The Raising of the Cross

In 1712 Mazi�re was given the commission to complete the high-relief Gospel scenes along the exterior of the choir enclosure at Chartres, which had been begun in the early sixteenth century. In such an impressive setting, amid so many competing claims for contemplation, Mazi�re’s scenes are perhaps little noticed by visitors today. Yet, as the largest of these, The Raising of the Cross, reveals Mazi�re achieved a near-Renaissance idiom, forceful and dramatic, by no means incongruous and quite free from any overly ‘decorative’ flourishes. Indeed, were his scenes not documented - to the years 1712-16 - they might pass as work of a much earlier period.