admin, Author at Teacher Curator

Nea Herakleia Reliquary

The Nea Herakleia Reliquary is exhibited in the Museum of Byzantine Culture, a favorite museum of mine, in Thessaloniki, Greece. http://odysseus.culture.gr/h/4/eh431.jsp?obj_id=4751&mm_id=983

The Reliquary in focus is a small rectangular silver box of hammered silver with a hinged lid. The lid has been badly damaged in several places, but its four decorated sides are in relatively good condition. The Traditio Legis, Christ’s passing of the law to Saints Peter and Paul adorns the front side of the reliquary. The other three sides, inspired by the Old Testament, present three very popular and symbolic scenes, the Three Hebrews, Daniel in the Lion’s Den and Moses receiving the Law. The lid is decorated with a Christogram flanked by the Greek letters α (alpha) and ω (omega) defining the omnipresence of God, the beginning and the end, as α is the first letter of the Greek alphabet and ω its last. The sides of the reliquary’s lid are decorated with a vine scroll with leaves, quite beautifully chiseled, and grapes. https://leipsanothiki.blogspot.com/2014/02/245.html

Kurt Weitzman in his “Age of Spirituality” the introductory essay says that “The transition from the dying classical to the rising and finally triumphant Christian culture was a complex process, extending over several centuries, in which the two coexisted and competed with each other.” He is so right! The Nea Herakleia Reliquary, a relatively unfamiliar example of silverwork, is an amazing example of this extraordinary era. An item of the Christian faith, decorated with New and Old Testament scenes, the Reliquary in focus, is an example of a movement in art, scholars often call the “Theodosian Renaissance.” The artist focused his interest in the depiction of the human body, facial expression, and movement. Very little else matters, with probably the exception of the two Lions flanking Daniel. There are restrictions or exaggerations in corporeality, but modeling is plastic in conception, postures are natural, facial expressions emotional and drapery softly modeled. This is indeed an exceptional work of art worth exploring further. http://odysseus.culture.gr/h/4/eh430.jsp?obj_id=4751

Visiting the Thessaloniki Museum for Byzantine Culture is a true cultural experience. In 1989, the Museum’s architect, Kyriakos Krokos, wrote: “I wanted a space within which movement would create a feeling of freedom, stirring up the senses, and where the exhibit would be a surprise within the movement. I believe that as visitors walk through the Museum Halls there are many pleasant surprises. The floor and wall mosaics in the first Early Christian Period Room, attract everybody’s attention. The Byzantine tunics with their fine embroideries, the icons and the intricately illuminated manuscript in the Middle Byzantine Period Room are definitely noticed. Finally, as the visitor is about to leave, one last surprise, a beautiful Post-Byzantine golden eikonostasi, one last startling work of art to ponder about. https://mbp.gr/en/building

For the PowerPoint Teacher Curator prepared, please… Click HERE!

Teacher Curator also prepared a student RWAP (Research – Writing – Art -Project)… presented HERE!

Grade 6 student project on the Nea Herakleia Reliquary

Baroque Bliss

If you ask my humble opinion, Hals’s painting of a Young Man and Woman in an Inn epitomizes Baroque Bliss! There is merriment in the way the woman cautiously leans over the young man. There is joy in how the young man laughingly raises his flask with his right hand and affectionately caresses an attending dog with his left. Extravagance in the background decoration is obvious in every aspect. So much so that a landscape painting hangs over the tavern’s mantle! The artist’s painting technique is equally excessive. With fluid movement and loose brushstrokes… is Hals implying that the painting was executed with speed, to catch a moment of great enjoyment? In the words of Walter Liedtke “…all artificial elements are swept away by a way of sensations: light, air, movement, and, one imagines, taste smell, and noise.”

