In Tuesday’s class we spent most of the class discussing Matthias Grünewald’s Isenheim Altarpiece. This piece was quite interesting because so many elements of the altarpiece were so tailored to the monastery where it would be placed. This piece was an essential element of the work that the Antonite monastery was doing for their patients with Ergotism (“St. Anthony’s fire”). The monks would bring their patients before the altarpiece to make sure that when they finally died, they would go to heaven. This was the first example I have seen of an altarpiece that was so integral to the function of a religious order—other altarpieces have felt more like additional decoration or adoration opportunity for members of the congregation, but this piece felt more interactive to me because it was so specific to the monastery it was placed in. The grotesque depiction of Christ’s infected skin and bloody wounds really ground Him as a human figure and remind the patients suffering from ergotism that Jesus suffered as they have and sacrificed himself so that they can go to heaven and have eternal life once they have died.