Windows....
It Has Been Quite a while, Dear Readers, since I last made windows for the Chapel! As with many parts of this Huge Castle building project, I sallied forth many years ago with little knowledge and much enthusiasm and have followed many many detours along the way. The two windows on the rear wall above the altar are actually the first of the glass windows I built for The Castle, and began my quest for the best method to use. They were constructed in September of 2010. And the windows on the side wall were built in May of 2011, almost exactly fifteen years ago! And I must also remind you that it took me a while to even decide to construct the exterior front opening walls of the castle... that came about in July of 2018 if you need to pursue the chronology... it is all there in the archives by date. But it was only two years ago, when I finally returned my attention to working on The Chapel that I gave any consideration to the subject matter for the opening wall side of The Chapel. The window openings had been cut years before, the two tall narrow windows were to be opposite the two on the back behind the altar. Because the paining on the wall between the windows will eventually have a version of The Annunciation (when Mary is told she will bear the Christ Child) I decided to have the windows show St. Anne (Mother of Mary) with Mary as a child, and The Visitation (when Mary, now pregnant, greets her cousin St. Elizabeth who is at an advanced age, pregnant with S. John the Baptist). As for the construction of the windows, that was just a matter of following my now well established method of building the "glass sandwich" window frames. It is time consuming and finicky work, but it makes the glass panes securely fitted to the openings, however oddly shaped they are. You can see above the shaped panels are getting the "quatrefoil" motif cut into the top of the arched openings.
And because each window needs two panels for the inner and outer frame,
the quatrefoils need to align with each other as exactly as possible.
This is a tedious process requiring much careful drilling and sanding
but the effort is worth it in the end!
And testing the panels in the window openings...
And then each panel gets cut to make the window opening.
I started by making the opening an arch... the easiest way to cut it,
but was pretty sure I would square up the lower pane opening
because the original windows were shaped that way.
Here both the windows have been cut
with the arched lower panel.
But I will square them up.
Like so!
And the bottom rail of the window frames is added.
And if you look at the right angle...
you can see through to the windows on the rear wall!
(The Chapel door blocks part of the view...)
And the first coat of gray paint and the "rocks" getting painted...
Before we finally get to the design of the glass panes themselves!
I spent a few days going through my Medieval Manuscript books
looking for the best representations of the images I wanted to portray.
In the Middle Ages, these "tropes" had become very standardized.
The symbolism and even the images themself were carefully copied
from book to book, place to place and year to year and with very little variation.
But in the Early Middle Ages, the era I am claiming for my Castle,
there was still a "primitive" originality to many of these designs.
Even so, I had a hard time finding images to use directly
and forgot to take pictures as I went.
St. Anne is usually known for her raising of the Virgin Mary to be...
and teaching her to read.... so I have chosen to show her
holding a young Mary's hand and holding the book.
The glass pane gets taped over the drawing,
carefully aligning it with the outer window frame edge
to be sure it will fit right!
Then I draw with the "liquid lead" (a Gallery Glass product).
This is a lot to fit into one narrow 1 inch wide pane of glass!
And the "liquid lead" goes on a bit lumpy.
I have learned that it can be cleaned up a bit later
once it has cured for a day.
For the Visitation pane, I had to stick to only one figure,
it is too narrow to show the greeting of both
which is the main theme of this event.
Here is an example from the 1300's...
showing at least the style of clothing contemporary to the painting
(as was usual in the miniatures... the artists did not know
ancient fashion so they portrayed what they knew).
St. Elizabeth is supposed to be "elderly" (past childbearing years)
but miraculously pregnant with St. John the Baptist.
I drew a solitary figure, but obviously pregnant
and touching her swollen belly as if she felt the baby move.
She is looking toward the place on The Chapel wall
that will have the Annunciation painting.
I could not achieve an "elderly" appearance to her...
but tried to make her solemn in wonderment.
The following day I began to "clean up" the blobby lead lines.
Here St. Anne is partly done.
And here she is finished with the trimming.
And St. Elizabeth trimmed.
And both panes with the original designs.
I decided I needed to add a couple more lines
for clarity of design, things that were too hard to fit
with the blobby leading at the first go-round.
In particular, features for the young Virgin Mary,
and more details for the cloak of St. Elizabeth.
If you look closely you can see a couple of yet untrimmed blobby lines!
I will trim them before adding the glass paint.
Starting with the Quatrefoil windows at the top.
And continuing with both at the same time
so I could try to be sure the colors are balancing
between the two windows.
Nearly done.
I wanted one more defining line for St. Elizabeth's cloak
so I added another blobby line and will paint
the rest when it has dried and been trimmed.
There!
The glass painting is finished!
Now we just want to see them in place... right?
Ah, well, this is really not so easy!
This is with the Chapel lights turned on....
and dreary dark evening light in the room....
And this is with the Chapel door open.... gosh,
I am going to have to figure out how to get good pictures of this!
I can't get the camera into The Chapel when the front is closed....!
And it only shows in the light from The Chapel...
Well, even if we can't see it
from outside, Dear Readers,
I will know it is there!
But there we are at Last...
The Chapel windows are done!
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