The Baroque is an elusive word and an interesting style to explain and understand. The first step I usually take, is to think of descriptive adjectives that best characterize the period: extravagant, theatrical, dramatic, grand, luxurious, sensual, majestic, opulent… to mention only a few. I also try to compare Baroque period artworks from different areas in Europe, a landscape painting for example by Claude Lorrain to a Rubens one. The differences are extraordinary, yet there are striking similarities. Finally, the word Baroque itself comes from the Portuguese word barroco, a term used to describe an irregularly-shaped pearl. How extravagant can it get! The Baroque style, dated during the 17^th century, originated in Rome, spread all over Italy, from Sicily to Venice, and became particularly popular in Spain, France, and the Low Countries.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art has a large and quite representative collection of Fans Hals paintings. The Young Man and Woman in an Inn is one of their finest examples. Frans Hals: Style and Substance, https://www.metmuseum.org/art/metpublications/Frans_Hals_Style_and_Substance?Tag=&title=style%20and%20Substance&author=&pt=0&tc=0&dept=0&fmt=0

For a Student Activity on Young Man and Woman in an Inn, please… check HERE!

Feast of the Gods

The Feast of the Gods is the story of a Renaissance Patron of the Arts, three Master Painters and a… very special Room, the camerino d’alabastro (alabaster study) of the Ferrara Castle.

The story starts with the desire of Duke Alfonso d’Este to decorate his studiolo, the camerino d’alabastro, with a series of bacchanals, mythological paintings that celebrate Bacchus and Venus, the gods of wine and love. Alfonso’s private studiolo in Ferrara was his retreat, where he would collect, exhibit and admire his collection of ancient medals, antique statuettes, and mythological paintings, celebrating the delights of nature and love. It was a very private place, only a handful of people ever saw while the Duke was still alive. Soon after he died, the room was disassembled, the paintings were taken to Rome, ending up in Washington DC, London, and Madrid.

For his first bacchanal, Alfonso turned to Giovanni Bellini, the Venetian master, who “very old, but still the best there is” as Albrecht Dürer said in one of his letters, was famous at the time for his “luminous color that would be the glory of Venetian painting for centuries to come.” The Feast of the Gods, Bellini’s creation, turned to be a very unique painting. Bellini, reluctant at first, accepted the Duke’s invitation and drawing inspiration from Ovid’s Poems, created “a wooded pastoral setting, in which the gods, with Jupiter, Neptune, and Apollo among them, revel eating and drinking, attended by nymphs and satyrs.” The painting has all the characteristics of Bellini’s excellence: brilliant colors, lush pastoral setting, an engaging story and an ambiance of sensuality.

The painting was completed in 1514 but a few years later Alfonso commissioned two artists, Dosso Dossi and Titian, to rework parts of the painting’s landscape background. Dosso Dossi changed parts of the landscape on the left side and added a pheasant resting on bright foliage at the upper right part of the painting. Then, Bellini’s student, Titian, added his own alterations. He reworked Dosso’s alterations adding the dramatic, mountainous backdrop that can be seen now, leaving only Dosso’s pheasant intact. The painted figures and decorative elements of the painting were untouched and remain Bellini’s own. There is, however, an enigma and further questions! “Did Alfonso, an amateur painter who was reported to fancy pheasants, paint the bird himself? Did Alfonso “picture” himself in another way as well? Some evidence suggests that Feast of the Gods contains cryptic references to the duke’s marriage to Lucrezia Borgia, perhaps even portraits of the couple.” https://www.nga.gov/collection/highlights/bellini-titian-the-feast-of-the-gods.html and https://www.nga.gov/collection/art-object-page.1138.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Feast_of_the_Gods#/media/File:Giovanni_Bellini_and_Titian_-_The_Feast_of_the_Gods_-_Detail-_trees_&_pheasant.jpg

Many scholars believe that Alfonso’s studiolo was the finest of its kind, a shining jewel box! The first commission went to the elderly Giovanni Bellini and the Feast of the Gods (NGA Washingon DC) was the result. Michelangelo and Raphael were also commissioned to create works of art for the Duke’s studiolo but their commissions never materialized. With Bellini’s death in 1514, Titian, and the Duke’s court artist, Dosso Dossi, stepped in to complete this ambitious project. Dosso Dossi’s painting was destroyed centuries ago, but Titian’s Bacchus and Ariadne (National Gallery, London) The Worship of Venus (Museo del Prado, Madrid) and the Bacchanal of the Andrians (Museo del Prado, Madrid) still survive to tell us their story. https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2003/feb/08/artsandhumanities.arts1

For Student Activity, please… check HERE!

