Joan of Arc & the Divine

“I was in my thirteenth year when I heard a voice from God to help me govern my conduct. And the first time I was very much afraid.” – Joan of Arc

Joan of Arc has long fascinated public imagination ever since her call to fight for France in the Hundred Year War in the early fifteenth century. If people in 2019 would be shocked by a teenage girl, called in a divine vision, to leave home and family, to go fight in the battlefield, imagine how much more Joan of Arc in the 1420s shocked the world with her divine call to fight. 

Joan’s sacred call to arms helped the French immensely in their fight against the English with the young girl leading the French to victory at the Battle of Orléans at the age of seventeen. She quickly became an icon and a symbol of French resistance to English domination, with her military successes contributing to the crowning of King Charles VII. Joan, herself, was eventually captured on the battlefield and sold to the English who tried her as a witch for heresy. At the young age of nineteen, she was charged with witchcraft and burnt at the stake in Rouen, France. It is said that the ashes of her remains were scattered in the Seine.

Ever since her martyrdom in 1431, artists have found fascinating subject matter in the story of this divinely inspired French peasant girl. Countless literary, operatic, and artistic representations have been drawn from her story in the almost six-hundred years since her death. Painters have been particularly fascinated with Joan’s visions as a teenager and the moment of her divine instruction to aid the French in battle. Artists throughout the century have wrestled with how to fit a spiritual encounter into a finite painting, however. The various artistic representations of Joan of Arc’s divine experience call viewers to ponder the weight of the spiritual vision, a moment where heaven punctures earth, in Joan’s life and death. 

Jules Bastien-Lepage, Joan of Arc, 1879, oil on canvas, 100 x 110 in, 89.21.1

Jules Bastien- Lepage in his famous larger than life painting of Joan of Arc, depicts a shocked young girl at her home in Domrémy, in North-Eastern France. The teenaged Joan seems to have forgotten her weaving behind her and is leaning against a tree in her garden, arm outstretched, in a trance. Behind her, painted into the trees of the overgrown garden scene hover Saints Michael, Margaret, and Catherine urging her to aid the French in the Hundred Years War. It is interesting to note that while St. Michael is offering her a sword, St. Catherine is weeping, perhaps foreshadowing the tragedy of Joan of Arc’s young death. 

Jules Eugène Lenepveu, Jeanne d'Arc, Bergère, 1886-1890, oil on canvas, Panthéon in Paris

In this late nineteenth century fresco done by Lenepveu for the Panthéon, an angel is seen hovering behind a young shepherdess Joan. This mystical figure gestures for Joan to go while handing her sword. Joan looks dazed, surprised, and off-balanced even as if she was going to fall over. It is interesting how in this depiction there is an additional peasant figure added who appears to not notice this divine interruption at all emphasizing perhaps the private nature of Joan’s revelation. 

Henryk Siemiradzki, Joan of Arc Kneeling before Angel, ca. 1880, oil on canvas, 3 ^1/2 x 35 ^1/4 ins, Private Collection 

Siemiradzki, a Polish painter, depicts a young Joan of Arc here kneeling before an angel. The angel is offering her a war flag while Joan looks up at her with shock and awe. It interesting to note that in this particular depiction, Joan looks at the angel directly rather than the divine revelation hovering over her as previously seen. Siemiradzki may also be using this composition to remind of us the visitation Mary, the mother of Jesus, experienced from the angel Gabriel. This comparison would heighten the divine revelation of Joan of Arc to a new level of spiritual significance. 

Gustave Wappers, The Vision of Joan of Arc, 1847, oil on canvas, 88 x 69 cm, Private Collection

In this painting by Belgian artist Wappers, three angelic figures reach down instructing a young Joan to take up the call to fight for France. While this painting is more serene than other depictions of Joan’s spiritual visions, there is a certain darkness to the image both in its composition and in its implication with the armor lying beside her. The smoke in the background could also be seen as foreshadowing her eventual fate – being burned at the stake.

  

Alphonse Mucha, Maude Adams (1872–1953) as Joan of Arc, 1909, oil on canvas, 82 ¼ x 30 in, 20.33

Czech artist Mucha painted this in the early twentieth century to promote the upcoming one-night-only gala showing of The Maid of Orleansa nineteenth-century play about the story of Joan of Arc. In the picture, he specifically paints the portrait of American actress Maude Adams as Joan of Arc. Joan’s outstretched hands immediately place her in a stage of fright or terror. In the painting, he includes a ghost face hovering above her adding to the suspense and fright painted on her face – continuing the tradition of depicting Joan as influenced by ghost into the twentieth century. 

Peter Paul Reubens, Joan of Arc, c. 1620 -1640, oil on canvas, 71 1/2 x 45 3/4 in, North Carolina Museum of Art

In this seventeenth-century oil painting, Ruebens depicts an armor-clad Joan knelt before a crucifix in front of her. While she appears to be in the posture of prayer, on her knees, with her hands clasped together in front of her, her face tells another story. Joan rather than looking at the crucifix is staring straight pass it, eyes wide open, cheeks blushed in shock as if she is seeing a vision. Even though Joan is no longer a young girl in the field in the painting, her experience with the divine is still depicted as strikingly as her initial visions.