My painted self-portraits in the style of Van Gogh

The assignment this time was to make two self-portraits in the style of Van Gogh in which I had to express two different emotions. I have chosen for the emotions mad and sad, because I thought these emotions were very different from each other. 

Van Gogh had two essential qualities: his brush strokes and his use of complementary colours. I tried to add these two aspects in my painting as well.


I started with the background of both the two self-portraits. The emotion sad always reminds me of rain. So, I wanted to let the background looks like rain. I did this by painting all the brushstrokes pointed downwards and by using blue and grey as colours, because rain always falls down and looks a bit of blue and grey. The emotion mad always reminds me of a confused person. So, I painted the brushstrokes in different directions, because I thought that looked confused. I have chosen for some darker colour to express mad in the background.

After I had painted the backgrounds, I painted the clothes. I tried to add some colours of the background in the clothes. So, I used the grey of the sad emotions in the clothes and the red of the mad emotion.

Then I painted my hair. I did this the same in both the paintings. I have blond hair, so in the painted I tried to use colours which looked like that. I painted the brushstrokes  in a bow around my face.

After I had painted my hair, I painted my skin. I tried to use skin colours.

Then I had to paint the details of my face and the shadows. I only didn't had enough time for this, so I have one face which is half done and on the other painting I haven't got a face at all. (My idea was to use the colours of the background in the shadows.)

My self-portrait

I had to make a self-portrait using a little mirror, so I would draw myself in the way in which I saw myself. I could make it with only a grey pencil or with either a grey pencil and colour pencils. I choose to use only a grey pencil, because I thought that would look nicer.

First, I started with drawing the form of my face. Then I drew my neck and shoulders. After I made this, I situated a horizontal and a vertical line in the middle of my face. Then I drew the outlines of my eyes on the vertical line. After this, I situated another vertical line in between the first vertical line and the bottom of my face. I drew outside lines of my nose just above this line. Then I situated another vertical line in between the last vertical line and the bottom of my face. I drew the outside lines of my mouth just above this line. 

After this, I could draw all the details of my face in my self-portrait. In my eyes I drew the iris and the pupil and I gave them eyelashes as well. Above my eyes I drew the eyebrows. Then I made the details at my nose. I tried to make some shadows on both sides of my nose. Below my nose, above my mouth, I made a kind of shadow as well. I made my lips a bit darker and gave it little cracks. Below my mouth I draw a little shadow for my chin. 

After I had drawn my face, I drew my hair. I did this by drawing a lot of little hairs next to each other. I tried to make it look realistic by making my hair a bit lighter on top of my head.

My drawing which I made when I was four years old

For this assignment I had to find a drawing which I made when I was between four and six years old. After that, I had to write a little report about what I had actually drawn.

I have chosen this drawing. I made the drawing in December 2002, when I was four, almost five, years old. The drawing is about St. Nicholas.

On the drawing, you can see St. Nicholas in the middle. I think the shape of his body looks kind of like the body of a butterfly. However, I did coloured the body in the right colour; red. I gave him one long and one short leg with both five fingers. He has got two arms as well. One of them has five fingers and the other one has seven fingers. Counting was clearly too hard for me when I was little. His head has two eyes, a nose and a mouth. I have not drawn his neck and ears. He looks a bit afraid. As assecoires I gave him his typical mitre with a cross and his staff.

On the right of St. Nicholas, I have drawn his assistent; 'Zwarte Piet'. Zwarte Piet is wearing a brown dress with a big dot in the middle. I am not so sure why I drew this dot. He has got two egual legs, but on one foot there are five toes and on the other foot I drew six toes. Apparently, I wanted to erase the six toes with my pencil, so now there are some strapes at the sixth toe. However, on both of his hands there are five fingers. His head has got two eyes a nose, a mouth, curly hair and even two very big ears. I did forgot the neck. As assecoires I gave him his sack in which he carries his typical Dutch 'pepernoten'.

