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 Svetlana
Rakić
Assistant Professor of Fine Arts at Franklin College
Icons
of Bosnia-Herzegovina
(16th-19th century)
Resume
Belgrade 1998, Institute for the Protection of Cultural
Monuments of the Republic of Serbia, Belgrade, Special editions 21,
Before the outburst of hostilities in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1992,
more than two thousand icons were housed in Serbian churches, from five
different dioceses.[1] With only one exception, all of the
icons date from the time of Ottoman rule, i.e. from the fifteenth to the
nineteenth centuries, and display a variety of origins and styles within
the general framework of post-Byzantine art. Most of them were done by
Serbian and Greek icon-painters, although a significant number of Russian,
Bulgarian and Romanian icons are also included in the Bosnian collections.
With very few exceptions, none of these has ever been reproduced for publication.
The richest collection by far (642 icons) was housed in the Church of
the Holy Archangels (the Old Serbian Orthodox Church) in Sarajevo (fig.
I). The treasuries of the Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin
(the Old Orthodox Church) in Mostar (fig. II), of the Episcopal Palace
in Tuzla (fig. III), and of the Serbian church in Livno also stored large
collections of icons. The monasteries of Lomnica (fig. IX), Žitomislić
(fig. XI), Zavala (XIII), and Gomionica (fig. XXI) had valuable specimens
of post-Byzantine icon-painting too. Many icons from Bosnia have been
destroyed or damaged in the recent war, some of them were moved to other
Serbian churches in safer places, while a few have remained at their original
locations.
The only extant example of icon painting in Bosnia dating from pre-Turkish
times is the processional icon of The Virgin Peribleptos (figs.
IV-V). The image of the Virgin and Child (fig. IV) is painted on one side,
and of St. John the Baptist on the other. Popularly known as the Čajniče
Beauty and deemed miraculous, the icon comes from the Church of the
Dormition in Čajniče, a traditional place of pilgrimage. It is the work
of a Byzantine artist who was probably serving at the court of the Serbian
king Stefan Dečanski in the first half of the fourteenth century.
At some later point, possibly in the sixteenth century, parts of the
icon were repainted. The original layer of paint has been preserved on
the faces, but the retouched surfaces around them cannot be precisely
dated until the coat of wax, spread over both sides of the icon, is removed.
The Child holds in his hands a scroll with an inscription in Serbian,
and not in the original Greek. On the opposite side, the scroll held by
St. John is written in Greek.
Sava Kosanović, a teacher from Sarajevo, noted in 1870 that the icon
of the Čajniče Virgin was brought to Bosnia from Serbia after the
monastery of Banja near Priboj had been abandoned. If this is true, then
there is a strong possibility that the icon was painted around 1329-1330,
while Stefan Dečanski was building his memorial church of St. Nicholas
of Dabar in Banja. Even before the royal memorial was erected, Banja had
been an episcopal center, and it remained the seat of Dabar's bishops
long afterwards. It is possible that the king himself commissioned the
icon while the church in Banja was being constructed.
Bilateral icons (painted on both sides) were carried during processions
as early as the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. These icons were particularly
respected and sometimes deemed miraculous, just like the Čajniče icon.
For this reason they received more attention from donors and other believers
and were exhibited in churches in prominent places, either on iconostases
or on supporting columns, if such existed. Bilateral processional icons
are rarely found among works of Byzantine art.
Most of them have been preserved in Ohrid, Macedonia. Among a number
of early fourteenth-century icons that once belonged to the Church of
The Virgin Peribleptos in Ohrid (today the Church of St. Clement) is the
icon of the Virgin Peribleptos, now in the National Museum in Ohrid,
which features the same characteristics as the contemporary Čajniče
Virgin. Both icons are modeled after a well-known prototype, the reputedly
miraculous icon from the monastery of the Virgin Peribleptos in Constantinople.
