readerto know is, that everyves-
tige of the church in which the ceremony took place was de-
stroyedat least as earlyas 1689; and that the ceremony itself,
having been abolished in the close of the fourteenthcen-
tury, is only to be conceived as takingplace within the more
ancient church, resembling St. Mark's"(11: 138). He directs
the reader'sattention to "the contrastbetween the former,
when it had its Byzantinechurch, and its yearlyprocession
of the Doge and the Brides;and the later, when it had its
Renaissancechurch 'in the style of Sansovino,'and its yearly
honouring is done away"(11: 138).
The yearlyprocession was a Venetian custom that brought
about the legendaryattackand rescue of brides in the year
943. During medieval times, nobles were allowed to wed
one day a year, in a sacramentbetween god and man where
every eye was invoked for its glance and everytongue for
its prayers"(11: 139). Ruskin'sfriend, the poet Samuel
Rogers,describes a typical bride as covered with a "veil
transparentas the gossamer,"which "fell from beneath a
starrydiadem"and over a jewel on her dazzling neck.'1
As per medieval legend, in the year 943 these jewels en-
ticed Triestine piratesto enter the church of St. Pietro di
Castello, to attackthe laity, and to abduct the virgin brides.
In response to this attack,the casseleri,a group of trunk
assemblage 32
makersor carpentersfrom the parishof Santa Maria
Formosa, rescued the brides and their dowrychests.The
possible translationof casseleriinto "casketmakers"in-
trigues Ruskin,who writes "if, however, the readerlikes to
substitute'carpenters'or 'house builders' for casket-makers,
he may do so with great reason,"thereby placing the build-
ing tradesmenat the center of the brides' rescue and the
restorationof social order (11: 143).16As a rewardfor their
braverythe Doge promised to visit the church of the
casselerieveryyear, so that "the festivalof the 2nd of Febru-
ary, afterthe year 943, seems to have been observedonly in
memory of the deliverance of the brides, and no longer set
apartfor public nuptials"(11: 140). From this event suppos-
edly emerged the Festival of the Twelve Maries, a three-
day-longprocession from San Marco'sCathedralto Santa
Maria Formosathat featuredas its central ornament twelve
maidens dressed in silver and gold.
In a more detailed account of the festivalthan Ruskinpro-
vides, EdwardMuir explains that on 31 January(the date
for parishprieststo solemnize all betrothalsfrom the previ-
ous year) the prince and the commune of Venice, in an act
of public charity,sponsoredweddings for twelve "deserving
but poor"girls by offeringthem dowries and adorningthem
in gems.7 It was both the dowries and the girls that attracted
the Triestine piratesto enter the cathedralof San Pietro di
Castello and make off with these treasures.According to
Muir, while "the rape of the Venetian and the Sabine
women are both myths concerned with the problem of
preservinggroup fertility,.. . the Venetian account em-
phasized the protective,peaceful, inward-lookingorder
providedby a strongcohesive community.""'The date
attributedto the retrievalof the brides and their dowries,
2 February,correspondedwith the day of the Purification
of the Virgin, or Candlemas, a ceremony commemorating
Mary'spostpartumpurificationand celebrating divine
motherhood.'9
112

Despite the fact that "everyfeatureof the surroundingscene
which was associatedwith that festivalhas been in succeed-
ing ages destroyed,"Ruskin nonetheless arguesthat the spot
is still worth a pilgrimage in orderto receive a painful lesson
(11: 144). He advisesthe readerto recall the ancient festivals
to the Virgin where the daughtersof Venice knelt yearly,be-
fore examining "the head that is carvedon the base of the
tower, still dedicated to St. Marythe Beautiful."It is
A head, - huge, inhuman,and monstrous,- leeringin bestial
degradation,too foul to be eitherpicturedor described,or to be
beheldfor morethanan instant,yet let it be enduredforthatin-
stant;for in thathead is embodiedthe typeof evil spiritto which
Venice wasabandonedin the fourthperiodof her decline;and it
is well thatwe shouldsee and feel the full horrorof it on this
spot,and knowwhatpestilenceit wasthatcame andbreathed
upon her beauty,until it meltedawaylike the whitecloud from
the ancientfieldsof SantaMariaFormosa.(11: 144-45)
Afterhe isolates this particularhead from the multitude in-
festing Venice, Ruskin lists the most contaminated build-
ings and, rathercannily, insiststhat we, too, should visit
them. His topographyof degenerate architecturedivertsthe
tourist'sitineraryaway from visiting the most beautiful or
noteworthysites into a surveyof the most hideous. His
unique processional route leads us from the churches of
San Mois&(by AlessandroTremignon in 1668), of Santa
Maria Zobenigo (by Giuseppe Sardi in 1680), of St.
Eustachio (also known as San Stae, by Domenico Rossi
in 1709), and of the Ospadeletto (by BaldassareLonghena
in 1674); then to the Palazzo Corner della Regina (by
Domenico Rossi in 1724-27), the Palazzo Pesaro (also
by Longhena, begun in 1652) and, finally, to the Bridge
of Sighs (by Antonio Contino in 1600).20 Each of the
churches is encrusted with excessive secular ornamentation
that swallowsthe faqadesthey are supposed merely to em-
bellish with sacred images. In other words,where the orna-
mental programshould subordinateitself as an extrinsic
element or frame to the largeraesthetic representationof
Singley
the building, here it consumes the building's face as a lep-
rous growththat feeds off of stony flesh.
By isolating the head on Santa Maria Formosa from the
largerbody of grotesqueornament, Ruskin opens in The
Stones of Venice a tangible fissure,towardwhich Mark
Wigley has pointed me, a fissurethat we are about to enter.
First, apartfrom Ruskin'shistorical excursusof the virgin
brides' abduction and the Virgin Mother'sappearancethat
motivateshis heated attack,the faqadeof Santa Maria
Formosa appearsrestrainedwhen compared with the other
buildings just listed and the lonely head appearsto be
ratherordinary.As a central antagonistwithin The Stones,
the head occupies a position in the book that its visage on
the church hardlyseems to merit.
Ruskin initiates his discussion on the grotesque Renais-
sance in an earlier chapter, titled "The Nature of Gothic,"
where he simply tempts us with a quick allusion to this
subject and then defers his explanation until the third vol-
ume.21 Not only does this deferralallow him to maintain
the chronological sequence necessaryto write the historyof
a rise and fall, it also heightens his climactic outrageagainst
the Renaissance perversionof art and society. In fact, as his
vivid language betrays,the grotesque is one of Ruskin's
great passions.22The open mouth of the ornamental head
acts as a closure to both The Stones and the Renaissance,
provokingthe question as to why, of all the innumerable
open sores that may be found in Venetian architecture,has
Ruskin directed such energy towardcensuring this particu-
lar head and then failing to representit? Despite his distinct
instructionto gaze at the degradedimage, if only for an in-
stant, Ruskin nonetheless expressesprofound ambivalence
towardour looking at this object that is too hideous to be
either pictured or described. Insteadof illustratinghis text
with the head on Santa Maria Formosa, he substitutesa
head from the foundation of the Palazzo Corner Regina
113

