A Nonbeliever, Curating Religious Art at NYC's Morgan Museum
ALJAZEERA AMERICA
By Judith H. Dobrzynski
NEW YORK---Roger S. Wieck is glowing like a doting father, though the cause is a tiny painting that sits in a glass vitrine in the center of a gallery at the Morgan Library & Museum. Occupying the left-hand page of a 2.75-by-2-inch prayer book made for Queen Claude of France (1499–1524), the painting portrays the Holy Trinity. His fervor is understandable. The 500-year-old prayer book is the centerpiece of Wieck’s new exhibition, “Miracles in Miniature: The Art of the Master of Claude de France.” At a time when society is increasingly secularized, when adherence to religion, at least in an organized form, is waning, it’s Wieck’s job, as the Morgan’s curator of medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, to wax enthusiastic about religious art. So it comes as a surprise, perhaps, to discover that Wieck himself does not believe in God. Though raised Catholic, he says he “became a nonbeliever gradually when I was in my 20s.” [link]
By Judith H. Dobrzynski
NEW YORK---Roger S. Wieck is glowing like a doting father, though the cause is a tiny painting that sits in a glass vitrine in the center of a gallery at the Morgan Library & Museum. Occupying the left-hand page of a 2.75-by-2-inch prayer book made for Queen Claude of France (1499–1524), the painting portrays the Holy Trinity. His fervor is understandable. The 500-year-old prayer book is the centerpiece of Wieck’s new exhibition, “Miracles in Miniature: The Art of the Master of Claude de France.” At a time when society is increasingly secularized, when adherence to religion, at least in an organized form, is waning, it’s Wieck’s job, as the Morgan’s curator of medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, to wax enthusiastic about religious art. So it comes as a surprise, perhaps, to discover that Wieck himself does not believe in God. Though raised Catholic, he says he “became a nonbeliever gradually when I was in my 20s.” [link]
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