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Orthodox Christian Iconography - Page 8

© Stefan Crisbasan

Between the Latin and Greek theologians, there was a different understanding of the meaning and purpose of icons. For the west, a representation of a holy person or event remained a means of instruction, although the west knew also the wonder-working icon. The differences are summed up in Libri Carolini where it is stated that the Greeks place all their hope on the icons whereas the Latins venerate the saints in their relics or even in their vestments. A different mind is at work. One, the Western is more concrete, prefers to express itself in stone rather than painting. The other, the Greek, philosophical and abstract, led to a metaphysical interpretation of the icon, which explains the vital role the icon played in the Eastern Church. In the West, the artist was let free to interpret the religious episodes according to his own concepts and emotions. Moreover, although sculptures, mostly of the Mother of God and saints, often became objects of liturgical cult, the icon as such remained unknown to the west. Religious panels in Churches were not considered revelations of a metaphysical reality. Even in Italy where for centuries the Byzantine art was greatly venerated and religious panels were produced much like Byzantine icons, these remained religious paintings only. They lacked the confrontation of man with the Holy. Since the Gothic period, the West was interestdc in presenting the state of one's emotions when one attempted to raise himself towards God.

In the East, through the icon, the grace of a personal meeting with the Divine was bestowed upon the faithful. The icon made the Holy present. The religious panel expressed what men felt about the Holy. The icon was developed and established in Byzantium which, after its fall, continued to be the source of spiritual life for the entire Orthodox Church. In the hands of the Greeks, the direct heirs of Byzantium, icon painting continued in the monasteries of the mainland, in the islands, and above all in Crete whose painters through contacts with the West, especially with Venice, enriched the repertory of iconography in the sixteenth and seventeenth century.

The theme of the transfiguration of nature and man's deification - man becomes god by grace - is declared in the Eastern Church through the liturgical arts. The icon is one of them and in its own way, it reveals the incorruptible Kingdom of God. The prototype represented by material means belongs to the corrupt world. Its transcendental quality, however, can be expressed by the fixation of the type, which removes that which is represented from all that is ephemeral. The icons are then pure fixation. This is why the icons cannot be represented according to the imagination of the artist or a living model. The relationship between the prototype and the image would have been lost. For this reason the icon painter uses manuals, like the Greek Hermeneia or the Russian Podlinnik which describe the iconography scenes and colors to be used. However, the use of manuals alone does not guarantee the painting of the sacred image. The painter must be 'illuminated'. This is why, according to Tradition, Saint Luke painted the icon of the Virgin Mary after the Pentecost.

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