"made merely monstrousby exaggerationsof eyeballs and
cheeks," as an example of the base grotesque;and he com-
pares it to another example of the base grotesque, a Gothic
lion symbol of Saint Markfrom the CastelbarcoTomb in
Verona (11: 190). In this strugglebetween attractionand re-
pulsion, iconophobia and iconophilia, Ruskinadmonishes
us to set our eyes brieflyupon an image that is too lurid
even for him to rendervisible in drawingsor in words. De-
spite the potential to drawfrom Ruskin'spublication as a
guidebook to Venice, the primaryrole of The Stones was as
a discourse on English architecture,culture, and mores;
and it is this polemic of reformthat severs Ruskin'stext
from the physical exigencies of Venice.
Or does it? Despite his claim that the head is too vile even
to describe in words, Ruskinactually does convey enough
illustrativedetails - such as huge, inhuman, monstrous,
and leering - for us to generate a vivid mental picture that
might even surpassthe horrorof the actual head. Further-
more, he describesthe typical grotesqueface as a tongue
protrudingfrom an expressionof sneering mockery.And,
finally, despite his promised silence, he cannot contain
himself from exclaiming that in the head on Santa Maria
Formosa "the teeth are representedas decayed"(11: 162)
His description,however guarded, inevitablyoverflowsthe
boundaries of representation.Ruskin'sadvice actually to
visit Venice operatesas a rhetoricaldevice that invites the
readeron an imaginaryvoyage;thus he covers his argument
of social reformwith the innocent jacketof a tourists'
guidebook. If Ruskinhad implored us never to set our eyes
upon the profane image, he would riskenhancing its erotic
appeal by thus veiling it. Instead,with an expertsleight of
hand, he encourages us to examine an object that is entirely
unavailableto our gaze - a skillful maneuver that also al-
lows him to dodge the crisis of representingthe disgusting
or the ugly. But, most important,by refusingto renderthe
assemblage 32
head visible in The Stones, Ruskin covers our naked eyes
with his written hand.
While my textual exegesis is overdetermined,it could not
possibly match the hyperbolic intensity of Ruskin'swords.
Three volumes are filled with what Tony Tanner describes
as "unblushingrhapsodicflights"of prose and as "extreme-
ly vituperative,even venomous" writing.23If we follow
Stephen Bann's argument, both the literarytraditionof
ekphrasis,the classical convention for writing about art, and
Horace's notion of Ut picturapoesis, or, as a painting so in
poetry,are central to our discussion of Ruskin and the gro-
tesque. Bann explains that ekphrasisis a genre of writing,
parasiticupon a workof art, "dependentfirstof all on the
riskypresumptionthat the visual workof art can be trans-
lated into the terms of verbaldiscourse without remain-
der."24 While Bann arguesthat verbal descriptionscannot
cover all aspects of an artworkand, consequently, must
leave something out, I would expand this discussion to ar-
gue that it is likewise possible for verbal description to over-
flow the limits of the artworkand to engulf it in a language
of surplus.While insufficient ekphrasisis a danger, so too,
are superfluousdescriptions,which threaten the statusof
the artworkwith a "devouringlanguage."25
When writing amplifies to an excessive extent the content
of a workof art, it can swallow the workwhole. While it
would be tempting, and even meaningful, to argue that
Ruskin'swriting mirrorsthe grotesque subjects of his discus-
sion, his omission of the head in his publication allows him
to circumvent neatly the possibilities of his own excessive
prose. Insofaras Geoffrey Galt Harphamconcludes that
"the ambivalentpresence of meaning, within the ostensibly
meaningless form constitutes the real threat, and the real
revolution, of grottesche,"Ruskin respondsto this "semiotic
ambivalence,"with his disturbedtreatment of the head.26
114

The oscillation between lack and surplusthat structuresthe
paradoxof representingthe ugly also applies to descriptions
of the terrifying;in both cases, to reproduce/imitatein
words the hideous or terrifyingobjects is to become them.
The conflictual relations sufficiency/insufficiency,surplus/
deficit, abundance/shortage,in terms of representation,
serve well to summarize the dilemma Kant encounters
when writing about the sublime:
Wherefine artevidencesits superiorityis in the beautifulde-
scriptionsit givesof thingsthatin naturewouldbe uglyor dis-
pleasing.The Furies,diseases,devastations of war,and the like
can (as evils)be verybeautifullydescribed,nayeven represented
in pictures.One kindof uglinessalone is incapableof being rep-
resentedconformablyto naturewithoutdestroyingall aesthetic
delight,and consequentlyartisticbeauty,namely,thatwhich
excitesdisgust.27
Similarly, it would seem that Ruskin actually writes of the
sublime when comparing the noble with the ignoble work-
man, because the latter "maymake his creaturesdisgusting
but never fearful"(11: 170).
Disgustand fear,grotesqueand sublime.To emphasizethis
distinctionRuskincalls forththe Furiesto describethe worker
who is not inspiredby the sublimityof divine terror,dividing
the propersubjectsof fear into modes of artistictemperament:
first,predeterminedor involuntaryapathy,second, mockery,
and third,diseasedand ungovernedimaginativeness(11:
166). Regardinginvoluntaryor predeterminedapathy,he
distinguishesbetween the false and the true grotesque:
In the truegrotesque,a man of naturallystrongfeeling is acci-
dentallyor resolutelyapathetic;in the falsegrotesque,a man
naturallyapatheticis forcinghimselfinto temporaryexcitement.
The horrorwhich is expressedby the one, comes uponhim
whetherhe will or not;thatwhich is expressedby the other,is
soughtout by him and elaboratedby his art.(11: 168)
In this respect, the artisanof the false grotesque"neverfelt
any Divine fear;he never shuddered when he heard the cry
Singley
from the burning towersof the earth, Venga Medusa:si lo
faremdi smalto.'He is stone already,and needs no gentle
hand laid upon his eyes to save him" (11: 169).28In this pas-
sage that Ruskinborrowsfrom Dante's Inferno,the gentle
hand belongs to Virgil, who is protectingthe younger poet
from the Gorgon'spetrifyinggaze.29Thus, when the Furies,
screaming from the burning tower, cry, "LetMedusa come
and we'll turn him to stone,"it is, in fact, the poet's hand
that drawsthe protectiveveil over the observer'seyes and
encryptsthe image within words.But in The Stones, Ruskin
covers our view with a veil as transparentas gossamer,and
in so doing actually endows the head with libidinal energy.
In other words,the failure of Ruskin'siconophobia to con-
structthe absence of compelling images as free from the se-
duction of absent images weaves a veil of desire. This, in a
nutshell, is the crisis of representationthat the grotesquedis-
closes when it intersectsthe rhetoricalprogramof ekphrasis.
Venga Medusa:si lo faremdi smalto. In Sigmund Freud's
frequentlycited essay "Medusa'sHead," "To decapitate =
To castrate."The terrorof Medusa is the fear of castration
linked to vision. This fear "occurswhen a boy. . . catches
sight of the female genitals . . . surroundedby hair"and dis-
covers the missing penis.3"Both the head of Medusa and
the vulva are apotropaic,or counterphobic, objects to the
male gaze: when openly displayedthey produce a feeling
of horroror petrifactionin the male viewer. And indeed,
Ruskin writes, "it is not as the creating, but as the seeing
man, that we are here contemplating the masterof the true
grotesque"(11: 169). While Freud refersto Rabelais'sstory
of "how the devil took to flight when the woman showed
him her vulva,"in a historical account of apotropaismin
action during the 1848 revolution, Parisianwomen were
known to lift up their skirtsand expose their pudenda as a
defensive tactic.' Regardingthe consequences of such an
exposure,Ann Bergren explains that afterthe male flees in
115
 assemblage 32

fright, he attemptsto "repressthe wound without a trace."32

In Ruskin'scase, when he covers the swollen lips of the sev-
ered head with his own textual surplushe both erases and
enhances the wound. The possibilities of an apotropaic
architecturesuggest an application of Freud'sanalysisto
Ruskin'sgrotesque object of desire, now viewed as a vagina
that leers in bestial degradation.Ratherthan a castration,it
is a grotesque cave or vagina dentata from which effuses the
liquid succubus of a perforatedinteriorthat turns the male
citizens of Venice into Ruskin'sstones while endowing the
women with phallic power. A form of invaginationthat
refersto multiple folds and an open interior,Ruskin's
grotesque overlapsthe intrauterinespace of architectural
origins:no longer the inviolate origins of virgin betrothal
and immaculate conception, but alluding to the "necessity"
of postpartumpurification.

