MEDIEVAL SCULPTOR, French
(active around 1200 in Picardy)

Central portal

c. 1200
Stone
Cathedral of Notre-Dame, Laon (Aisne)

Around the turn of the 13th century the sculpture of Northern France started to show a strong classicising tendency. The decoration of the west portal of the Laon Cathedral seems to mark the beginning of this development. Of the three doorways, the left-hand and central ones are devoted to the Virgin while the subject of the right-hand one is the last Judgment.