Characteristic features of the last great period of Byzantine art, the
Paleologan Renaissance, present in both Ohrid and Čajniče icons, are seen
in the classical shape of the Virgin's face, the very restricted range
of colors, stressed sentimentality, and specific maternal emotions towards
the Child. As early as the eleventh century, "the crying Virgin" and "the
passionate Virgin" were mentioned in church poetry. The endless sorrow
of the Virgin's face and the pointedly worried face of Christ in the Čajniče
icon, reveal their dramatic inner tension by means of deep shadows and
slanting eyebrows, which stress the eternal grief in the Virgin's eyes.
A small iconographic idiosyncrasy of the Čajniče Virgin - the fact that
she holds the Child on her right arm, and not on her left as usual - connects
this motif with the legend of the icon painted by St. Luke while the Virgin
herself was posing for him. Among wooden icons, this iconographic type
first occurred in the Virgin from the Serbian monastery of Hilandar
on Mount Athos (thirteenth century), in the Virgin Episkepsis from
the Church of the Holy Healers Cosmas and Damian in Ohrid (the second
half of the fourteenth century), and in the Čajniče icon.
How much the practical function of an icon influenced its subject matter
and the manner of its artistic execution is particularly important question
when processional icons are concerned. The image of St. John the Baptist
is related to the sorrowful expression on the Virgin's face on the reverse
side. The scroll written in Greek which the Baptist holds in his hands
reads as follows: "Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand" (Matthew
4: 17). The words define the Baptist as a prophet who announces Christ's
incarnation. The Virgin's final realization of the necessity of Christ's
sufferings in order to attain salvation, as well as a comprehensive utterance
of the secret of sacrifice and salvation, is a part of the theological
idea of the Čajniče icon. An early appearance of the same passage accompanying
representations of St. John the Baptist in the same manner as presented
in the Čajniče icon, can be found in the monasteries of Nerezi (twelfth
century), Žiča (thirteenth century) and Gračanica (fourteenth century).
The Čajniče icon was furnished with its cover of gilded silver in 1868
(fig. V). It took the Sarajevo goldsmith, Risto Andrić, three years to
produce such an outstanding example of metal work in the nineteenth-century
Bosnia.
All Serbian icons preserved in Bosnia date from the sixteenth century
onwards. They reveal some interesting changes in iconography that occurred
in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and the rare but genuine penetration
of elements typical of contemporary Cretan painting. At the same time,
other examples from the Bosnian collections illustrate the persistence
of Byzantine traditions in Serbian post-Byzantine art.
Ever since it obtained its independent status in 1219, the Serbian Orthodox
Church has been the major source of national awareness for the Serbs.
This became even more apparent after 1557, when the Ottomans permitted
the restoration of the Serbian Patriarchate at Peć. Demanding of their
painters complete Fidelity to Orthodoxy and the artistic principles of
the old masters, Serbian bishops stressed the importance of tradition
and the cult of local saints, thus recalling the past glory of the Serbian
medieval kingdom.
However, in a few icons from Bosnia painted by the most talented and
educated Serbian painters from the sixteenth and the seventeenth centuries,
who perfectly embodied the ideas of the Patriarchate of Peć, we can observe
some minor but interesting changes that occurred in Serbian art of that
period. Some of them are directly related to problems of national identity.
During the late Middle Ages, Byzantium was an ideal which the Serbian
court and church tried to imitate. After the loss of national independence,
this consciously appropriated foreign cultural model became the only relevant
element of historical and religious legitimacy for the Serbs. Byzantine
art from Serbian medieval monasteries in the Turkish period became the
only expression of Serbian national and spiritual identity, losing its
Byzantine connotations in the process.
Reflecting the new historical circumstances and the consequent spiritual
needs of the Serbs, the medieval iconography of Serbian rulers acquired
some new elements, with the stress shifting from their sainthood to their
martyrdom. A clear example of this change is seen in representations of
the Serbian Prince Lazar, who was killed in the battle of Kosovo in 1389.