Forgotten Masters: Indian Painting for the East India Company

https://www.wallacecollection.org/forgotten-masters-indian-painting-east-india-company/

A very unique Exhibition takes place in London these days. The Wallace Collection presents Forgotten Masters: Indian Painting for the East India Company honours historically overlooked Indian artists like Shaikh Zain ud-Din, Bhawani Das, Shaikh Mohammad Amir of Karriah, Sita Ram and Ghulam Ali Khan and brings to life a forgotten moment in Anglo-Indian history. Another unique Exhibition highlight is the guest curator of the Exhibition, William Dalrymple, Scottish renowned historian and writer, art historian and curator, as well as an award-winning broadcaster and critic.

Forgotten Masters: Indian Painting for the East India Company introduced me to the work of Shaikh Zain ud-Din, a Bengali Muslim artist whose work blends Mughal and Western painting techniques, creating “…incredibly precise and beautifully observant” works of art, as Xavier Bray, director of London’s Wallace Collection comments on the Smithsonian Magazine. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/awe-inspiring-wildlife-drawings-shaikh-zain-uddin-180973502/

Shaikh Zain ud-Din worked for Sir Elijah first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court at Fort William, Calcutta, and his wife, the natural historian Mary Impey. The Impeys moved to India in 1773 and soon fell under the spell of the subcontinent, establishing a menagerie of Indian and South-East Asian birds and animals in the extensive grounds of their estate. It was only natural for Mary to commission in 1777, a small group of artists, eminent among them Shaikh Zain ud-din, to paint her exotic flora and fauna. The result of this “brilliant” decision was a collection of paintings, 362 in number, known as the Impey Album. “These paintings,” Xavier Bray, director of London’s Wallace Collection says, “were made into albums to be leafed through back home, on a rainy day, drinking Earl Grey tea.” https://coromandelart.wordpress.com/

Shaikh Zain ud-Din’s paintings, although rendered in European materials, capture India’s natural history in a way that only a local could. They are an unprecedented hybrid of East and West. They “emulate, on a greatly enlarged scale, the refinement of 17th century Mughal natural history paintings,” and, believed to have been painted from life, they also exhibit the artist’s ability to assimilate European conventions. The 2012 Ashmolean Lady Impey’s Indian Bird Paintings Exhibition was the first major presentation of Shaikh Zain ud-Din’s oeuvre to the public, the current London Exhibition will further establish his work as a fine moment in the history of Indian Art. http://jameelcentre.ashmolean.org/collection/6980/10198

An unlikely ‘collaboration’ is a very interesting, worth reading Interview with the Exhibition’s curator, award-winning historian, writer and curator William Dalrymple, by Mark Rappolt, for the ArtReviewAsia. https://artreview.com/features/ara_winter_2019_feature_interview_william_dalrymple/

For a PowerPoint on the Wallace Collection Exhibition, please… check HERE!

A Roy Lichtenstein Trilogy

Roy Lichtenstein (Textile) Lee Rudd Simpson, Sunrise Dress, 1965, white satin one-piece dress, silk-screen print by Roy Lichtenstein, Kyoto Costume Institute
Roy Lichtenstein, Sunrise, 1965, Enamel on steel, One from an edition of five, 57.5 × 91.5 cm, Basil & Elise Goulandris Foundation, Athens
Roy Lichtenstein, Sinking Sun, 1964, oil and magna on canvas, 68 x 80 in. 172.7 x 203.2 cm, private collection

A Roy Lichtenstein Trilogy is about the artist’s 1965 fascination with landscapes depicting the Sun. In 1964, Lichtenstein started experimenting with Landscapes, exploring aspects of the Sea and the Sky, including his famous painting of the Sinking Sun. His explorations were in various media, including paintings, enamel on metal, like the example exhibited in the Basil &Elise Goulandris Foundation, drawings, collages and Lithographs.

