The Dawn of Christian Art in Panel Paintings and Icons

The Dawn of Christian Art in Panel Paintings and Icons PDF

Author: Thomas F. Mathews

Publisher: Getty Publications

Published: 2017-02-01

Total Pages: 59

ISBN-13: 1606065092

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Staking out new territory in the history of art, this book presents a compelling argument for a lost link between the panel-painting tradition of Greek antiquity and Christian paintings of Byzantium and the Renaissance. While art historians place the origin of icons in the seventh century, Thomas F. Mathews finds strong evidence as early as the second century in the texts of Irenaeus and the Acts of John that describe private Christian worship. In closely studying an obscure set of sixty neglected panel paintings from Egypt in Roman times, the author explains how these paintings of the Egyptian gods offer the missing link in the long history of religious painting. Christian panel paintings and icons are for the first time placed in a continuum with the pagan paintings that preceded them, sharing elements of iconography, technology, and religious usages as votive offerings. Exciting discoveries punctuate the narrative: the technology of the triptych, enormously popular in Europe, traced by the authors to the construction of Egyptian portable shrines, such as the Isis and Serapis of the J. Paul Getty Museum; the discovery that the egg tempera painting medium, usually credited to Renaissance artist Cimabue, has been identified in Egyptian panels a millennium earlier; and the reconstruction of a ring of icons on the chancel of Saint Sophia in Istanbul. This book will be a vital addition to the fields of Egyptian, Graeco-Roman, and late-antique art history and, more generally, to the history of painting.

The Clash of Gods

The Clash of Gods PDF

Author: Thomas F. Mathews

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2022-09-13

Total Pages: 408

ISBN-13: 0691246998

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Between the third and sixth centuries, the ancient gods, goddesses, and heroes who had populated the imagination of humankind for a millennium were replaced by a new imagery of Christ and his saints. Thomas Mathews explores the many different, often surprising, artistic images and religious interpretations of Christ during this period. He challenges the accepted theory of the "Emperor Mystique," which, interpreting Christ as king, derives the vocabulary of Christian art from the propagandistic imagery of the Roman emperor. This revised edition contains a new preface by the author and a new chapter on the origin and development of icons in private domestic cult.

Late Antique Portraits and Early Christian Icons

Late Antique Portraits and Early Christian Icons PDF

Author: Andrew Paterson

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2022-06-30

Total Pages: 258

ISBN-13: 100060022X

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This book focuses on the earliest surviving Christian icons, dated to the sixth and seventh centuries, which bear many resemblances to three other well-established genres of ‘sacred portrait’ also produced during late antiquity, namely Roman imperial portraiture, Graeco-Egyptian funerary portraiture and panel paintings depicting non-Christian deities. Andrew Paterson addresses two fundamental questions about devotional portraiture – both Christian and non-Christian – in the late antique period. Firstly, how did artists visualise and construct these images of divine or sanctified figures? And secondly, how did their intended viewers look at, respond to, and even interact with these images? Paterson argues that a key factor of many of these portrait images is the emphasis given to the depicted gaze, which invites an intensified form of personal encounter with the portrait’s subject. The book will be of interest to scholars working in art history, theology, religion and classical studies.

The Structural Conservation of Panel Paintings

The Structural Conservation of Panel Paintings PDF

Author: Kathleen Dardes

Publisher: Getty Publications

Published: 1998-10-29

Total Pages: 582

ISBN-13: 0892363843

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This volume presents the proceedings of an international symposium organized by the Getty Conservation Institute and the J. Paul Getty Museum. The first conference of its kind in twenty years, the symposium assembled an international group of conservators of painted panels, and gave them the opportunity to discuss their philosophies and share their work methods. Illustrated in color throughout, this volume presents thirty-one papers grouped into four topic areas: Wood Science and Technology, History of Panel-Manufacturing Techniques, History of the Structural Conservation of Panel Paintings, and Current Approaches to the Structural Conservation of Panel Paintings.

Christian Art

Christian Art PDF

Author: Rowena Loverance

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2007

Total Pages: 256

ISBN-13: 9780674024793

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At once a sumptuously illustrated survey of Christian art over time and across the globe as well as a study of what RChristian artS really means, Loverance concludes with an assessment of the current state of this art form at the beginning of the 21st century.

Mummy Portraits of Roman Egypt

Mummy Portraits of Roman Egypt PDF

Author: Marie Svoboda

Publisher: Getty Publications

Published: 2020-08-25

Total Pages: 413

ISBN-13: 1606066536

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This publication presents fascinating new findings on ancient Romano-Egyptian funerary portraits preserved in international collections. Once interred with mummified remains, nearly a thousand funerary portraits from Roman Egypt survive today in museums around the world, bringing viewers face-to-face with people who lived two thousand years ago. Until recently, few of these paintings had undergone in-depth study to determine by whom they were made and how. An international collaboration known as APPEAR (Ancient Panel Paintings: Examination, Analysis, and Research) was launched in 2013 to promote the study of these objects and to gather scientific and historical findings into a shared database. The first phase of the project was marked with a two-day conference at the Getty Villa. Conservators, scientists, and curators presented new research on topics such as provenance and collecting, comparisons of works across institutions, and scientific studies of pigments, binders, and supports. The papers and posters from the conference are collected in this publication, which offers the most up-to-date information available about these fascinating remnants of the ancient world. The free online edition of this open-access publication is available at www.getty.edu/publications/mummyportraits/ and includes zoomable illustrations and graphs. Also available are free PDF, EPUB, and Kindle/MOBI downloads of the book.