The grotesque also overlapsthe "uterine"disease of hysteria

and the implications of mental disordersto which, accord-
ing to Ruskin, all artistsare subject. If we returnto the ques-
tion of apathydiscussed above, Ruskin himself describesthe
grotesque as belonging in partto diseased and ungoverned
imaginativeness:
The grotesquewhich comesto all men in a disturbeddreamis
the mostintelligibleof thiskind,but alsothe mostignoble;the
imagination,in this instance,being entirelydeprivedof all aid
fromreason,and incapableof self-government. I believe,how-
ever,that the noblestforms of imaginativepowerarealso in
some sortungovernable,and havein them somethingof the
characterof dreams;so thatthe vision,of whateverkind,comes
uncalled,and will not submititselfto the seer,but conquers
him, and forceshim to speakas a prophethavingno powerover
his wordsor thoughts.Only,if the whole manbe trainedper-
fectly,and his mind calm, consistent,and powerful,the vision
which comesto him is seen as in a perfectmirror,serenely,and The grotesque mask at Santa Maria
in consistencewiththe rationalpowers;but if the mindbe im- Formosaand the face of a male hysteric
perfectand ill trained,the visionis seen as in a brokenmirror,
withstrangedistortionsand discrepancies,all the passionsof the
heartbreathinguponit in crossripples,till hardlya traceof it
remainsunbroken.(11: 178-79)33

116

Although the image of the broken mirrorreflects the inte-
rior of AlexanderPope's garden grotto, lined with shardsof
sparklingglass, I have cited this passagefor its classical allu-
sion to artisticmadness and the symptomologyof the gro-
tesque mind that produces it. While the head of Santa
Maria Formosa, in Ruskin'sanalysis,reflects the mind of a
sufferingartist,it is Jean-MartinCharcot, writing in Les
Difformeset les malades dans l'art of 1889, who directly
links the head with the visage of a male hysteric and, in so
doing, returnsthe grotesque from the fantasiesof disturbed
minds to the field of naturalrepresentation.So importantis
the head to the argument Charcot proffersin this publica-
tion that he opens the firstchapter, titled "LesGrotesques,"
by explaining that the grotesque mask on the Church of
Santa Maria Formosa is his point of departureand by citing
Ruskin'spowerful description, quoted above, from The
Stones of Venice: "Ahead,- huge, inhuman, and mon-
strous,- leering in bestial degradation,too foul to be either
pictured or described, or to be beheld for more than an in-
stant."34Charcot sees the signs of convulsion in worksof art
as representingactual physiological disturbances.While
artistsmay idealize and normalize their subjects, they also
serve to decipher deformities into pathologies. As Georges
Didi-Huberman writes,
The workof artinterpretsthe symptomin the sensethatit repro-
duces it. This is the case of the famousgrotesquemaskfromthe
Churchof SantaMariaFormosain Venice, whereCharcotrec-
ognizednone otherthana 'facialspasmof a specialnature,often
foundin male or femalehystericsubjectswitha semiparalysis of
the limbs,and exhibitingsuch distinctivecharacteristics thatit is
impossibleto confuseit withanyotherspasmodicfacialdisor-
der.'Charcotnamesit hemispasme glossolabiehysterique,and
having it 'in front of his at
eyes Salpetriere,' has Richer jointly
engravethe Venetianmaskandthe portraitof one of his hysteri-
cal patients:as two 'interpretations'of the samerole, of the same
form.35
Charcot specifically aligns Ruskin'shead with the physical
etiologies of hysteria,traditionallya female malady, now lo-
Singley
cated in the male face. And while this reproductionof the
head on the church of Santa Maria Formosa is a striking
analog to Ruskin'sStones, Charcot offerseven furtherre-
search on the Venetian Renaissance in Les Demoniaques
clansl'art,where he analyzes a reproductionof Vittore
Carpaccio'spainting Miracle of the TrueCrossthat he titles
"Le Patriachede grade d livre un demoniaque":
The scene occurson the banksof the GrandCanalof Venice,
in the groundfloorof a palazzo.Hereis a mise-en-scene ablyar-
rangedto strikethe imaginationof the people,and whichper-
mitsa largenumberof dignitariesto assistthe miracle.At the
foot of the palazzo,the crowdis alreadynumerous;it is continu-
ally enlargedby the curiouswho arriveby water,and, in the dis-
tance,by the processioncrossingthe bridge.The GrandCanal
is coveredby gondolas.Withinthe loggia,surroundedby clerics
and clergyholdinglargealtarcandles,a youngboy is in torment;
his mouthis open,his head is bent back,and turnedto one side.
His appearanceis moreone of a youngchoreic,or of one show-
ing the symptomsof the danceof Saint-Guy,thana patientin
the gripof a hystero-epileptic
seizure.The patriarchpresents
him the cross.36
Charcot finds something close to the symptomsof epileptic
hysteria,characterizedby an open mouth, within Carpac-
cio's depiction of an exorcism. The thin line between art
and realitythat Charcot observeshaunted Ruskin,who had
proposed writing a complete guide to Carpaccio'sworkand
who obsessed on the likeness between St. Ursula and the
object of his affections, Rose La Touche, to the brink of his
own madness.37
The open and salivatingmouth of Carpaccio's"hysteric,"
metaphoricallylinked to a dyspepticstomach and flatulent
anus, describes a grotesquebody gorging in carnival inver-
sion and excessive appetite. We might recall that the elabo-
rate dining hall of Nero's Domus Aurea was precisely such
a site for feastingand feeding. A strongproponent of the po-
tential for revolutionarytransgressionsinspired by Rabelais's
carnival, Mikhail Bakhtin describes the grotesqueas walls
turned to flesh in a world where the human body is used as
117

a building material:where we can no longer distinguish the
architecturalboundariesbetween body and building, inside
and outside, frame and subject. Quoting Rabelais'scharac-
ter Panurge from Gargantuaand Pantagruel,Bakhtinde-
scribes a delirious reversalof body and building parts:"I
have observedthat the pleasure-twatsof women in this part
of the world are much cheaper than stones, thereforethe
In Bakhtin'sgro-
walls of the city should be built of twats.""38
tesque carnivalthe lower aperturesof waste reach into the
upper regions of taste through a mouth, that, when opened,
reduces the face to a gaping orifice and also transforms
Ruskin'smaskingof the head into the writing-overof the
oral capacity. If, as Bakhtinargues,the grotesquebody may
be translatedinto an architectureof gaping passagesand tu-
mescent towers,the head on Santa Maria Formosaengages
in a dialogue with the campanile, where the mingling of
phallic and vaginal topoi borderson fornication. Let us re-
call, too, that this was the only church in Venice dedicated
to the Virgin, the legendaryretrievalof the brides and their
little boxes.39Thus this particularsite representswhat hap-
pens when voluptuous desire erodes the fraternalbonds of
the control of reproductionthrough marriage.
From pageantsdedicated to sharinga communal Eucharist
placed upon tongues that spoke the word of the Lord, to the
festival'stransubstantiationinto moist tongues licking loose
lips, Ruskin marksthe specific moment of Venetian decline
with the death of the Doge Tomaso Mocenigo in 1423 and
the ensuing year of festival. From then onward,the Vene-
tians "drankwith deeper thirstfrom the fountains of forbid-
den pleasure and dug for springs,hitherto unknown, in the
darkplaces of the earth"(11: 195). Ruskin'sratheroblique
reference to digging invokes the etymological origins of the
grotesque, an archaeologythat takes us inside the cavern at
which we have thus far only gaped.
assemblage 32
Given the linguistic dilemma of discussing the grotesque
without referringto its archetypalorigins, Walter Benjamin
also succumbs to the compulsion to repeat:
The discoveryof the secretstorehouseof inventionis attributed
to Ludovicoda Feltre,called 'il Morto'becauseof his 'grotesque'
undergroundactivitiesas a discoverer.Andthanksto the media-
tion of an anchoriteof the samename (in E. T. A. Hoffmann's
Die Serapionsbriider), the antiquepainterwho waspickedfrom
Pliny's much discussed passageon decorativepaintingas the
classicof the grotesque,the 'balcony-painter' Serapion,hasalso
been used in literatureas the personificationof the subterra-
Foreven at thattime the
nean-fantastic, the occult-spectral.
character of the effectof the grotesque
enigmaticallymysterious
seemsto havebeen associatedwith its subterraneanly mysterious
originin buriedruinsand catacombs.The wordis not derived
fromgrottain the literalsense,but fromthe 'burial'in the sense
of concealment- whichthe caveor grottoexpresses.The enig-
maticwasthereforepartof its effectfromthe verybeginning.
Forthisthe eighteenthcenturystill hadthe expressiondas
Verkrochene [thatwhichhas creptaway].Winckelmann'sposi-
tion is not so veryfarremovedfromthis. Howeverseverelyhe
criticizesthe stylisticprinciplesof baroqueallegory.40
I will close with Benjamin's opening in the ground. The
chthonic journey into the cryptand its originarystatusas ar-
chitecture inhabits Ruskin'stext as "the subterraneanfan-
tastic"and " the occult-spectral."By entering the grottoand
transgressingthe Vitruviancanon of proprietyand mimesis
in representation,late Renaissance artistsrupturedthe con-
tinuity between cinquecento humanism and Roman classi-
cism by liberatingthe free and inventive license that the
grotesque signified.41 Ruskin,unlike our previous litany of
theorists,does not directly returnus to the cave through
Vasari'soriginaryaccount. Rather,he constructsa new defi-
nition of the grotesque and its concomitant vines that dis-
places it from the grotto and locates it in ornament covering
the building's faqade.And yet, by examining the mouth of
the head on Santa Maria Formosa,the Venetians, as well as
Ruskin, entered a similar passagespiralingdownwardinto
118

