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Photios Kontoglou: Icons as Anagogic Art Transforming Sight
9:56
Blessed Photios Kontoglou's essay "What Orthodox Iconography Is" presents the theological foundation of Byzantine sacred painting. Kontoglou explains that the Christian religion, as a new creation in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17), gives rise to a distinct sacred art. This art, called hagiographia, is anagogic and liturgical: it elevates natural phenomena so the faithful can taste the liturgy and perceive immortal life.
The purpose of Byzantine iconography is not to please the carnal sense but to transform it into a spiritual sense, enabling the viewer to see what surpasses the visible world. Kontoglou contrasts this with Western illusionistic art that arose in the Italian Renaissance. He describes the Renaissance as a rebirth of ancient pagan carnal thought, where theology followed Greek philosophy and painting followed the art of idolaters.
Western painters copied nature with rationalism, producing Madonnas that pose hypocritically and lack mystery. The Greek people distinguish the sentimental "Frankish virgin" from the austere Odigitria, the true Mother of God. Western art uses clouds, sunsets, and sunbeams to depict heavenly glory, but these are only sentimental and emotional, not spiritual.
The blessedness to come has no relation to sense pleasure, for "eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man" (1 Corinthians 2:9). To portray what surpasses nature, iconography must dematerialize visible elements and transmute them from carnal to spiritual, just as faith transmutes passions into love for God.
The material elements pass through the pure soul of the iconographer like gold through a refiner's fire. The beauty of liturgical art is spiritual, not carnal; worldly judges call the figures ugly while the faithful perceive the beautiful transformation. An ascetic who sees created beauty as a reason to glorify God is already incorruptible before the resurrection.
Key moments
- Because Christ's religion makes the believer a new creation, the art that expresses its mystery is a new art; the church's arts are anagogical, elevating natural phenomena through a beautiful transformation, and liturgical, letting man taste the liturgy and become like the heavenly hosts.
- Byzantine sacred painting (hagiographia) took form in Byzantium as the mystical ark of Christ's religion; its purpose is not to please the carnal sense of light but to transform it into a spiritual sense so that in visible things we see what surpasses this world.
- Illusionistic art arose in the Italian Renaissance as a rebirth of the ancient pagan carnal mode of thought; theology followed Greek philosophy and painting followed the art of the ancient idolaters, so Western religious art became materialistic and worldly.
- Western painters tried to perfect Byzantine iconography by copying nature, faces, clothes, buildings, landscapes, with the same rationalism the theologians applied to doctrine, producing works with no mystery in which men merely masquerade as saints.
- The Greek people call a woman who pretends to respectability a "Franco Panagia" (Frankish virgin), drawing a sharp distinction between the sentimental Western Madonnas and the true Mother of God, the austere Odigitria.
- Western painters used clouds, sunsets, and sunbeams to depict heavenly glory, but these are only sentimental and emotional, not spiritual; the blessedness to come has no relation to sense pleasure, for "eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man."
- To portray what surpasses nature, iconography must dematerialize visible elements and transmute them from carnal to spiritual, just as faith transmutes carnal passions into love for God; the material elements of Byzantine iconography pass through the pure soul of the iconographer like gold through a refiner's fire.
- The beauty of liturgical art is spiritual, not carnal; worldly judges call the figures ugly while the faithful perceive the beautiful transformation, and an ascetic who sees created beauty as a reason to glorify God is already incorruptible before the resurrection.