On the left of St. Nicholas, I have drawn his horse Amerigo. Amerigo is purple and misses two of his legs. He misses his tail as well. On his head, he has got four long hairs. He looks a kind of curious.

I drew the background, too. On the top left, I drew a blue cloud and on the top right I drew a sun. I tried to write the word sun next to it in Dutch, zon, but I was obviously not great at spelling so I mixed up a letter and not it says 'son'.

I liked to write about this drawing. I think nobody or at least me, can not draw very well when he or she is little and that is why I am glad that the teacher wrote next to it what I had actually drawn.

My painting of Green Wheat Field with Cypress by Vincent van Gogh

In this assignment I had to draw a painting. It had to chose a painting made by Vincent van Gogh. It had to be a painting he drew in the impressionism style. Moreover, it had to be one of his paintings which wasn't very famous. I've chose the painting Green Wheat Field with Cypress, because I liked the colours and the landscape. (There's more informations about this painting and about why I've chosen this painting in my report of Green Wheat Field with Cypress by Vincent van Gogh on this blog!)

After I'd chosen a painting, I could start. First of all, I made a quick sketch. I drew the shapes of the cypress, the little houses and the scrubbery. Due to this, I knew the location of the objects in the painting. After this I could already start painting.

First of all, I painted the sky and the clouds. Second of all, I painted the cypress and the scrubbery in front of the sky. After this, I painted the wheat field. At last, I painted the scrubbery in front of the wheat field.

The colours of paint which I used for this painting were yellow, red, blue (light and dark), white, black and brown. For the other colours I had to mix. So, to get green I had to mix yellow and blue. In this way, I could make a lot of different kinds of green.

Then was the result:

My report of la préfecture du Nord de Lille

                                                               
              la préfecture du Nord de Lille

                                                               Simone Ruiter

T2B

25/05/2012

Introduction

On Friday, the 27^th of April 2012, I went to Lille. Lille is a city in France, near the border with Belgium. I went together with my classmates and the other second classes. In groups we had to do a search. Due to this, we saw a lot of Lille and during our search we passed a lot of beautiful buildings. The aim of this report is to write about one building from Lille. I have chosen ´La Préfecture du Nord de Lille´. This is a building on the Place de la République, opposite La Palais des Beaux Arts. I choose this building, because it was the first building we saw while we went out of the metro. It was very huge, impressive and nicely decorated that you needed to look at it.

What is ´La Préfecture du Nord de Lille´?

La Préfecture du Nord de Lille is a prefecture. A prefecture is the place where the head of the police is situated. France is divided in 27 regions, which are a kind of provinces. These regions are in total subdivided in 101 departments. La prefecture du Nord de Lille is nowadays the boss of all the police-stations in two departments; Nord and Pas de Calais. These two departments form the region Nord-Pas de Calais. Lille is situated in the department Nord. Owning to this, the building is now called ´La prefecture du Nord de Lille´.

The building of La Prefecture du Nord de Lille

In 1865 there was a competition held in Lille about whose design for this building was the best. The architect Charles Hammer won. However, he didn’t design everything of the building. The garden is designed by George Aumont.

The whole building is made of limestone, just like a lot of buildings in Lille. From the outside I could already see that the building was old.

I could see that the walls were constructed with bricks and very precise masonry. The construction workers used the ‘Lillois-style’. Early 1800 it was forbidden to build wooden buildings in Lille, because they were not safe enough. That is why a lot of buildings, also the prefecture, are built from limestone. La Préfecture du Nord de Lille is built on poles, owning to the fact that there was an unstable ground.

The size of La Préfecture du Nord de Lille

La Préfecture du Nord de Lille is built in an H-form. Both the length and the width are around 93 meters long. The building is four floors high and has in the middle another dome on top of it. In total the building has a surface area of approximately 6600 square meters.  The height of the building without the dome is around 20 meters. The dimensions of this building make it one of the biggest buildings of Lille.