the forbiddendepthsof the mind.Ruskin,likeVitruvius-
who disparages "slenderstalkswithheadsof men andof
animalsattachedto halfthe body"- lamentsthatgro-
tesqueornamentis the fruitof greatmindswho "candraw
the humanheadperfectly" yet "cutit offandhangit by the
hairat the end of a garland"(11: 170).42Despitesuchpro-
testsagainstthe dismemberedandhybridbody,the disturb-
ing awarenessthata fragmented,ratherthanwhole,body
hasalwayslurkedwithinthe classicaltemplecontaminates
bothRuskin'sandVitruvius's treatises.43Whenthisorna-
mentbeginsto showitsteethor to overflowbeyonditstoler-
atedcavityas a libidinousbodydrunkfromgrapevinesthat
chokethe edifice,when it is too full to be containedand
burstsforthin unrestrained fecundity,then the cracksof ar-
chitecturedilateandthe grotesquepresentsitsbrownand
bloodyheadin an originarymomentno longerstable,
clean,or progressive.
Singley
Notes
1. Vitruvius On Architecture,trans.
Frank Granger (New York:Putnam,
1934), 105. On the style of painting
Vitruvius describes, see Frances K.
Barasch,The Grotesque:A Study in
Meanings (The Hague: Mouton,
1971). Barasch explains the termi-
nology of Pompeiian wall paintings:
"The Ornate style, which Vitruvius
condemned, preceded the fantastic
style known today as the Grotesque,
the Fantastic, or the Intricate Style.
Until the nineteenth century, both
Augustan and Titus fantastic styles
were regardedas one. Eighteenth-
and nineteenth-century restorations
at Pompeii and Herculaneum and
certain remarksin Vitruvius en-
abled August Mau and others to
identify four stages in the ancient
art of Rome as well as Pompeii: 1)
The IncrustationStyle, c. second
century B.c.; 2) The Architectural
Style, c. first century B.C.; 3) The
Ornate Style ('LandscapeStyle' in
Granger'stranslationof Vitruvius),
which overlapped the second mid-
Augustan period to A.D. 63; this was
Vitruvius'period; 4) The Fantastic
or Intricate Style, A.D. 63-79." Cf.
Eugenie Strong,Art in Ancient
Rome (New York, 1899). Nine-
teenth-century art historiansAlfred
Woltmann and KarlWoermann fa-
vor the term grotesquefor the third
style: "Most . . . of the painting of
Herculaneum and Pompeii exhibit
... the later grotesque style with
which Vitruvius finds fault so bit-
terly"(quoted in Barasch,The Gro-
tesque, 29).
2. Suetonius, Historyof the Twelve
Casars, trans. Philemon Holland
(1606; reprint, New York:AMS
Press, 1967), 2: 124-25.
3. Giorgio Vasari, Lives of the Most
Eminent Painters,Sculptorsand Ar-
119
chitects, trans. Gaston du C. de
Vere, 10 vols. (London: Philip Lee
Warner, 1912-15), 8: 75.
4. As cited by Ewa Kuryluk,Salome
and Judas in the Cave of Sex: The
Grotesque:Origins, Iconography,
Techniques (Evanston:Northwest-
ern University Press, 1987), 105.
Also see John Serle, A Plan of Mr.
Pope's Garden (Berkeley:University
of California Press, 1982). On
Pope's grotto as an optical device,
see JurgisBaltru•aitis,Aberrations:
An Essay on the Legend of Forms,
trans. Richard Miller (Cambridge,
Mass.:The MIT Press, 1989).
Kurylukcites another description of
Pope's grotto by "an observerfrom
Newcastle":"To multiply this Di-
versity,and still more increase the
Delight, Mr. Pope's poetick Genius
has introduced a kind of Machin-
ery, which performsthe same Part
in the Grotto that supernal Powers
and incorporeal Beings act in the
heroick Species of Poetry:This is
effected by disposing Plates of
Looking glass in the obscure Parts
of the Roof and Sides of the Cave,
where a sufficient Force of Light is
wanting to discover the Deception,
while the other Parts,the Rills,
Fountains, Flints, Pebbles, &c.
being duly illuminated, are so
reflected by the various posited
Mirrors,as, without exposing the
Cause, every Object is multiplied,
and its Position represented in a
surprisingDiversity. Cast your Eyes
upward, and you half shudder to see
Cataractsof Water Precipitating
over your head, from impending
Stones and Rocks, while salient
Spouts rise in rapid Streams at your
Feet: Around, you are equally sur-
prised with flowing Rivulets and
rolling Waters, that rush over airey
Precipices, and breakamongst
Heaps of ideal Flints and Spar.

