Modern art in the twelfth century

By the eleventh and twelfth centuries there had emerged in western Europe within Church art a new sphere of artistic creation without religious content and imbued with values of spontaneity, individual fantasy, delight in color and movement, and the expression of feeling that anticipate modern art. This new art was accompanied by a conscious taste of the spectators for the beauty of workmanship, materials, and artistic devices. M. Shapiro, Romanesque Art. Selected Papers (New york 1977).