Pugin and the English Neo-Gothic Revival: Art and Spirit Reawakened in Dark Times

"I seek antiquity not novelty. I strive to revive not invent."

St. Anne’s, Leeds Catholic cathedral.

In the early 19th century Britain and Europe were sinking into the dark and toxic pall of industrialisation, and cities grew choked with populations deracinated and forced out of their ancestral homes to go to work in the “dark satanic mills.” The man-made environment started to be reduced to grim, utilitarian forms that mirrored the dehumanizing effects of mass production.

Into this situation, a man emerged who broke with the elite consensus of his time, championing a radical vision: a return to the beauty, spirituality, and integrity of the medieval Gothic, which he believed could heal a society fractured by industrial and cultural upheaval.

In today’s post for paid subscribers, we’re going to examine one of the great examples of “push-back” in recent artistic history, a model for us today who are facing the final, radically anti-human forms of the Industrial Revolution, and the impending collapse of the way of life it created.

We’ll explore how Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin and his contemporaries sought to reclaim beauty, spirituality and human dignity, and offered us possible insights into how art and architecture can be acts of resistance - and perhaps even seeds for cultural renewal.

We will look at how Pugin’s movement provides an answer to the rampant materialism and utilitarianism of his time among industrialist elites, offering a counter-vision rooted in beauty, spirituality, and communal values. His devotion to the sacred and the meaningful in art could also form a thought-basis for us now, as we face down our own society’s anti-humanism, and its preoccupation with profit and functionality at the expense of the transcendent and the timeless.

---

---

The Sacred Images Project is a reader-supported publication where we talk about Christian life, thought, history and culture through the lens of the first 1200 years of sacred art. It’s my full time job, but it’s still not bringing a full time income, so I can’t yet provide all the things I want to and am planning for. You can subscribe for free to get one and a half posts a week.

For $9/month you also get the second half of the weekly Friday Goodie Bag post, plus a weekly paywalled in-depth article on this great sacred patrimony. There are also occasional extras like downloadable exclusive high resolution printable images, ebooks, mini-courses, videos and eventually podcasts.

If you would prefer to set up a recurring donation in an amount of your choice, or make a one-off contribution, you can do that at my studio blog.

This helps me a lot because the patronages through the studio blog are not subject to the 10% Substack fee.

I’ve been restocking the online shop with some of the printed items for this year’s Sacred Images Project Christmas market. Like this little Sienese Gothic angel tree ornament:

People tell me all the time - and I’ve found this myself - how difficult it can be to find really nice religious cards and decorations for Christmas. So I’m focusing this year on cards and tree ornaments that will bring some medieval imagery into your holidays.

Enjoy a browse:

---

Subscribe to join us below the fold:

---

---