In a 1967 Interview with John Coplans, Roy Lichtenstein reflected on his Sinking Sun painting: “There is something humorous about doing a sunset in a solidified way, especially the rays, because a sunset has little or no specific form. It is like the explosions. It’s true that they may have some kind of form at any particular moment, but they are never really perceived as defined shape… It makes something ephemeral completely concrete.” (Lichtenstein interviewed by John Coplans cited in Exh. Cat., Pasadena, Art Museum, Roy Lichtenstein, 1967)

**Roy Lichtenstein, Sinking Sun,** 1964, oil and magna on canvas, 68 x 80 in. 172.7 x 203.2 cm, private collection

Lichtenstein’s Sunrise at the Basil & Elise Goulandris Foundation in Athens is a fine example of his 60’ turn to Landscape representations. A leading figure in 20th century American Pop Art, Roy Lichtenstein used comic book representation and advertising imagery to further enhance his quest for visual perception. The Goulandris’s Sunrise of 1965, enamel on metal, rich texture, improves upon his hard-edged, Pop stylized landscape imagery and heightens the Pop Art Culture. His colour palette, reduced to the three primary colours of red, yellow and blue reminds us of what the artist has said: “I use colour in the same way as a line. I want it oversimplified – anything that could be vaguely red becomes red. It is mock insensitivity. Actual colour adjustment is achieved through manipulation of size, shape and juxtaposition”. (Roy Lichtenstein interviewed by G. R. Swenson cited in Exh. Cat., London, Tate Gallery, Roy Lichtenstein, 1968)

**Roy Lichtenstein, Sunrise,** 1965, Enamel on steel, One from an edition of five, 57.5 × 91.5 cm, Basil & Elise Goulandris Foundation, Athens
https://goulandris.gr/en/artwork/lichtenstein-roy-sunrise

The Roy Lichtenstein Trilogy comes to an end with the Sunrise Dress! now in the Kyoto Costume Institute. It “…caused a stir when worn by Lichtenstein’s friend, Letty Lou Eisenhauer, to the opening of the artist’s 1965 exhibition at the Galerie Ileana Sonnabend in Paris.” The Sunrise dress was accompanied by a simple white coat, “a wearable work of art…the dress being the painting and the coat… a simple white cover-up, concealing the painting until its time to be revealed, for the utmost dramatic effect!” https://www.kci.or.jp/en/archives/digital_archives/1960s/KCI_242?fbclid=IwAR0mjI__BNzqkPN-WUOA-SVQ4OVndv7-gIQk5bJ6WNKx44RLE427hUguvnE

The Basil & Elise Goulandris Foundation in Athens provides an interesting Audio Guide for their visitors… https://goulandris.gr/en/artwork/lichtenstein-roy-sunrise

For a Roy Lichtenstein PowerPoint, please… check HERE!

The Joshua Roll

When I think of Byzantine Manuscripts, the first one that comes to my mind is the Joshua Roll… unique, luxurious and remarkable in every aspect… Hellenistic in spirit!

Dated in the 10^th century, this Macedonian Renaissance illuminated manuscript comes to us in a very rare format, a Roll… 31 cm high and about 10 meters long, one of the most priceless treasures in the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana. The master artist of the Joshua Roll is unknown, but he definitely belonged to a selected group of Constantinopolitan painters trained in a style much influenced by the classicizing tradition prevailing in the Imperial Court of the time.

The Joshua Roll is dedicated to the Old Testament Book of Joshua. Although incomplete, as it starts with Chapter II and ends with Chapter X, it presents the most important adventures and military accomplishments of the great Israelite figurehead. Joshua was originally Moses’ assistant and after his death, the leader of the Israelite tribes, leading them in conquering the promised land of Canaan. When the Joshua Roll was created, the Byzantines were, after a long period of defence, able to successfully campaign in the Holy Land, enjoying decisive victories. Scholars believe that the illuminated manuscript was meant to glorify the military success of the Byzantine army, and exalt their Emperor.

The Joshua Roll is a very unique Codex, unparalleled and unrivalled in the whole world… yet enigmatic! The Bibliography of the Joshua Roll is extensive and challenging. In 2012 another volume was added – Wander, Steven H. The Joshua Roll. Wiesbaden: Reichert Verlag, 2012. pp. 224. ISBN: 978-389-5008-542 – where information of interest and controversy was added to the already extensive arguments. Wander “dates the manuscript to 961 and connects it to the patronage of the powerful middle Byzantine eunuch, courtier, and illegitimate son of Emperor Romanos I Lekapenos (r. 920-944), Basil the Parakoimomenos (chamberlain) (c. 925-c. 985).” Wander takes his controversial interpretation one step further, he “proposes that the Joshua Roll was the study for a small-scale triumphal column that would have commemorated Basil’s military success in the East during the reign of Emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogennetos (r. 945-959).” His arguments, important and novel, challenge long-standing assumptions. (Wander, Steven H. The Joshua Roll. Wiesbaden: Reichert Verlag, 2012. pp. 224. ISBN: 978-389-5008-542 (hardback) and an interesting review https://scholarworks.iu.edu/journals/index.php/tmr/article/view/20003