                                   

The decorations of La Prefecture du Nord de Lille

The building is, especially on the outside, beautifully decorated. The most decorations are carvings and statues in the walls. The decorations are designed by Felix Huidiez. The most decorations are on the upper side of the building and above the windows. Both on the left and the right side of the front façade above the windows you can see a triangle and statue angels.

Personally, I like the decoration in the middle of the building, under the little dome, the most. There is a clock surrounded by a lot of precise carvings in the form of plants and flowers. Moreover, above the clock there is a bow filled with decorations. There are a crown and a lion underneath it.

Function of the building

From the outside of the building I could not tell what kind of a building it was. I thought it was something like a palace of someone. However, the building was meant to be a prefecture. It had always been one, but in the past it had other functions, too. It was also like a little hotel for VIP-guests, the guards and the family of the guards. In 1855 the gardens were built for the ‘Universal Exhibition of 1855’. Nowadays the gardens are just to enjoy the view.

The surrounding of La Prefecture du Nord de Lille

Owning to the fact that the building is built in the same style as the rest of the buildings in Lille, the ‘Lillois-style’, the building fits with the surrounding. This building belongs in Lille. It is still a special building of Lille, because it is one of the biggest buildings in Lille. This makes the building very remarkable.

My opinion about La Prefecture du Nord de Lille

To sum up, I think the building is very intriguing, a kind of creative, a kind of original, very old fashioned and very beautiful. I found it intriguing, because it is so big. It is even bigger when you know that there are another two arms on the back of the building. I think the size of the building makes it really fascinating. Moreover, I think the building is a kind of creative and original due to its shape. This is the only building I ever saw in an H-shape and I think that that it makes it very special. I think the building looks old fashioned, too, but that is not really strange because it is an old building.

I think the buildings which are built nowadays do not have so much decorations. The decorations make the building look old fashioned, but very beautiful, too. I think it is amazing that people can make such a precise sculptures.

Conclusion

I liked it to do my report about La Prefecture du Nord de Lille. I found it very fascinating that the building is in the form of an H and that it is so large. I wouldn’t have thought that when I stood in front of it.

List of resources

Websites:

-      http://www.google.com/earth/index.html

-      http://maps.google.nl/maps?hl=nl&ie=UTF-8&tab=wl

-      http://www.flickr.com/photos/racheldancer/460085904/

-      http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Prefecture_of_Lille,_Detail593.jpg

-      http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pr%C3%A9fectureLilleFL_2008_D%C3%A9tail596.jpg

-      http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pr%C3%A9fecture_de_Lille

-      http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:France_departements_regions_narrow.jpg

-      http://www.reizen-ts.net/PGM/REIS/Lille.htm

My report of Green Wheat Field with Cypress from Vincent van Gogh

Green Wheat Field with Cypress

By Vincent van Gogh

Simone Ruiter

T2B

03/05/2012

Introduction

For this assignment of arts I could choose a painting myself, but it had to be by Vincent van Gogh. I have chosen the painting titled ´Green wheat field with cypresses´. The painting is made by Vincent van Gogh in the year 1889. I have chosen this painting, because it is the painting which I am drawing at this very moment as an assignment of art, too. There are several reasons why I like this painting.

First of all, it reminds me of the spring due to all of the green in this painting. Personally, the spring is my favourite season. I think it is worth remembering all those green out of the painting.

Secondly, I like the small house in the back of the painting. I think it is the kind of house where a grandmother could live and where everybody is welcome.

Finally, I think it is just beautifully painted.

About Vincent van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh was born on 13^th March 1953 in Zundert. He grew up as a shy boy and went, due to not having enough money, to four different schools. On the age of sixteen he started working at ‘Goupil & Cie’, the art gallery which used to be from his uncle. Here he felt in love with the daughter of his hostess. Unfortunately, she was already engaged. This was the beginning of Van Gogh’s depression.

