A műemlékek sokszínűsége (A 28. Egri Nyári Egyetem előadásai 1998 Eger, 1998)

Előadások / Presentations - Georgiosz PROKOPIU: The polychromy in byzantine art church decoration, origin, form and technique

them that hue of earthly warmth, that contrasts so dramatically with their spirituality, it transmutes them from abstract symbols into moving divinities. The decoration of the Byzantine church attains supreme heights with the painting of the sacred scenes that introduce both a human and superhuman scale in the architectural work. Thanks to them, space becomes not merely larger, but more majestic, constructing a world that is suspended from the glance of the Almighty, and across which the angels' wings flutter and the saints' feet tread. The reproduction of this heavenly hierarchy, involved problems of scale, composition and style in Byzantine iconography, closely bound up with its architecture. No aesthetic analysis intended to reveal the sublime character of the Byzantine church can, therefore, ignore its iconography. This is why we must always examine decoration, mosaics and wall paintings, as an inseparable part of the Byzantine church. To quote again from prof. P. Michelis: „The painting of any great architectural style cannot, of course, be judged independently of its architectural setting, and in the Byzantine church to overlook the decorations and sacred paintings in themselves, would be to miss not only the goal of the great architectural style, but also the spirit of the age. For the church paintings, in narrating the Lord's Passion and depicting the Donors, Martyrs, Saints and God Himself, were the mute interpreters of the Christian dogma. As St. Basil puts it, „What the verbal account presents to the ear, the silent picture presents by imitation". Being thus didactic as they were descriptive, they were able more directly to offer the moral as well as the aesthetic, nature of the church's sublime scope, of which architecture, (depending on intellectual and abstract forms) could exhibit only a part. Furthermore, the icon, from the theological point of view, was regarded (in accordance with the theory of emanation introduced by the Neoplatonists and adopted by the Christian Church) as a product of illumination. It partakes of the sanctity of the prototype, because it is identical with it, according to meaning. In this sense the painting completed and complemented the architectural edifice. The position of the paintings in the church depended as much on the hierarchical order established by the dogma as on the inner architecture of the church: each painting demanded a surface as eminent as its subject. If the sacred scenes, figures and emblems in the building had to be painted to the size and allotted the space and position befitting their hierarchiai importance, then the size and importance of the surfaces, as established by the architectural composition, had to be seriously considered. A simultaneous grading of surfaces and pictures was needed. In the church, (as we have seen) the dome and the apse symbolised heaven, and the square of the floor the earth. Iconography, on the other hand, following the dogma, defined three zones in the church, representing a. Heaven, b. the life of Christ and c. the earth with the Army of Saints. Such theological views on the symbols and their disposition in the church agreed perfectly with the aesthetic conception which embraced them. We find, thus, the Cherubim placed high up in the building, in what would seem to be the most fitting place, the four pendentives, (although later the Evangelists were placed there as an escort to the Almighty). In Haghia Sophia the Cherubim, placed in the pendentives, are not only themselves displayed to advantage, but their symbolic attributes also conribute to the illusory elevation of the dome, seeming, as they do, to carry it on their wings. TECHNIQUE Byzantine monumental painting employed two techniques mainly with which to stress its sublime character: mosaic and fresco. Mosaic is constructed with small cubes of glass or stone, which are either applied directly or placed in