During her Spring semester abroad at the American University Center of Provence, Alexandra Highet ’13 carried out her Friedberg Travel Fellowship to explore the architecture of French cathedrals.
“My solo trip thus came at the perfect point of my semester, when I was linguistically equipped and excited to travel on my own. I also had absorbed the intricacies of the French themselves, as well as the cultural differences between les français du nord et du sud, and was excited to see how the northern landscape compared to Provence.
The true gift of this trip was the opportunity that it gave me to experience the hallmarks of the Gothic style in a short, consecutive amount of time. In six days I saw four cathedrals, all of which I’d seen in lecture back in Williamstown. The trip was a fast-paced, intense research project that allowed me to compare the cathedrals instantly. Yet it was primarily visual, and it wasn’t rushed: I spent mornings and afternoons in these spaces, absorbing the architectures and moods. I climbed all the towers and walked around the exteriors. Fourteen pages of my journal are filled with drawings, floor plans, dates and reactions, the product of sitting in the pews and understanding my entrancement. “
During my back-to-back tour, I characterized each cathedral and reflected on their personalities. St. Etienne de Bourges is unique for its five aisles; Notre Dame de Reims, in which Clovis and successive generations of French kings were baptized, has a markedly different feel of regality; Notre Dame de Laon, the oldest cathedral I visited, represents the crossroads between Romanesque and Gothic styles and the upwards architectural movement; and finally I made my way to Notre Dame d’Amiens, the highest achievement of the High Gothic.
My university hosts in Bourges, along with most other young people I met, were surprised at my interest in these old buildings. Yet I am still in awe of the ability of these spaces, which have stood for over eight hundred years, to transfix visitors and worshippers. This architecture is incredibly powerful. These regions of northern France, in addition, suffered under both wars. Reims was bombed in World War I and the site of Nazi surrender in World War II, after Amiens was flattened by air raids. Yet these cathedrals still stand, miraculously. The confluence of architecture, sculpture and painting, the stone’s ornamented functionality and the overwhelming height that had entranced me in lecture exceeded my expectations. I am so grateful for the chance to visit these cathedrals, and will look back on this trip as a definite high point of my Williams experience.
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