ARCHITECTURE
OF SILENCE: Cistercian Abbeys of France; Photographs
by David Heald
 
American photographer David Heald has spent nearly twenty years admiring
and recording the geometric precision of the Cistercian abbeys of France.
Built in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries by the severe monastic order
founded by Saint Bernard, these quiet places of retreat and contemplation
are free of distracting embellishment. This pure architecture has an uncompromising
allure. The exhibition of 40 original gelatin-silver prints has been selected
from the large body of work that David Heald has devoted to these Romanesque
churches, cloisters and chapter halls, situated in remote, rugged and mostly
unspoiled landscapes. They communicate the intense spirituality that this
architecture was created to shelter and to provoke. The exhibition is at
once an essay on medieval architecture and a demonstration of the camera’s
power to capture its essence.
Curator:
David Heald’s work has appeared in numerous books and periodicals and is
represented in private and public collections, including the Cleveland
Museum of Art and the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris. Heald is presently
Chief Photographer for the Guggenheim Museum in New York. Architecture
of Silence, first published in 2000 by Harry N. Abrams, N.Y., was
chosen as one of the best architecture books of the year by the New York
Times Book Review.
Joan T. Rosasco has been the curator or coordinator
for numerous exhibitions organized by Exhibitions
International. She was on the faculty of the French
departments of Smith College and Columbia University.
Her publications include Voies de l’imagination
proustienne, as well as articles on various aspects
of French literature, decorative arts, and music.
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