Andreas Pavias |
When confronted with icons, educated viewers rarely know what theyβre looking at. The problem is not a lack of education, but the nature of the one most of us received. Giorgio Vasari, the father of art history, was right about many things, but he began his Lives of the Artists by taking aim at the βincompetent β¦ crude, stiff, and mediocre β¦ dead tradition of the Greeks.β We know better now: In the last half-century, Byzantine art historians have permanently altered our understanding of neglected Eastern contributions to Italian art. Recently reconsidered Byzantine frescoes and the discovery of icons at St. Catherineβs Monastery, at the foot of Mount Sinai, show that Byzantine painters in fact anticipated Cimabue and Giottoβs innovations centuries beforehand. Historical circumstances, however, permitted these images little chance to influence the late-blooming discipline of art history, an opportunity which fell to Vasari instead.
New York City has been part of the reappraisal of the Byzantine tradition. In 1944, the Metropolitan Musuem of Art was surprised by the popularity of its show displaying copies of the mosaics of Hagia Sofia, one of which still quietly overlooks the medieval sculpture gallery. Since then, the museum has celebrated Byzantine splendor with three blockbuster exhibits: βThe Age of Spiritualityβ (1977), βThe Glory of Byzantiumβ (1997), and