…and the Joshua fresco from the Hosios Loukas Monastery
https://contentdm.lib.byu.edu/digital/collection/CivilizationHamblin/id/1892/

My favourite assumption is the Roll’s connection to monumental art, and more specifically the art of wall painting. There is a striking connection to a recently discovered fresco in the church of Hosios Loukas in Phocis, and the extraordinary fresco Marian Cycle of the church of Santa Maria Foris Portas a Castelseprio, dazzling its viewers today as it did in 1944 when they were discovered! The similarities between the Joshua Roll illuminations and the Castelseprio frescoes are long-standing, as they are both considered the products of a common artistic tradition. (On Hosios Loukas and the Joshua Roll: Carolyn L. Connor, “Hosios Loukas as a Victory Church,” Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 33, no. 3 (1992): 293-308, esp. 304-305 and on Castelseprio: Kurt Weitzmann, The Fresco Cycle of S. Maria di Castelseprio, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1951)

Santa Maria Di Castelseprio Photos
https://cartesensibili.wordpress.com/2014/05/29/mete-di-viaggio-raffaella-terribile-un-piccolo-scrigno-riscoperto-santa-maria-foris-portas-a-castelseprio/

Coming back to my original statement, the Joshua Roll is… unique, luxurious and remarkable in every aspect and so much so Hellenistic in spirit! The Byzantium I love!

For a Full Digital Fascimile of the Manuscript, please check the site of the Vatican Library: https://digi.vatlib.it/view/MSS_Pal.gr.431.pt.B

For a Joshua Roll Student Activity… check HERE!

The Month of January

The Month of January is a fresco, and it comes from the Torre Aquila in the Castello del Buonconsiglio, in Trento, Italy. It is part of an amazing fresco Cycle of the Twelve Months painted on the walls of the tower’s 2nd-floor main room. Today, only eleven of the original 12 panels survive as a 16th-century wooden spiral staircase, connecting the tower floors, destroyed the painted panel of March. The famous painted Cycle of the Months is divided into twelve panels, one for each month. Each one of the twelve panels is separated by a slender column, distinctive yet subtle, so as not to disturb the natural continuity between months and the seasons.

This exceptional room, 6 x 5,8 x 3 m in size, was commissioned by Prince-Bishop George of Liechtenstein, as a quiet, atmospheric retreat, away from the rest of the Castello’s busy and noisy state quarters. It has been suggested and widely accepted that the painter of this extraordinary fresco Cycle of the Months was Maestro Venceslao, a Czech painter, popular in the Tyrol area of the time.

The Cycle of the Twelve Months is a favourite theme in the arts of the Middle Ages and the Early Renaissance. Often linked to the signs of the Zodiac, the Cycle of the Months is often perceived as a link between the work of man, the seasons of the year and God’s ordering of the Universe. As a theme, it recurred in the sculptural decoration of cathedrals and churches across Europe, in illuminated manuscripts like the popular Books of Hours, palace frescoes and rarely, panel painting.

The fresco panels in Torre Aquila are rare and special. They document life in the Trentino area, with references to the aristocratic pastimes throughout the year, or the peasant activities and duties to their masters. They also depict a vivid landscape, romanticized even then, from bare and covered with snow, to rich and fertile, to autumnal, covered with fallen leaves.