In 1880 he got impressed by the painters Rembrandt and Millet and he started drawing. One year later he got painting lessons from his nephew Anton Mauve. In the next ten years he made all of his paintings. He dreamed of being in an artist’s group. He wanted to gather people around him and his friend Paul Gauguin, but nobody wanted in a group with them. They used both the specific trend in art called post-impressionism. This was a major art event at this time. Actually, Vincent van Gogh did belong to an artist’s group; the post-impressionists. They all experimented with impressionism, but they didn’t have the same subjects, or the same characteristics. In the beginning of this period he had a wife,  Christine Hoornik. However, she was an alcoholic and a prostitute and they broke up. She got a son in 1882, but it is never proved to be from Vincent van Gogh. On 29 July 1890, aged 37, Vincent died in Auvers-sur-Oise. They think that he has commit suicide by shooting himself in his chest, but this is never proved.

About the painting

From top to bottom, about one third of the painting is the sky. The sky is bright blue with a lot of sharp white spots (clouds). On the left side, in the middle of the air, there are three big, bold clouds. The clouds are white with stripes in the same blue colour of the sky in which they are. Underneath the bright blue sky there is a little haze of dark blue sky. Beneath this haze, there is dark green shrubbery spread all over the painting. Left, just slightly away from the edge, there is a big bunch of plants, which are almost touching the three clouds. In the middle of the shrubbery, actually a little bit to the left, there is a big cypress. This three is dark green with black spots and it is as high as the top of the painting. Between the cypress and the right edge of the painting, hidden between the shrubberies, there is a little white house with a yellow roof. You see the house from the side. I have two windows and it consists of two parts; the left part is a low rectangle and the right part is a high square. The shrubbery around the house is as high as the house. In front of the row shrubbery there is a large wheat field spread across the whole painting. This wheat field is light green with yellow and has in the middle a lot of white dots. Personally, I think this is a nice feature of this painting; it is everywhere as busy as on other places. Like, in the middle it is less busy while in the back there are lots of detailed things. In the left bottom until the middle of the height of the painting and until the middle of the length of the painting there are dark green plants. Some stalks of the wheat stick out of this plants and one of them reaches almost the cypress. In the left bottom there is a little middle green shrubbery with black stripes.

This painting is not made from mixed colours. It is made from ‘basic’ colours which are put in little dots next to each other. Consequently, the colours are actually not mixed, but it only looks like it. This specific trend in art is called pointillism. This trend began in around 1880 until 1900. Pointillism is a part of post-impressionism. Post-impressionism was derived from impressionism, but in post-impressionism they want to ‘twist’ the reality a bit, so they were able to put more emotion in the painting.

I think that Van Gogh painted abstract, because of the dots he used. In reality everything is not made from dots of course. However, I think it is also painted realistic, because it looks real when you look at it from a distance. That is why I personally think that he used two ways of painting.

Another reason why I found the painting realistic is due to the linear perspective he used. In this style of painting he made space in the painting, by painting the object smaller as their distance to him increases. For example, the shrubbery in the front of the painting is four times as big as the house!

A closer look at the painting

Vincent van Gogh made the painting ‘green wheat field with cypress’ on canvass. This is a painting cloth. He made the painting with oil paint, a coloured powder which is mixed with vegetable oil to keep the powder together.

My opinion about the painting

Personally, I like the painting very much. I love the fact that it is not too busy. There are a lot of detailed things in the back, but in the middle it is a large wheat field. This makes the things in the back more special. One disadvantage of the painting is, according to me, the three white stripes in the halfway up on the right, underneath the shrubbery. I cannot see what they used to be or why he has drawn them. Moreover, I would like it when he had painted the shrubbery with the same amount of details and different colours than he has painted the cypress. Still, I think Vincent van Gogh has done a good job, owning to the fact that it looks so real, why he has drawn it with all those little stripes. I think those little stripes make it very hard to be able to paint realistic. To sum up, I think the painting is beautiful and if I have to give it a grade I would give it a nine, because I really think it is wonderful, but I have got a few disadvantages. It is still very good, though.

I think other people should see this painting, too. It gives me a feeling that it is spring, which makes my happy. So, I hope other people will get this feeling as well.