Understanding Early Christian Art

Understanding Early Christian Art PDF

Author: Robin M. Jensen

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2023-08-29

Total Pages: 322

ISBN-13: 1000924483

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Surveying the content and character of early Christian iconography from the third to the sixth century CE, this substantially revised and updated new edition of Understanding Early Christian Art makes the critical tools of art historians accessible to students. It opens by discussing a series of questions pertaining to the evidence itself and how scholars through the centuries have regarded this material as expressing and transmitting aspects of the developing faith and practice of early adherents of Christianity. It considers possible sources for the various motifs and the complex relationship between words and images, as well as the importance of studying visual and material culture alongside theological and liturgical texts. Rather than organising surviving examples by medium or chronology, the chapters categorise the evidence according to their general iconographic type, such as generic symbols, biblical narratives, and portraits. Each chapter takes up important questions of visual culture, formal style, and the ways in which the iconography is distinct from or shows parallels with contemporary documentary sources like sermons, exegetical works, catechetical lectures, or dogmatic treatises. Concluding with a discussion of the late-emerging depictions of Jesus’s crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension, it remains a valuable guide to comprehending the complex theology, history, and context of Christian art. Augmented by over 140 full-colour images, accompanied by parallel text, the interdisciplinary and boundary-breaking approach taken in this extensively revised edition of Understanding Early Christian Art enables students and scholars in fields such as religion and art history to further their understanding and knowledge of the art of the early Christian era.

Perceptions of the Body and Sacred Space in Late Antiquity and Byzantium

Perceptions of the Body and Sacred Space in Late Antiquity and Byzantium PDF

Author: Jelena Bogdanovic

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2018-04-09

Total Pages: 419

ISBN-13: 1351359606

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Perceptions of the Body and Sacred Space in Late Antiquity and Byzantium seeks to reveal Christian understanding of the body and sacred space in the medieval Mediterranean. Case studies examine encounters with the holy through the perspective of the human body and sensory dimensions of sacred space, and discuss the dynamics of perception when experiencing what was constructed, represented, and understood as sacred. The comparative analysis investigates viewers’ recognitions of the sacred in specific locations or segments of space with an emphasis on the experiential and conceptual relationships between sacred spaces and human bodies. This volume thus reassesses the empowering aspects of space, time, and human agency in religious contexts. By focusing on investigations of human endeavors towards experiential and visual expressions that shape perceptions of holiness, this study ultimately aims to present a better understanding of the corporeality of sacred art and architecture. The research points to how early Christians and Byzantines teleologically viewed the divine source of the sacred in terms of its ability to bring together – but never fully dissolve – the distinctions between the human and divine realms. The revealed mechanisms of iconic perception and noetic contemplation have the potential to shape knowledge of the meanings of the sacred as well as to improve our understanding of the liminality of the profane and the sacred.

Phenomenology of the Icon

Phenomenology of the Icon PDF

Author: Stephanie Rumpza

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2023-08-31

Total Pages: 313

ISBN-13: 100931792X

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Interweaving art history, patristics, theology, and aesthetics, this original phenomenological study develops a fresh new approach to the icon.

The Routledge Handbook of Early Christian Art

The Routledge Handbook of Early Christian Art PDF

Author: Robin M. Jensen

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2018-05-20

Total Pages: 398

ISBN-13: 1317514173

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The Routledge Handbook of Early Christian Art surveys a broad spectrum of Christian art produced from the late second to the sixth centuries. The first part of the book opens with a general survey of the subject and then presents fifteen essays that discuss specific media of visual art—catacomb paintings, sculpture, mosaics, gold glass, gems, reliquaries, ceramics, icons, ivories, textiles, silver, and illuminated manuscripts. Each is written by a noted expert in the field. The second part of the book takes up themes relevant to the study of early Christian art. These seven chapters consider the ritual practices in decorated spaces, the emergence of images of Christ’s Passion and miracles, the functions of Christian secular portraits, the exemplary mosaics of Ravenna, the early modern history of Christian art and archaeology studies, and further reflection on this field called “early Christian art.” Each of the volume’s chapters includes photographs of many of the objects discussed, plus bibliographic notes and recommendations for further reading. The result is an invaluable introduction to and appraisal of the art that developed out of the spread of Christianity through the late antique world. Undergraduate and graduate students of late classical, early Christian, and Byzantine culture, religion, or art will find it an accessible and insightful orientation to the field. Additionally, professional academics, archivists, and curators working in these areas will also find it valuable as a resource for their own research, as well as a textbook or reference work for their students.