The conceptual horizon of this work is the relationship between material culture, the aesthetics of visual language, and socio-semiotic aspects. Objects with secular images occupy a special position among Gothic ivory works, as they visualise central scenes of contemporary novels. This research paid particular attention to points of contact between poetry and the visual arts. An evaluation of the scenes depicted and their significance is still necessary to understand their deeper meaning. In this project, all secular pictures on Gothic ivory objects will be recorded and analysed in the form of a catalogue. The fact that the warlike side of the Middle Ages is rarely represented in iconography gives these secular ivory works their intensity. The objects show experimentation with material, content, text, image, effect and perception.
In addition to traditional image analysis, the inclusion of current literary research and the theoretical method of affordance will reconstruct the artefact biographies and the understanding of the images. By examining the effects or emotions that the brutal images could provoke, this study integrates itself into the current discourse on virtue. The intensity of the brutal scenes is complemented with perspectives on the viewer's ability to identify the gender-specific approaches. The project goes one step further by investigating the socio-semiotic aspects of image communication and the psychology of perception. Thus, the research on the brutal side of the Middle Ages fits into an innovative field of research that goes beyond the identification of scenes. The study presented here deals with the rhetoric of images and also takes up historical, social and gender-specific problems. The love scenes are permanently sketched out as an important antithesis to the warlike, brutal images. The proximity between love and war is a particular feature here.
