Byzantine Art

Byzantine Art!!

Early Byzantine Age 527 – 726 (Justinian 527 - 565)
Iconoclasm 730 – 787 and 814 - 842
Middle –843 – 1204 (restoration of icons)
Break from the Western Church – 1054
Constantinople Falls to Venetian Invaders in the 4th Crusade - 1203
Late Period 1261 – 1453
The fall of Constantinople to Mehmed II of the Ottoman Empire - 1453

Justinian
reigned 527 - 565
In the late Fifth and early Sixth Centuries, the Western half of The Roman Empire fell into a shambles. Even Italy was under the control of feuding barbarians.TheEmporer Justinian rallied his forces and Recoverred Ravenna. For a short time Ravenna became the Byzantine capital in the West and a number of important early Byzantine monuments are preserved there today. The church of San Vitale in Ravenna is one of these monuments. SanVitale's humble exterior protects a glistening interior full of glass mosaics and sumptuous decorative marble.

Emperor Justinian and Attendants, Saint Vitale, Ravenna, c.547

Built during the city’s rebuilding after riots of 532
“Purple makes a fine shroud” – attributed to Theodora

Pendentive vs. Squinch

Hagia Sophia – Holy Wisdom
Designed by 2 scholar-theoreticians:
Anthemius of Tralles (geometry and optics) & Isisorus of Miletus (physics)
Rumored to have been constructed by angels in 5 years (532 – 537)
Massiveness of piers and walls disguised by mosaics
Dome has a band of 40 windows around the top making it appear to float (first one fell in 558)

Early Byzantine Art in the Age of Justinian
Hagia Sophia, Istanbul
Combination of central plan and axial plan
Exterior: plain and massive, little decoration
Altar at far end, but emphasis placed over the area covered by the dome
Dome supported by pendentives
Powerful central dome, with forty windows at base
Cornice unifies space
Arcade decoration: wall and capitals are flat and thin but richly ornamented
Great fields for mosaic decoration
At one time had four acres of gold mosaics on walls

Many windows punctuate wall space
Minarets added in Islamic period

Apse mosaic (detail) hagia sophia, 867

Emperor Justinian and Attendants, Saint Vitale, Ravenna, c.547

Justinian and Attendants

To his left the clergy, to his right the military
Dressed in royal purple and gold
Symmetry, frontality
Holds a plate for the host, or perhaps a golden bowl
Slight impression of procession forward
No volume of figures, seem to float, and yet step on each other’s feet
No background to set the figures in space
No landscape, gold background indicates timelessness
Maximianus identified, patron of San Vitale
Halo indicates saintliness

Pictorial space not depicted as a window to the natural world (i.e. Romans)

Theodora and Attendants, Saint Vitale, Ravenna, c.547

Theodora and Attendants

Hieratic composition
Slight displacement of absolute symmetry with Theodora
Sumptuously executed
She holds a chalice for the ceremony and is about to go behind the curtain
Altar boys and ladies at court accompany her

Mosaics

More abstract than Roman Paintings
Used as narrative illustrations to instruct the faithful
Bright colors, small bits of stone, glass tesserae

S. Vitale, c. 525 -547
Commisioned by Bishop Ecclesius

Column Capitals, San Vitale

Column Capitals, Hagia Sophia

Santa Costanza, Rome
Ambulatory

Early Byzantine Artin the Age of Justinian
San Vitale, Ravenna (c. 547)
Byzantine forces capture Ravenna in 540
8 sided structure
Plain exterior except porch added later in Renaissance
Large windows for illuminating interior designs
Interior has thin columns and open arched spaces, complex spatial system
Sense of mystery in the space

Transfiguration of Christ with Sant’Apollinare, 1st Bishop of Ravenna (549)

Revelation of Christ’s divinity
12 sheep surround Christ
Expressing essential spiritual meaning rather than the material world

Moses and Elijah
Apostles Peter, James and John
Bishop Appolinaris

Byzantine Icons
How Icons Are Made
Made of rectangular wooden panels
Painters were monks and worked with humility, rarely signing anything
Wood prepared by covering the surface with fish glue and then a layer of putty
Cloth placed on top and successive layers of stucco are laid over the cloth
Paper sketch is placed over and lines are traced on the surface
Gilded, then painted
Varnish applied last to make it shine and protect the surface
Icons were often handled and kissed

Byzantine Icons
Iconoclastic Controversy: icons prohibited as sacrilegious and pagan between 726-843
Pronounced by Leo III and caused widespread destruction, destroying most icons

Thought to have miraculous powers
Jesus sent a portait to King Abgar of Edessa, known as the Mandylion. In Constantinople and taken by Crusaders in 10th century
Church at first was uneasy about the power of images, but accepted as aids to meditation and prayer
Created a need for more immediate and personal religion

Monastery of St. Catherine, Mount Sinai, built by Justinian, ca. 550

Virgin of Vladimir
c. 11th or 12thcentury
“Virgin of Compassion”
The spread from Constantinople to Kiev

Byzantine Icons
Virgin and Child Enthroned between Saints Theodore and George (c. 600)

Theodore and George, two military saints, have rigid frontal poses, as befits the military
Archangels painted with free open brushwork
Devoid of depth
Virgin relatively solid and three-dimensional, her knees to the right
Virgin’s head frontal, but eyes averted
Christ convincingly rendered as a child
Perhaps executed by three different artists in different styles

Annunciation (c. 1300)