Late Gothic Architecture: Its Evolution, Extinction, and Reception (2018) by Robert Bork is a work impressive both in physical size and scholarly breadth. Totaling 552 pages, including 337 black and white illustrations and 32 color illustrations (the majority the author's own), Late Gothic Architecture succeeds in broadly spanning not only architectural style, time, and geography, but also intended audience.
Indeed, of Late Gothic Architecture's numerous strengths, one that stands out is its ability to engage both readers that are relative newcomers to the study of medieval architecture, as well as more experienced and focused scholars. Bork achieves this by providing (in each of Late Gothic Architecture's seven chapters) a clearly-written survey of medieval European architecture in manageable twenty-five to fifty-year chunks, as well as a carefully researched argument for the reconsideration of late Gothic architecture as worthy of renewed study. This mix of clearly explained architectural elements and history, such as the creation and evolution of the term "Gothic," with astute analysis of the events, structures, and texts at the heart of the Gothic-to-Renaissance transition allows for Late Gothic Architecture to serve as both an introductory text for students of Gothic architecture as well as a scintillating read for trained specialists.
Bork takes as his main point the stylistic movement away from the Gothic in the sixteenth century, which he refers to as the "anti-Gothic turn" (1). Although he provides a comprehensive overview of European architecture from late antiquity through 1500, Bork's central aim is to provide a new perspective on the cultural transition from Gothic to Renaissance (i.e., classicizing) architecture. To this end, Bork explains the fall of Gothic architecture as a "crisis imposed by social forces beyond the [medieval] builders' control" (13). Although Bork discusses at some length, in both his introduction and epilog, his efforts to steer clear of value judgements of medieval and renaissance architecture, his constant insistence that the Gothic style was unfairly treated gives the opposite impression.
This sense of the Gothic style's mistreatment at the hands of the Renaissance is most evident when Bork states that "the Gothic tradition did not die of natural causes, but rather...was effectively murdered by a confluence of external factors" (15). As a medievalist who focuses on the visual culture of late medieval France, I agree with Bork's revisionist approach to the Gothic-to-Renaissance architectural transition. I take issue, however, with Bork's use of what I see as a faulty theoretical model. In both the introduction and the epilog Bork suggests the use of a biological model to better explain and understand this architectural transition. He states that:
"Darwinian evolutionary theory...deserves recognition as a
powerful and highly flexible intellectual model for the discussion
of change over time, one that merits far more sustained attention
from art historians than it has received to date" (15).
Although I agree that the use of interdisciplinary models can often help to better explain complex historical theories and events, I disagree with the sort of downtrodden agency that Bork's Darwinian model allocates to the late Gothic style. By characterizing the "collapse of the Gothic tradition" as not necessarily predetermined, but increasingly inevitable, Bork seems to suggest that the late Gothic style itself could have turned the tide of popularity back towards the Gothic and away from the classical (16).
This theoretical disagreement, however, does little to dampen my overall enthusiasm forLate Gothic Architecture. There is much in Late Gothic Architecture that is eye-opening, and worthy of applause. For example, as part of his defense of the Late Gothic style, Bork discusses the changing definition of "modern" architecture during the medieval and renaissance eras, wherein "modern" originally referred to the ahistorical Gothic style, which was viewed in the medieval period as "progressive or innovative" yet later came to represent the classicizing Renaissance style when compared to the now "outmoded and unfashionable" Gothic style (3, 14). Examples such as this serve to illustrate the arbitrary nature of the shift in popularity from Gothic to classicizing Renaissance architecture.
Bork also does well to point out and debunk some of the most grievous misunderstandings about medieval architecture. First, that there was an utter lack of classical or antique architectural influences during the Middle Ages, which was corrected by the Renaissance, a period that is typically defined as a rebirth of all things classical. Secondly, Bork also deals in multiple chapters with the idea that the late Gothic style, such as the French Flamboyant, was characterized by a lack of organization or structural reason. Bork points out how Gothic architecture, while it lacked the flashy theoretical background of Renaissance architecture (Vitruvius' De Architectura, most notably), made up for it in practical know-how achieved through a millennium of guild-organized work. Indeed, much of Bork's reasoning for the rise of the classical Renaissance style rests on his point that "the association of Renaissance architecture with theory has given it an attractive air of intellectual sophistication that late Gothic architecture seems to lack" (9).
Bork also demonstrates his familiarity with both scholarly and survey-level texts on medieval architecture, referencing the way in which the Northern Renaissance is more often than not presented in an "architecture-free" way due to the supposed backwardness of Northern Europe in the 15th and 16th centuries, which unlike Italy, still drew on Gothic rather than antique architectural models (5).
Late Gothic Architecture does much to make us, as scholars of medieval art and architecture, question our use of periodization, most notably that of the transition from the medieval to the Renaissance. Bork posits that rather than viewing late Gothic architecture as the visual form of the decline of the Middle Ages and therefore the rise of the Renaissance, we should instead treat late Gothic architecture as a distinct period in and of itself, worthy of closer study and consideration.
Bork concludes his epilog to Late Gothic Architecture by stating that the overarching goal of the book is to "foster conversation about the dynamics of the anti-Gothic turn" and that "to the extent that it energizes the debate...it will have fulfilled its purpose" (436). Late Gothic Architecture most certainly fulfils its purpose, providing a welcome and much needed new voice to the scholarly chorus of art historical texts on Gothic architecture.