Thus, by a fine Taste and happy
Management of Nature, you are
presented with an indistinguishable
Mixture of Realities and Imagery"
(105-6).
5. Johann Joachim Winckelmann,
Winckelmann:Writingson Art, ed.
David Irwin (London: Phaidon,
1972), 84-85.
6. The Worksof John Ruskin, ed.
E. T. Cook and AlexanderWedder-
burn, 39 vols. (London: George
Allen, 1904), 11: 161-62. Subse-
quent references in the text to
Ruskin'swritingswill be to the vol-
ume and page numbers of the Li-
braryEdition.
7. Mikhail Bakhtin, Rabelais and
His World,trans. Hel1ne Iswolsky
(Bloomington: Indiana University
Press, 1984), 31-32. Bakhtin con-
tinues: "Whatis the characterof
these ornaments?They impressed
the connoisseurs by the extremely
fanciful, free, and playful treatment
of plant, animal, and human forms.
These forms seemed to be interwo-
ven as if giving birth to each other.
The borderlines that divide the
kingdoms of nature in the usual
picture of the world were boldly in-
fringed. Neither was there the usual
static presentation of reality.There
was no longer the movement of fin-
ished forms, vegetable or animal, in
a finished stable world; instead the
inner movement of being itself was
expressedin the passing of one
form into the other, in the ever
incompleted characterof being.
This ornamental interplayrevealed
an extreme lightness and freedom
of artisticfantasy,a gay, almost
laughing, libertinage. The gay tone
of the new ornament was grasped
and brilliantly rendered by Raphael
and his pupils in their grotesque
decoration of the Vatican loggias"
(32).
8. Manfredo Tafuri, Theoriesand
Historyof Architecture,trans.
Giorgio Verrecchia (New York:
Harperand Row, 1980), 17.
9. MarkTaylor, "Nuclear Architec-
ture or Fabulous Architecture or
Tragic Architecture or Dionysian
Architectureor ..., Assemblage
11 (April 1990): 14. Taylor applies
his theory of the grotesque archi-
tectural body to the work of Peter
Eisenman, writing that "Eisenman's
gaping architecture - like all such
gaps - is grotesque. . Does this
...
grotesque other have anything to do
with a tomb or crypt?"(14).
10. Jennifer Bloomer, Architecture
and the Text:The (S)cryptsof Joyce
and Piranesi (New Haven: Yale
UniversityPress, 1993), 49.
11. Vasari,Lives, 5: 229. Vasarialso
writes:"He was a melancholy per-
son, and was constantly studying
the antiquities;and seeing among
them sections of vaults and ranges
of walls adorned with grotesques, he
liked these so much that he never
ceased from examining them
....
He was never tired, indeed, of ex-
all that he could find be-
amining
low the ground in Rome in the way
of ancient grottoes,with vaults in-
numerable" (227).
12. On the origins of the grotesque,
see also Geoffrey Galt Harpham,
On the Grotesque:Strategiesof
Contradictionin Art and Literature
(Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 1982), 27. Harphamwrites:
"More because of the setting than
because of any qualities inherent in
the designs themselves, a consensus
soon emerged according to which
the designs were called grottesche
- of or pertaining to underground
caves. Like Vitruvius'sjudgment,
this naming is a mistake pregnant
with truth, for although the designs
assemblage 32
were never intended to be under-
ground, nor Nero's palace a grotto,
the word is perfect. The Latin form
of grotta is probablycrupta (cf.
'crypt'),which in turn derives form
the Greek Krupth,a vault; one of
the cognates is Krupteig,'to hide.'
Grotesque,then, gathers into itself
suggestions of the underground, of
burial, and of secrecy" (27).
13. By architecturalorigins I am, in
part, invoking Abb6 Laugier'slittle
rustic hut and his dismissal of the
cave. Laugier writes:"The savage,
in his leafy shelter, does not know
how to protect himself from the un-
comfortable damp that penetrates
everywhere;he creeps into a nearby
cave and, finding it dry, he praises
himself for his discovery. But soon
the darknessand foul air surround-
ing him make his stay unbearable
again" (Marc-AntoineLaugier,
An Essay on Architecture,trans.
Wolfgang Herrmann [Los Angeles:
Hennessey and Ingalls, 1977], 11).
On the symbolic relationship be-
tween the cave and the female
body, Kurylukwrites:"The Euro-
pean symbolism of the cave as a
dwelling-place of mythical feminin-
ity, personifyingfertilityand regen-
eration of earth and water, was
established in Greece . . . Homer
speaks of the elemental architecture
created by nature and of life origi-
nating from it. His image inspires
endless fantasy,as in Porphyrius's
extensive commentary on the cave
of naiads in the Odyssey.The
length of this mystical text conveys
the significance Porphyriusattrib-
uted to the grotto as a metaphor for
the spirit of the earth and the mys-
teries of procreation.The luminous
gods, incarnationsof sunlight and
reason, visit the cave, but its perma-
nent inhabitantsare the shadow,
the unconscious, and the female.
Nature is a she and in her subterra-
120
nean chambers dwell all great god-
desses, like Venus and Diana
(Salome and Judas in the Cave of
Sex, 100). Kurylukalso explains
that "the shell is one of the em-
blems of the grotesque, not only in
architecture but also in the decora-
tive arts.The predilection for it re-
flects both its inherent qualities and
the universal reverie provokedby
the miraculous creation of snails,
which produce houses of their own
substance - as if from nothingness.
Being an intimate enclosure, the
shell has been regardedas the sym-
bol of the vagina and the uterus;
hence it can be viewed as a minia-
ture grotto"(103).
14. Ruskin'saccusation of "drunk-
enness" alludes to a set of icono-
graphic relationshipsbetween
grotesque vines and ripe grapes that
Stephen Bann, The True Vine: On
Visual Representationand the West-
ern Tradition(Cambridge:Cam-
bridge University Press, 1989),
outlines beautifully: "Grapesare
the origin of one of the most preva-
lent myths about representationin
the West: the storyof the Greek
painter Zexius, whose skill was so
great than even the birdsflew down
to peck at the deceptive patches of
pigment crafted by his brush"(6).
He continues: "the motif of the
grape vine, in its infinite varietyof
decorative uses, seems to concretize
in a particularway the quality of
being 'present in sensuous abun-
dance.' This feature can be traced
in the painted designs of the Greek
and Etruscan potteryof the ancient
world, where there is often a precise
painterly expressionof the exuber-
ance of the vine motif. (Exuber-
ance, we might note, is a word
related etymologically to uber, the
Latin word meaning 'abundant.')"
(7). And finally: "The representa-
tion of the grape, differentiated

from the remaining iconography by
its materialityand (almost) its li-
quidity, suggests an implicit met-
onymic connection between the
container and the contained - be-
tween the dots and pools of pig-
ment and the invigoratingflow of
wine" (8).
15. Samuel Rogers, "Italy,"in The
Poetical Worksof Rogers,Campbell,
J.Montgomery(Philadelphia: J.
Grigg, 1836), 51. Rogers devotes a
section of this poem to "The Brides
of Venice." The phrases I am quot-
ing come from a passage that reads:
At noon, a distant murmur through
the crowd,
Rising and rolling on, announced
their coming;
And never from the first was to be
seen
Such splendor or such beauty. Two
and two
(The richest tapestryunrol'd before
them),
First came the Brides in all their
loveliness;
Each in her veil, and by two bride-
maids follow'd,
Only less lovely, who behind her bore
The precious casketsthat within
contain'd
The dowry and the presents. On
she moved,
her eyes cast down, and holding in
her hand
A fan, that gently waved, of ostrich-
feathers.
Her veil, transparentas the
gossamer,
Fell from beneath a starrydiadem;
And on her dazzling neck a jewel
shone,
Ruby or diamond or darkamethyst;
A jewell'd chain, in many a wind-
ing wreath,
Wreathing her gold brocade.
16. While Ruskin translatescasseleri
into the building trades, the other
possible translationof the word as
"casketmakers"suggests my men-
tioning Freud's essay "The Theme
of the Three Caskets"of 1913 (in
Sigmund Freud, Collected Papers,
ed. and trans. James Strachey, vol. 4
[London: Hogarth Press, 1950]).
This storyinvolves a scene from
Shakespeare'sThe Merchant of
Venice in which Portia'ssuitor will
be determined by his proper selec-
tion of a casket containing her
portrait.As Freud points out,
Shakespeareborrowsthis storyof
weddings and chests from a tale in
the Gesta Romanorum.Of the three
men selecting between three cas-
kets in Shakespeare'stale, Freud
writes:"Ifwe had to do with a
dream, it would occur at once to
us that caskets are also women,
symbols of the essential thing in
woman, and therefore of a woman
herself, like boxes, large or small,
baskets,and so on" (245-56). Refer-
ring to the three sisters in King
Lear, Freud concludes his analysis
of the caskets:"One might say that
the three inevitable relations man
has with woman are here repre-
sented: that with the mother who
bears him, with the companion of
his bed and board, and with the
destroyer.Or it is the three forms
taken on by the figure of the
mother as life proceeds: the mother
herself, the beloved who is chosen
after her pattern, and finally the
Mother Earth who receives him
again" (256).
17. EdwardMuir, Civic Ritual in
Renaissance Venice (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1981),
135. As Muir clarifies, this legend,
or fabrication, explained a preexist-
ing ritual:"In the fifteenth and six-
teenth centuries it was generally
believed that the annual ceremo-
nies at the church of Santa Maria
Formosa had begun in the tenth
Singley
century as a celebration of a victory
over pirates.An anonymous
chronicle composed at the end of
the fifteenth century, perhaps the
most detailed account of the leg-
end, claims that since 'ancient
times' on January31, the day of the
transferof Saint Mark,the prince
and commune gave dowries to and
sponsored weddings for twelve de-
serving but poor young girls in a
ceremony conducted by the Bishop
at his cathedral of San Pietro di
Castello. One year a group of
Triestine pirates, tempted by the
girls, their dowries, and the gems
with which the prince adorned
them for the occasion, stole their
way into the cathedral;after attack-
ing and wounding or killing many
of the assembled worshippers,the
pirates fled the cathedral with the
bejeweled brides and their dowry
boxes, escaping aboardboats they
had hidden outside. Quickly assem-
bling a fleet, the Venetian menfolk
pursued them to a small port near
Caorle - to this day called the
Porto delle Donzelle - where the
Triestines had anchored to divide
the spoils. First to board the pirate
craft, the casseleri (either cabinet-
makersor carpenters)of the parish
of Santa Maria Formosa fought
valiantly, killed all the Triestines,
threw the corpses without cere-
mony into the sea, and burned the
ships. Returning with brides,
dowries, and treasuresintact, the
casseleriwon honors for the victory,
which occurred on February2, the
day of the Purification of the Vir-
gin, or Candlemas. To rewardthe
casselerithe doge agreed that he
and his successors would visit Santa
Maria Formosa each year following
vespers on the eve of the Purifica-
tion and for mass of the feast day
itself' (135-56).
18. Ibid., 137.
121
19. Ibid., 140. Also see Tony
Tanner, Venice Desired (Oxford:
Blackwell, 1992). As Tanner ob-
serves, "a fiercely intransigent
Protestantat the time, Ruskin was
constantly having trouble with the
Mariolatry(indeed the female al-
together) and more generally the
undeniable fact that it was Catholi-
cism which had inspired or inform-
ed much of the art and architecture
he most admired (while Protestant-
ism seemed to nourish little or
none)" (94). Given this bias, Muir's
observationsregardingthe cult
of Mary in Venice will help to
account for Ruskin'sposition
regardingSanta Maria Formosa.
Muir explains that "the Venetians,
indeed, assiduouslyvenerated the
Virgin Mary. Her cult was so popu-
lar and so ancient that, like many
other cities, Venice was often iden-
tified as the city of the Virgin." He
also writes that "the Festival of the
Marysparaphrasedthe peculiar
status of women in trecento Vene-
tian society. In two recent articles
Stanley Chojnacki has shown that
women, especially patrician ladies,
had a distinctive and importantso-
cial and economic influence that
contributed to the harmony and
stabilityof Venetian society. In a
patrician regime such as that of
Venice, a complex of attitudes,legal
precepts, and rules of inheritance
served to protect the patriline as the
foundation of society. In Venice a
woman had a 'curious status':she
was exiled from the patriline when
she received her dowry - in theory
her share of the patrimony - so
that the absence of an obligatory
orientation towardher paternalkin
permitted her to mediate between
two patrilines allied through her in
marriage.Thus, women contrib-
uted, in particular,to the strength
and stabilityof the patriciateby