If I would own the painting ‘green wheat field with cypress’, I would probably not want to give it away or sell it to a museum. However, I think the whole world must be able to enjoy this painting, so I would hang it up in my own house, in front of a window with the front side to the window. Than everybody can see it, it does not get dirty and when I want to look at it I just have to turn the painting.

Conclusion

I enjoyed to search out more about the painting ‘green wheat field with cypresses´. Owning to the fact that I am drawing it at this moment I was really interested in this painting and I have taken a closer look at the painting. 

List of resources

Book

-      Bijbel met impressies, Vincent van Gogh en zijn tijdgenoten – Jan L.J, Kappers – 2007

Websites

-      http://www.vangoghgallery.com/             -          27/04/2012

-      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vincent_van_Gogh                      -          27/04/2012

-      http://www.vincentvangoghart.net/        -          28/04/2012

-      http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_materials_did_Vincent_van_gogh_use -28/04/2012

-      http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/gogh_d/hd_gogh_d.htm        -30/04/2012

-      http://drawsketch.about.com/od/perspectivetechdrawing/ss/aerialperspect_2.htm      -            30/04/2012

-      http://www.vincentvangogh.be/start.htm                      -          02/05/2012 

My stained glass window

From Tuesday the 20th of December 2012 until Thursday the 22nd of December, I went on a trip to England together with the other students. On Wednesday, at our stay in England, we visited the Canterbury Cathedral.

The Canterbury Cathedral was built in the middle ages. It was built on the orders of the Archbishop of Canterbury, St. Augustine. In these times the cathedrals were built in the Gothic style. Characteristics of Gothic architecture are the ribbed vaults, the pointed arches, the flying buttresses and ... the stained glass windows.

In this assignment I had to design such a window. A stained glass window is made of colourful pieces of glass, which are held together in a tracery. They didn't use big pieces of glass because they weren't able to do this; the glass would simply breake. In the Middle Ages some of the stained glass windows were used to tell a story of the Bible. Due to the fact that a lot of people couldn't read, they used pictures to tell them the stories. However, there were also stained glass windows which were there to allow light to come in and as decoration. My stained glass window doesn't tell a story from the Bible either. After designing my stained glass window, I tried to colour it as colourful as possible, just as in the Gothic style. When I had finished my stained glass window, I could chose to go on with the assignment and make a tracery for my stained glass window, too. I did it, because I had some spare time left. This was easy, I could just pull over my stained glass window and cut the boxes out.

Finally, this is my tracery above my stained glass window.

My skateboard deck

I had to design a skateboard deck. Except that it had to be a skateboard, I was free to draw on it whatever I want. I wanted to draw something in graffity-style, that is why I have tried to draw my name on my skateboard deck in graffity-style. In addition, I wanted to make it really mine, so I decided to put my hobbies in it.

- There is a can with paint and a crown pen. These two things represent that I like art and I enjoy it to draw.
- There is a piano a music note and a music book. These three things represent that I like music and I love to play the piano.
- There are four girls doing gymnastics. These four things represent that I like to sport, most of all gymnastics.
- There is a rabbit. This represents that I like my rabbits, especially to hug with them.

My Keith Haring bike

Keith Haring was born in May 4th, 1958. Later, Keith Haring became an art student at the School of Visual Arts in New York. He wanted to bring art to everyone rather than creating art only for museums. He wanted to be able to communicate to the whole world. One day, while riding the subway, Keith noticed some black paper hanging in all the unused advertising space. He ran to a store, bought some white chalk and started drawing. Owning to the fact that he knew he could get in trouble with the police, he had to draw fast. He drew simple figures, which became little characters; people hugging each other, dogs, flying saucers... This is how he invented his style. He died on Febuary the 16th, 1990.

I had to design a two bicycles in the style of Keith Haring. I used mainly the people he had drawn. I didn't wamt to design a normal bike. That's why my first bike is a classical bike, one they had in former times. I wanted to make something else than drawing characters on the wheels, so I make the frame full of little persons.