The Trentino frescoes love presenting anecdotal details. The depiction of fashionable outfits for the rich, multicoloured and extravagant in style, or shabby for the farmers and artisans, is only one such striking example. The January panel is “a case in point: nowhere else in art do aristocrats come to play in the snow, men and women alike, chuckling snowballs about with determined, impish delight, their long sleeves dragging in the drifts. Oddly – but surely intentionally – the castle’s roof is snow-free, and its garden is full of summer growth. It’s an image of the warmth of their protected life. Maestro Venceslao was painting a dream, but he wanted to make it as real as possible…”

The Best Art You’ve Never Seen: 101 Hidden Treasures From Around the World by Julian Spalding, Rough Guides Reference, 2010 https://books.google.gr/books?id=L3e0BgAAQBAJ&pg=PA11&lpg=PA11&dq=cycle+of+the+months+paintings&source=bl&ots=PDmmhZPn37&sig=ACfU3U0ZvpPwd-ZSa8dnhL4AUn2uBLt26g&hl=el&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjVxcGIzNzmAhWRGewKHQiuD5g4ChDoATAGegQIBxAB#v=onepage&q=cycle%20of%20the%20months%20paintings&f=false

For a PowerPoint, please… check HERE!

For a Student Activity on the discussed Fresco Panel depicting the Month of January, please… check HERE!

The Flight

There is a small Georges Braque Lithograph, at the Basil & Elise Goulandris Foundation in Athens, titled The Flight. It caught my attention and my thoughts ran wild. I saw a soft lilac bird run, a heavy black duck dancing and a white bird, beautifully outlined over the black one, fly… away! It reminded me of Nietzsche’s idea of …dancing before flying and I felt good, content and accomplished. Please don’t ask why, this small Lithograph felt like a monumental accomplishment, like steps to freedom.

For George Braque, experimenting with the motif of birds in flight, started in1949 and never ended. He even visited the famous bird sanctuary in Camargue, in the south of France. This experience, as you can read, broadened his interest in birds flying, and led to his “metamorphose” bird motif “afresh.”

“One summer, few years ago, I was in the Camargue. I saw some huge birds flying above the waters. From that vision I derived aerial forms. Birds have inspired me, and I try to make the best use of them that I can in my paintings. While they interest me as living animal species, I have to burry in my memory their natural functions as birds. This concept, even after the shock of inspiration which has brought them to life in my mind, must be deleted, so that I can draw closer to my essential preoccupation: the construction of pictorial art. Painting alone must impose its presence on what relates to it, and metamorphose it afresh; everything that goes to make up the picture must be integrated in this presence, and must efface itself before it.”

More on Braque’s fascination with Birds, “Apropos another bird painting, Braque talked to me about his visits to the Camargue, where our mutual friend the ornithologist Lukas Hoffmann… had established a vast bird reserve, La Tour du Valat. …Braque told me how the apparition of a heron flying low above the marshes had inspired his large 1955 Bird Returning to Its Nest, of all the late paintings the one that meant the most to him. Maybe because I shared his feelings for the Camargue, Braque gave me an oil study for this haunting work. I remember him saying how, on still, grey days, the sky seemed to reflect the lagoons rather than the other way round, and the birds seemed to swim through the air… ”

The Art Book Tradition in Twentieth-Century Europe, Edited by Kathryn Brown, Tilburg University, The Netherlands, 2013 by Ashgate Publishing, page 54 https://books.google.gr/books?id=zEMrDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA54&lpg=PA54&dq=Braque+and+Camargue&source=bl&ots=sLPlE6IiJu&sig=ACfU3U29l5ZOfxZgXeBAxTBGDRKti-F73g&hl=el&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwigrvj2lcLmAhVNKuwKHZkyDkIQ6AEwAXoECAkQAQ#v=onepage&q=Braque%20and%20Camargue&f=false

Inside the Artist Studio of Georges Braque by John Richardson, November 13, 2019, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice. Copyright © 1999 by John Richardson Fine Arts Ltd. Published by Knopf on November 12th with a new introduction by Jed Perl https://lithub.com/inside-the-artist-studio-of-georges-braque/

A PowerPoint of my favourite paintings of Birds and Flying, by George Braque… HERE!

Church of the Holy Saviour in Chora

The Church of the Holy Saviour in Chora, part of a grand Monastery, has many stories to tell…

Tradition has it that the church, the Katholikon of a monastic complex, was originally built during the early 5^th century, outside the walls of Constantinople, and its full name was “The Church of the Holy Redeemer in the Fields,” It makes sense. When the city of Constantinople expanded at the time of Theodosius II (408-450), and formidable land walls were built by the Emperor, the monastery retained the name Chora (in the Fields), but became part of the defended city.