bonding together variouspatrician
lineages. Moreover, through their
ability to make bequests, dispose of
their own dowries in their wills, and
invest independently in business,
women were able to exert psycho-
logical pressureon their male kin
and to expresspersonal preferences
without regardto lineage" (Civic
Ritual in RenaissanceVenice, 150-
51).
20. In the entry on the Ospadeletto
Church in the "Index"to The
Stones, Ruskin writes:"The most
monstrous example of the Gro-
tesque Renaissance which there is
in Venice; the sculptures on its
faqade representingmasses of dis-
eased figures and swollen fruit. It is
almost worth devoting an hour to
the successive examination of five
buildings, as illustrativeof the last
degradationof the Renaissance. S.
Moist is the most clumsy, S. Maria
Zobenigo the most impious, S.
Eustachio the most ridiculous, the
Ospadeletto the most monstrous,
and the head at S. Maria Formosa
the most foul" (11: 397). Also see
Arnold Whittick, ed., Ruskin's
Venice (London: George Godwin,
1976), 195-56.
21. In volume two, "The Sea Sto-
ries,"chapter six, "The Nature of
Gothic," of The Stones, Ruskin of-
fers a hierarchyfor the "charac-
teristic or moral elements" of the
Gothic building as: 1. savageness,2.
changefulness, 3. naturalism,4. gro-
tesqueness, 5. rigidity,and 6. redun-
dancy (11: 79). To this he adds the
qualities of the Gothic builder: 1.
savagenessor rudeness, 2. love of
change, 3. love of nature, 4. dis-
turbed imagination, 5. obstinacy,
and 6. generosity. Thus the gro-
tesque and a disturbedimagination
are aligned. While he carefully ex-
plains what he means by each of
these separatecharacteristics,when
he arrivesat the grotesque he
writes:"The fourth essential ele-
ment of the Gothic mind was above
stated to be the sense of the GRO-
TESQUE; but I shall endeavor to
define this most curious and subtle
characteruntil we have occasion to
examine one of the divisions of the
Renaissance schools, which was
morbidly influenced by it. It is the
less necessaryto insist upon it, here,
because every readerfamiliar with
Gothic architecture must under-
stand what I mean, and will, I
believe, have no hesitation in ad-
mitting that the tendency to delight
in the fantastic and ludicrous, as
well as in sublime, images, is a
universal instinct of the Gothic
imagination"(11: 203). It is impor-
tant to note that Ruskin is attracted
to the grotesque of the Gothic pe-
riod: "There is jest - perpetual,
careless, and not infrequently ob-
scene - in the most noble workof
the Gothic periods; and it becomes,
therefore, of the greatestpossible
importance to examine into the na-
ture and essence of the Grotesque
itself, and to ascertain in what re-
spect it is that the jesting of art in its
highest flight, differsfrom its jesting
in its utmost degradation"(11:113).
Also see BarbaraMaria Stafford,
"'IlliterateMonuments': The Ruin
as Dialectic of Broken Classic," The
Age of Johnson.Staffordobserves,
"Especially noteworthyis Ruskin's
construct of the naturalgrotesque
which for him is close to a total,
comprehensive art capable of bring-
ing into conjunction the multiple
oppositions of the world:the one
with the many, the divine with the
monstrous"(3).
22. Similarly, on Ruskin'srelation-
ship with Venice, Tanner writes in
Venice Desired: "In Venice with his
young wife, Effie, their marriage
assemblage 32
unconsummated, his abstinence
could hardly be furtherfrom
Byron'sdissipation. Whereas Effie
enjoyed the available social life,
Ruskin preferredto avoid it and at-
tended on sufferance, suffering. His
business was with those under-canal
vaults and mud-buried porticoes. I
might have said his assignation -
for Ruskin seems to have literally
crawled and climbed over the
whole ruined body of a city; peering
with his incomparable eye into ev-
ery darkened nook and cranny, high
and low; gently picking over the
abandoned stones of decaying pal-
aces; gliding into and down the
darkestand dingiest canals. It
would be too easy and not particu-
larly illuminating to talk of a mas-
sive displacement of the activities of
the marriagebed into the explora-
tion of the city. But, if the word
means anything at all, there can be
no doubt that Ruskin'smost intense
love-affairwas with Venice, and his
writingsabout her from the first to
last manifest, at their extreme, the
positive and negative efflorescences
of the unresting desire which the
very idea, image, memory of the
city aroused in him" (68-69).
23. Ibid., 72, 81.
24. Bann, The True Vine, 28, 39.
25. Julia Kristeva,Powersof Horror:
An Essay in Abjection,trans. Leon
S. Roudiez (New York:Columbia
UniversityPress, 1982), 40. Kristeva
develops this concept when describ-
ing a little girl, frightened of being
eaten up by a dog, who spoke more
intensely the more frightened she
became. Kristevawrites:"Through
the mouth that I fill with words
instead of my mother whom I
miss from now on more than ever,
I elaborate that want, and the
agressivitythat accompanies it by
saying. It turns out that, under the
122
circumstances, oral activity,which
produces that linguistic signifier,
coincides with the theme of devour-
ing, which the 'dog' metaphor has a
first claim on. But one is rightfully
led to suppose that any verbalizing
activity, whether or not it names a
phobic object related to orality, is
an attempt to introject the incorpo-
rated items. In that sense, verbaliza-
tion has alwaysbeen confronted
with the 'ab-ject'that the phobic
object is" (41).
With the grotesquewe find a de-
vouring architecture - what Pirro
Ligorio refersto as la insatiabilita
- an architecturethat can con-
sume itself Regardingthis specific
reference and the Renaissance un-
derstandingof the grotesque, see
David Summers, Michelangeloand
the Language of Art (Princeton:
Princeton UniversityPress, 1981).
Summers'sresearchindicates that
the cinquecento attitudetowardthe
grotesquewas by no means uniform;
he discusses the writingsof Ligorio,
Sebastiano Serlio, and G. P. Lomaz-
zo on this subject: "Grotteschi
are made 'to bring amazement
and marvel (stuporeet maraviglia)
to miserable mortals,to signify
as much as may be possible the
pregnancyand fullness of the
intellect and its meanings ... to
accommodate the insatiability(la
insatiabilita) of the variousand
strangeconcetti drawnfrom the so
great varietythat is created in
things.' At the same time, those
'moderns'misunderstandsuch
paintings, who call them merely
'grottescheet insogni et stravaganti
pitture anzi mostruose.'He argues
that they do and should conceal
mysteries;this attempt to give
grotteschian allegorical significance
is at base an attempt to subject them
to decorum. Ligorio generally re-
jects the kind of free and fantastic