As my second bike, I didn't want to have a normal bike either. I have chosen to draw an unicycle. It had to be different from my earlier bike, so I couldn't do all those little persons as a frame again. That's why I thought to draw all those little persons in the spokes. They are all doing a different activity.

My report of the Canterbury Cathedral

Visit to

Simone Ruiter

T2B

13-1-2012

Visual art

Introduction

From Tuesday the 20th of December until Thursday the 22nd of December I went on a trip to England together with the other students of T2A and T2B. On Wednesday, at our stay in England, we visited the Canterbury Cathedral. The aim of this report is to identify what I expected from the cathedral before the visit and what I think about it after we had visited the cathedral.

Before the visit to the Canterbury Cathedral

In the beginning, I didn’t know anything about the Canterbury Cathedral. But, because I was going to visit the cathedral I did do some research.

I found out that the Canterbury Cathedral is one of the oldest buildings in England. In the year 597 the pope Gregorius sent the archbishop Augustine to England, together with around forty monks, and they had to convert the Saxons, who lived in England, to Christianity. Augustine did a good job and he baptized a lot of Saxons in a small church on the spot where nowadays the Canterbury Cathedral can be found.

In 1066 some Normans attacked England and occupied parts of England. A Norman archbishop named Lefranc took over the power of the church. He saw the church was too small for all the monks and he rebuild the small church into a big cathedral, the Canterbury Cathedral.

 Later on, Thomas Becket became Archbishop of the Canterbury Cathedral. Sadly, Thomas Becket excommunicated a lot of people because he told they weren’t loyal to the church and their belief. The king of England, Henry II, didn’t agree, so he required Thomas Becket to undo his deeds. Thomas Becket didn’t and finally four men were sent to him by the king and they murdered Thomas Becket.

This is all I know about the history of the Canterbury Cathedral. I hope that I will get to know a lot more about the cathedral. I think that in the cathedral I will see the grave of Thomas Becket, because I’ve read that his grave is still there. Personally, I don’t like to see graves of dead people, because it makes me sad. But, I think there are a lot of other nice things which I definitely will enjoy.

One of the main things I like about visiting cathedrals is to watch the stained glass windows. I think is fascinating how people, even a long time ago, can make art like that. I’m a big fan of art myself, so I really want to see that.

During the visit to the Canterbury Cathedral

When we arrived at the Canterbury Cathedral I noticed straight away that it was a huge and highly decorated building. I found it very impressive to see. After we entered the entrance, we were introduced to a guide. The guide gave us a tour through the whole cathedral. While we were walking he talked about the history of the cathedral and what things we were visiting at the moment.

After we went through the entrance, we entered the nave. The nave is a very big aisle which starts at the main entrance of the cathedral and leads to the high altar. The word nave comes from the Latin word ’navis’, which means ship. I think this name is well chosen, because the high ceiling of the nave looks like the bottom of a ship. In the nave there were lots of chairs to sit on while visiting the church or while following a mass. Besides the chairs, there were also a lot of decorations in the nave.

One type of decorations are the statues. A particular statue inside this nave is the welcoming Christ, which lets everybody feels themselves welcome. Another type of decorations inside this cathedral are the stained glass windows. Every window tells a story. These biblical stories were made in the Middle Ages. They have been made, because most of the ordinary people couldn’t read the bible, but because of these images they could know the biblical stories. An example of a stained glass window which I could recognize was Adam, digging in the ground. I really liked the stained glass windows, because it was very colourful and cheerful.

After we visited the nave we walked along the high altar and we went outside, into the Cloisters. This is the inner courtyard of the cathedral. While we were walking through the Cloisters we walked on lots of graves.

Then we went entered the Chapter House. This is the gathering place for monks. An impressive thing of this room is, according to me, the ceiling. The ceiling is beautifully decorated with a complicated pattern. In addition, the walls are nicely decorated too. There are colourful stained glass windows all over the room, which all tell a story belonging to a person.