Historical evidence tells us that it was Maria Dukaina, the mother-in-law of Alexius I Comnenus, who rebuilt the Chora Church and Monastery around 1077–1081 as a cross- domed church, a popular architectural style of the time. Early in the 12th century, yet another Comnenus, Isaac, the 3^rd son of Emperor Alexius, stepped in, restoring the church after a disastrous earthquake.

Two centuries later, around 1316-21, the powerful Byzantine statesman Theodore Metochites enlarged the church and embellished it with many fine mosaics and frescoes. Today, the Church of the Holy Saviour in Chora stands as one of the finest examples of the Palaeologian Renaissance, in architecture and mosaic-work. Theodoros Metochitis political career was turbulent during the later years of his life: He was exiled by the usurper Emperor Andronicus III in 1328, but two years later, he was allowed to return to the city and live out the last two years of his life as a monk in his beloved Chora Monastery.

Soon after the fall of Constantinople to the Ottomans, the Chora Church was converted into a mosque, named Kariye Camii, serving the city’s Moslem population up until 1958, when it officially opened to the public as a museum, the Kariye Müzesi. Much of what we see today, much of what we know about Chora Church and Monastery is the work of Thomas Whittemore and Paul A. Underwood, from the Byzantine Institute of America and the Dumbarton Oaks Center for Byzantine Studies, who in 1948, sponsored a restoration and research program.

“Fear not, for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people” Luke 2:10

I can only describe the Chora Church mosaics in general, and the Church’s Nativity scene in particular, as…brilliant, outstanding, remarkable and exceptional! They best represent the refined taste of Theodore Metochites, a man, passionate about Greek antiquity and obsessed with the ancient Greek idea of ‘grace’ in art. I stand in front of them and I see elegance, harmony and balance in their compositions. I am amazed by the grace, sophistication and spirit of the depicted figures. I feel warmth, as I am enfolded by their divine light. I marvel at their Hellenistic artistic heritage…

Best Wishes for the Holiday Season!!!

ΥΓΕΊΑ ΣΕ ΌΛΟΥΣ

A PowerPoint on the Nativity scene in the Church of the Holy Saviour in Chora is… HERE!

Mystical Nativity by Sandro Botticelli

**Sandro Botticelli,** about 1445 – 1510
**Mystical Nativity**, about 1501, Tempera on canvas, 108.6 x 74.9 cm, National Gallery, London

Our 1^st Christmas story is about the… Mystical Nativity by Sandro Botticelli.

“I Sandro painted this picture at the end of the year 1500 in the troubles in Italy in the half time after the time according to the 11th chapter of St. John in the second woe of the Apocalypse…”

This small Botticelli painting makes us dream, encourages us to be pensive, romantic and adoring, urges us to study details in the composition, colours, conflicting perspectives and depicted figures. It is a mystery, difficult to solve! John Ruskin saw it in London and referring to its ‘mystic symbolism’ became the painting’s godfather! Its composition is rather unusual combining all of the traditional events of the birth of Jesus and more. Is Botticelli, an ardent follower of Girolamo Savonarola, presenting us with a vision of the Nativity inspired by the prophecies in the biblical Book of Revelation of Saint John? Does Botticelli’s Nativity reveal Christ’s second coming and the end of the world?”

“The infant Christ reaches up towards the Virgin Mary, oblivious of his visitors – the Three Kings on the left and the shepherds on the right. The golden dome of heaven has opened up and is circled by 12 angels holding olive branches entwined with scrolls and hung with crowns. In the foreground, three pairs of angels and men embrace; among their feet demons scuttle for shelter in the underworld through cracks in the rocks. The Greek inscription mentions ‘the troubles of Italy’, a reference to the invasion of the French, who took Naples in 1494 and Milan in 1499, and to the civil strife in Florence itself. Botticelli associated these events with the turmoil mentioned in the biblical Book of Revelation, which talks about the end of the world and Christ’s second coming. The period of upheaval it described would end upon Christ’s return, when the devil would be buried, as in this picture.” This is the description provided by the National Gallery of London https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/sandro-botticelli-mystic-nativity

For a PowerPoint on Botticelli’s Mystical Nativity, please… check HERE!