construction for which grotteschi
stood; for him, they are not
audaciae, but rathera mode of sym-
bolic thought almost al-
.... Ligorio
ways writes of Michelangelo himself
with respect, but like Vasari in the
second edition, he heaps coals on
the heads of his followers, the
Michelagnolastriwhose license in
both painting and architecturehe
abhors. Ligorio'sattitudestoward
grotteschiand towardthe question
of invention in general were, in
short (at least at the time he wrote)
precisely parallel. The question of
the relation of pure ornamental in-
vention to the invention or allegory
deserves careful separateattention.
In his discussion of grotteschi,Serlio
... stressedfreedom of invention
within definite architecturalframe-
works.Lomazzo . . . stressesin addi-
tion the possibilities for significance
of such inventions, calling them
enigmas, or ciphers, or Egyptian
figures, called hieroglyphics, to sig-
nify some concetto or pensierounder
another form (sotto altre figure), as
we do in emblems and imprese';
grotteschiare most suitable to the
expressionof all meaning because
they include 'tutto quello che si pub
trovareet imaginare'"(496-67).
26. Harpham, On the Grotesque,
31.
27. Immanuel Kant, The Critique
of Judgment,trans. James Creed
Meredith (Oxford:Clarendon
Press, 1989), 173. While the subject
of the grotesque in relation to the
sublime is beyond the scope and in-
tention of this essay, I will offer one
or two observationson this subject
that will help to place Ruskin in
this largertheoretical context.
Ruskin specifically refersto the sub-
lime in his analysisof the grotesque
as a distinct aesthetic category:
"The reader is alwaysto keep in
mind that if the objects of horror,in
which the terrible grotesque finds
its materials, were contemplated in
their true light, and with the entire
energy of the soul, they would cease
to be grotesque, and become alto-
gether sublime" (11: 178). He also
writes:"Now, so far as the truth is
seen by the imagination in its
wholeness and quietness, the vision
is sublime; but so far as it is nar-
rowed and broken by the inconsis-
tencies of the human capacity, it
becomes grotesque"(11:181).
Similarly, Victor Hugo, in Dramas:
Oliver Cromwell(Philadelphia:
George Barrieand Son, 1896), dis-
cusses the close proximitybetween
the grotesque and the sublime: "the
ugly exists beside the beautiful, the
misshapen beside the graceful, the
grotesque beside the sublime, evil
with good, darknesswith light"
(25). But, unlike Ruskin, Hugo sees
this as a necessary and inherent re-
lationship: "modern genius springs
from the fruitful union of the gro-
tesque type and the sublime" (27).
For Hugo, the grotesque serves "as
a glass through which to examine
the sublime, as a means of contrast,
the grotesque is in our judgment,
the richest source of inspiration that
nature can throw open to art"(32).
See also Suzanne Guerlac, The
ImpersonalSublime: Hugo,
Baudelaire, Lautrdamont(Stanford:
StanfordUniversityPress, 1990). It
is, of course, with Kant that the gro-
tesque/sublime receives its philo-
sophical elaboration.As Kant writes
in The Critiqueof Judgment,the
sublime is "a feeling of displeasure,
arising from the inadequacy of the
imagination in the aesthetic estima-
tion of magnitude to attain to its
estimation by reason, and a simulta-
neously awakened pleasure, arising
from this very judgment of the inad-
equacy of the greatestfaculty of
Singley
sense being in accord with ideas of
reason, so far as the effortto attain
these is for us a law" (106). This
pleasure involves the mind set in
motion versus the mind set in rest-
ful contemplation, a movement
comparable to "a vibration, i.e.,
with a rapidlyalternatingrepulsion
and attraction,produced by one
and the same Object" (107). Apro-
pos of Ruskin, Kant discusses the
sensation of sublime fear: "we may
look on an object as fearful, and yet
not be afraidof it" because "one
who is in a state of fear can no more
play the part of a judge in the sub-
lime of nature than one captivated
by inclination and appetite can
of the beautiful" (110). As with
Ruskin, who will distinguish be-
tween the noble and ignoble gro-
tesque in terms of the interested
and the apathetic artisan,Kant
writes:"Everyaffection of the
STRENUOUS TYPE (such, that is,
as excites the consciousness of our
power of overcoming every resis-
tance [animus strenuus])is aesthe-
tically sublime, e.g., anger, even
desperation (the rage of forlornhope
but not faint-hearteddespair). On
the other hand, affection of the
LANGUID TYPE (which converts
the very effortof resistance into
an object of displeasure [animus
languidus]) has nothing noble about
it, though it may take its rank as
possessing beauty of the sensuous
order"(125). Pertinent to Ruskin's
sermonizing, Kant invokes the pri-
mary crisis of representingthe sub-
lime, "perhapsthere is no more
sublime passage in the Jewish law
than the commandment: Thou
shall not make unto thee any
graven image, or any likeness of any
thing that is in heaven or on earth,
or under the earth &c." (127). Kant
explains that this law is based on
the fear that we will fail to ad-
123
equately representthe image and
then render it lifeless and cold.
Kant specifically mentions the gro-
tesque when writing that "thus En-
glish taste in gardens, and fantastic
taste in furniture,push the freedom
of imagination to the verge of what
is grotesque - the idea being that
in this divorce from all constraintof
rules the precise instance is being
affordedwhere taste can exhibit its
perfection in projects of the imagi-
nation to the fullest extent" (88). Fi-
nally, Kant describes an ornamental
motif that fits our earlier descrip-
tions of the grotesque:"So designs
a/
la grecque,foliage for frameworkor
on wall-papers,&c., have no intrin-
sic meaning; they representnothing
- no Object under a definite con-
cept - and are free beauties. We
may also rank in the same class
what in music are called fantasias
(without a theme), and indeed, all
music that is not set to words"(72).
28. Tanner, Venice Desired, also
cites this significant passage in The
Stones, observing that "Ruskinbur-
ies Venice under the Bible, drawing
on scripturalwrath and prophecy to
inscribe at once its damnation and
annihilation" (118).
29. Ruskin takes this line from
canto 9 of Dante's Inferno.The sec-
tion containing this quotation reads
in full: "Andmore he said, but I
have it not in memory, for my eye
had wholly drawn me to the high
tower with the glowing summit,
where all at once three hellish
blood-stained Furies had instantly
risen up. They had the partsand
bearing of women, and they were
girt with greenest hydras.For hair
they had little serpents and cerastes
bound about their savage temples.
And he, who well recognized the
handmaids of the queen of eternal
lamentation, said to me, 'See the