Then we entered the cathedral again. We arrived at the place where Thomas Beckett was murdered, the Martyrdom. At the back of the room there was a grave with a statue laying on it. Our guide told us Thomas Beckett was laying beneath this statue. On another wall, there were hanging three swords which made the symbol of a cross. These swords had to remind us of the cruel event which has happened before: Thomas Beckett was murdered with a sword. Below these swords, on the ground, there was written something in red: Thomas. It was written in red as a representative of his blood. On the one hand, I didn’t like this room because I don’t enjoy the feeling that someone is killed on the exact place where I’m now. It feels kind of dangerous and evil. On the other hand, the decorations on his grave were very special and nice.

Then we went to the Crypt. The crypt is a chapel beneath the ground. There were a lot of people buried in this place, that’s why some people call it a burial chamber. In the crypt we couldn’t take pictures. Likewise, we also had to be quiet, so people could pray in silence. In the crypt there were a lot of pillars. All these pillars were decorated at the upper side with drawings. One drawing I recognized was a weird animal; it had a head of a lion and as tail a snake head. In the chapel there was a kind of a secret room. Earlier the room had four walls, so nobody could get in. Nowadays they have discovered the room and cut one wall out, so we could see this room. The room was highly decorated with icons. An icon on the ceiling was a drawing of Adam and Eve. I found this room very nice, because of the knowledge it for hidden for a long time.

Next we went to the Quire. The quire was earlier the place for monks to hold their church services. Back then pilgrims weren’t even allowed to come here. Nowadays we can visit this room and this room is even still used. I saw that there were still church services being held, because of the banks and the altar. One special thing I saw in this room was a statue called the lectern. It was a golden statue of an eagle. In my opinion, this was a very impressive statue.

Then we walked on to the Trinity Chapel. In this place there was long time ago a shrine of Thomas Beckett. Back then, pilgrimage would come and kiss this shrine. Nowadays there’s a candle in memory of Thomas Beckett. The shrine isn’t there anymore because someone has destroyed the shrine.   

When we walked further on we came across statues with heads cut off. This is done due the iconoclasm. People wanted to break the statues as a protest, because they were hungry while the church had huge wealth. Only this couldn’t be done, because the most statues were cut out of the wall, so they were resolute to the wall. That’s why they cut off their heads. After we had passed all these statues, we entered the nave again. We were back at our starting point, so our tour was over.  

After the visit to the Canterbury Cathedral

The Canterbury Cathedral was totally not what I expected it to be. I’ve already been in a lot of churches and some cathedrals. In addition, I had also seen some pictures of the Canterbury Cathedral. Still, it was very different. I knew the cathedral would be huge, but the cathedral was way larger than I expected it to be. I didn’t know that there was another part after the nave and the altar. But there was even a part under the ground and it had also its courtyard!

The cathedral was also more beautifully decorated than I thought. The most beautiful things of the cathedral were, in my opinion, all the stained glass windows. I found it very impressive how people from a long time ago could make such art. They were brilliant, because of all the colours. I could even recognize half of all the drawings,

One part of the Canterbury Cathedral that I didn’t enjoyed was the martyrdom. Although it had all kinds of impressive decorations, it made me feel very distasteful and unpleasant.  

However, I really think that the cathedral was impressive and beautiful. I’ve learned a lot and I’ve definitely enjoyed my visit to the Canterbury Cathedral.

The Canterbury tales

A story which has something to do with the cathedral is the story about the Canterbury tales. The story is about pilgrims. They are all making a journey to the Canterbury cathedral, to kiss the shrine of Thomas Beckett. The host makes the rules. He says that each person should tell two stories on their way to Canterbury and two stories on their way back. Each pilgrim will chose at the end of their journey whose tale is the most meaningfulness and fun.

I found this story a very special story, because in fact it is a lot of little stories. All the stories the pilgrims tell are also not just normal stories. Every time there’s a meaning behind the story. That’s what makes all the Canterbury tales stories special to me.

   

the Canterbury Cathedral