The University of Kansas

Artist unknown

France, early 12th century
Confrontation of Men and Demons
Museum purchase, 57.72

In the center of the Medieval Gallery is an early 12th-century Romanesque column capital, an architectural fragment from a French church. It depicts a Confrontation of Men and Demons. Typical of Romanesque sculpture, the figures are simplified and have exaggerated hands and facial features. Through this exaggeration the sculptor evokes a violent confrontation in a symbolic moral struggle. Religious subjects in art were not only central to salvation, they often became vehicles for human emotions as well. As in most of the medieval and Renaissance works in this gallery, the subject is Catholic; the Protestant Reformation would not begin until the 16th century.