fierce Erinyes!That is Megaera
on the left; she that wails on the
right is Alecto; Tisiphoe is in the
middle'; and with that he was silent.
Each was tearing at her breastwith
her nails; and they were beating
themselves with their hands, and
crying out so loudly that in fear I
pressed close to the poet. 'Let Me-
dusa come and we'll turn him to
stone,' they all cried, looking down-
ward. 'Poorlydid we avenge the as-
sault of Theseus.' 'Turn your back,
and keep your eyes shut; for should
the Gorgon show herself and you
see her, there would be no return-
ing above.' Thus said the master,
and he himself turned me round
and, not trusting to my hands, cov-
ered my face with his own hands as
well. O you who have sound under-
standing, markthe doctrine that is
hidden under the veil of the strange
verses!And now there came over
the turbid waves a crash of fearful
sound, at which both shores
trembled: a sound as of a wind,
violent from conflicting heats,
which strikesthe forest and with
unchecked course shattersthe
branches, beats them down and
sweeps them away, haughtily driv-
ing onward in its cloud of dust and
putting wild beasts and shepherds
to flight" (Dante Alighieri, The Di-
vine Comedy, trans. Charles Single-
ton, vol. 1 [Princeton:Princeton
UniversityPress, 1970], 90-93).
30. Sigmund Freud, "Medusa's
Head" (1922), in Collected Papers,
vol. 5 (London: Hogarth Press,
1952), 105.
31. Ibid., 106. On the 1848 revolu-
tion, see Neil Hertz, "Medusa's
Head: Male HysteriaUnder Politi-
cal Pressure,"in The End of the
Line: Essays on Psychoanalysisand
the Sublime (New York:Columbia
UniversityPress, 1985).
32. Ann Bergren, "Bauboand
Helen: Gender in the Irreparable
Wound," in Drawing, Building,
Text:Essays in ArchitecturalTheory,
ed. Andrea Kahn (New York:
Princeton ArchitecturalPress,
1991), 110.
33. In a footnote to this paragraph,
Ruskin adds: "This opposition of art
to inspirationis long and grace-
fully dwelt upon by Plato, in his
'Phaedrus';using, in the course of
his argument, almost the words of
St. Paul: ... 'It is the testimony of
the ancients that the madnesswhich
is of God is a nobler thing than the
wisdomwhich is of men;' and again,
'He who sets himself to any work
with which the Muses have to do,.
. without madness, thinking that
by art alone he can do his work
sufficiently, will be found vain and
incapable, and the work of temper-
ance and rationalismwill be thrust
aside and obscured by that of
inspiration."'
34. Jean-MartinCharcot and Paul
Richer, Les Difformeset les malades
dans l'art (1889; reprint,Amster-
dam: B. M. Israel, 1972) 1: "Une
tete enorme, inhumaine et
monstrueuse, dit-il, ricanante,
d'une espression qui la ravaleau
niveau de la brute, trop abjecte
pour ^trerepresent&eou d'crite,
et qu'on ne sauraitcontempler au
dela de quelques instants.... On
peut y voir l'indice de cette com-
plaisance Acontempler la degrada-
tion de la brute et l'expressiondu
sarcasmbestial, qui est, je crois,
l'6tat d'espritle plus deplorable oii
l'homme puisse descendre."
35. Georges Didi-Huberman,
"Charcot, l'histoire et l'art:Imita-
tion de la croix et demon de l'imita-
tion," in Jean-MartinCharcot and
Paul Richer, Les Demoniaques dans
l'art (1887; reprint,Paris:Macula,
assemblage 32
1984), 169. Translationfrom the
French by JeffreyBalmer.
36. Charcot, Les Demoniaques, 24
(my emphasis). Debora Silverman's
article on Charcot's "hallucinatory
interior"(filled with arabesques),
"AFin de Si&cleInteriorand the
Psyche: The Soul Box of Dr. Jean-
Martin Charcot,"Daidalos 28
(June 1988), brought my attention
to these comparativeimages. She
writes:"Charcotwas particularly
fascinated by artistic creativity;he
was celebrated by his contemporar-
ies, Sigmund Freud among them,
for transposingartisticcategories to
medicine and for creating a new
visual language of diagnosis. His
yearnings for an artisticcareer were
pressed into the service of his medi-
cal practice . . . Charcot invented a
new visual language for diagnosis,
the 'clinical-picture method', which
was his greatestcontribution as a
clinician" (27).
37. See John Dixon Hunt, The
WiderSea: A Life of John Ruskin
(London: J. M. Dent, 1982). Hunt
explains that the death of Rose La
Touche "only intensified, rather
than mitigated, Ruskin'sobsession:
during the winter of 1876-77 his
study of Carpaccio's St. Ursula
cycle became so entwined with his
thought of Rose that the virgin-
martyrand the Irish girl merged in
his precariouslystable mind" (199).
Ruskin copied the Dream of St.
Ursula that had been put in a spe-
cial room for his disposal. "The
sleeping saint and the 'sleeping'
Rose La Touche merged fitfully
in Ruskin'smind. The painting
seemed so real that he could at
times convince himself that it was
Rose, simply sleeping" (365). This
delusion continued until Rose
actually appeared to Ruskin in a
miraculous apparition.
124
38. Bakhtin, Rabelais and His
World, 313. As Bakhtin argues, all
the features of the human face are
instrumental to the grotesque, "but
the most importantof all human
features is the mouth. It dominates
all else. The grotesque face is actu-
ally reduced to the gaping mouth;
the other featuresare only a frame
encasing this wide-open bodily
abyss"(317). He observesthat the
gaping mouth is related to the lower
bodily stratum,it is "the open gate
leading downwardinto the bodily
underworld.The gaping mouth is
related to the image of swallowing,
this most ancient symbol of death
and destruction.At the same time,
a series of banquet images are also
linked to the mouth" (325). And
once again, "Birthand death are
the gaping jawsof the earth and the
mother's open womb. Further on,
gaping human and animal mouths
will enter into the picture" (329).
39. In of terms the vaginal orifice
and the spoken word, Bakhtin also
mentions Denis Diderot's Les
Bijoux indiscrets,a story in which
women's vaginas literally speak of
their sexual secrets. The English
translationof Diderot's work, The
IndiscreetJewels,takes us back to
the gems adorning the brides, as
well as their little boxes, as met-
onymical references to their
anatomy.
40. Walter Benjamin, The Origin of
German Tragic Drama, trans. John
Osborne (New York:Verso, 1977),
171. Benjamin is referringto a sec-
tion in the Natural Historywhere
Pliny writes:"On the other hand, 'A
picture by Serapio,' saysVarro, 'cov-
ered the whole of the Maenian Bal-
conies at the place beneath the Old
Shops.' Serapio was a most success-
ful scene-painter, but he could not
paint a human being" (Natural
 Singley

History, trans. H. Rackman [Cam- thropomorphic analogy to the or-

bridge, Mass.: HarvardUniversity ders; he describes an architecture of
Press, 1912], bk. 35, 113). multiple, ornamental bodies.
41. Also see Barasch,The Gro-
tesque:"By 1524, grotteschebecame
associated with anti-Vitruvianism. Figure Credits
The fantastic style was clearly a de- Engravingsfrom Jean-MartinChar-
viation from classical conceptions of cot and Paul Richer, Les Difformes
et les malades dans l'art (1889;
reality, from the perfected forms of
the ancients which had their basis reprint,Amsterdam:B. M. Israel,
in nature, and from the standardof 1972).
moral and philosophical simplicity Photographsby Paulette Singley.
by Vitruvius"(30). In comparison to
the Vitruvian point of view, Barasch
sets up Vasari as his theoretical
counterpart:"The Vasarianposi-
tion, which many of his readers
held, was essentially this: The mas-
ters of the fourteenth century (the
second age of painting) had intro-
duced rule, order, proportion,
draughtsmanship,and manner, and
in so doing had rendered a great
service to the progressof painting,
but in the third and greatestage of
painters, architects, and sculptors,
the artists'seeing excavated out of
the earth certain antiquities' were
able to attain the perfection of the
arts"(31). This perfection consisted
of accepting freedom within the
rules.
42. Ruskin writes:"Ifwe can draw
the human head perfectly, and are
mastersof its expression and its
beauty, we have no business to cut
it off, and hang it up by the hair at
the end of a garland. If we can draw
the human body in the perfection
of its grace and movement, we have
no business to take away its limbs,
and terminate it with a bunch of
leaves."
43. Indeed, without exactly saying
so, Vitruvius actually licenses this
contamination when he inscribes
the well-built male body in a circle
and simultaneously extends the an-

125