While during his lifetime he was celebrated in art as a ruler and a donor
of churches,[2] in the seventeenth century he was primarily
a martyr saint, for the Church now saw him as a man who had died while
leading his Christian army against the infidel Turks. This change in iconography
is apparent in an early seventeenth-century icon from the Old Church in
Sarajevo. The icon, representing the Apostle Paul and Prince Lazar
(fig. 37), is a work by a Serbian artist by the name of Radul. The upper
part of the icon, which includes the names of the saints, is damaged,
and only the last three letters of Lazar's name have remained. While the
apostle Paul is represented with his traditional iconographical features,
the depiction of Prince Lazar has some interesting details. Lazar is dressed
in the royal garb, divitision, richly decorated with a golden foliage
ornament, and he is wearing a golden rounded crown on his head. Lazar's
martyrdom is emphasized by a thin white cross which he holds in his hands.
The cult of Prince Lazar developed in Serbian frescoes and icons during
the time of Radul's life, around the fourth decade of the seventeenth
century. This is when the new image of Prince Lazar occurred - he was
envisioned as a martyr ruler and a leader of the Serbs in the battle of
Kosovo. This change in iconography, which reflected the specific historical
circumstances and spiritual needs of the Serbs, who at that time had been
living under the Turkish occupation for more than two centuries, would
further develop and spread in the eighteenth century.
The same trends can be observed in the contemporary products of peasant
culture as well. In Serbian epic poetry the position of Prince Lazar before
the fatal battle and his preference for the "heavenly" kingdom (seen in
his choice to die rather than live under the Turks), are compared to that
of Jesus Christ during the Last Supper. Serbian oral epics illustrate
how medieval grandeur was envisioned and preserved in the shared consciousness
of peasants and how important it was in the process of their self-definition.
Since the Serbian aristocracy was completely destroyed in the fifteenth
century, the peasantry became the major social group to carry on national
awareness. This fact is reflected in the penetration of some elements
of "lower" culture into icon painting. A good example of those rare but
significant modifications of common iconography is the icon of St. George
(fig. 6) from Čajniče, dating from 1574. In one of the scenes from the
saint's life, which presents the destruction of pagan idols, St. George
is shown pulling the Emperor Diocletian by the beard and hitting him on
the head. In the mind of a Serbian peasant, this way of settling accounts
obviously was more meaningful than throwing away sculptures of pagan gods,
which was the traditional way of representing this scene.
Some examples of Serbian icons from Bosnia illustrate the random penetration
of Cretan elements into contemporary Serbian icon painting. An example
of this process is seen in a Serbian icon from the Old Church in Sarajevo
representing Christ as the King of Kings and the Great Archpriest
(fig. 18). The icon was done in the early seventeenth century, probably
by one of the followers of Georgije Mitrofanović, if not by the famous
master himself. There are considerable similarities in style between this
obscure icon and the one of the Holy Trinity (fig. 17) from Foča,
signed by Georgije Mitrofanović and dated around 1616. On both icons Christ's
face is modeled with broad dark brown shades which leave only narrow rosy-ochre
lighted parts under the eyes. The drawing of the facial features is brown
except for the eyes and eyebrows, which are black. Both upper and lower
lip of the small mouth are delineated with white light accents. The prominent
cheekbones, short white comma-like striations under the eyes, the small,
barely visible ears, the soft rendering of the thin beard and mustache,
as well as the very thin and elongated fingers of Christ in both icons,
closely connect the Sarajevo icon with the known work of Georgije Mitrofanović.
Elements of Cretan painting are prominent in both icons. In the Sarajevo
icon, they are seen in Christ's marble throne with decorative vases on
top of it, a detail which clearly comes from Venetian painting. In the
icon from Foča, the dense golden striation of the draperies, one of the
hallmarks of the Cretan school, differentiates Mitrofanović from his contemporaries.
While most Serbian artists from the Turkish period looked back to Byzantine
art preserved in Serbian medieval monasteries, Mitrofanović, a monk from
Hilandar, incorporated in his work elements of the sixteenth century Greek
painting, with which he became familiar while living on Mount Athos.
Despite the minor changes in iconography and the random penetration of
Cretan elements, Serbian art during the Turkish period was hostile to
any major innovations or foreign influences, especially Western. Icons
done after 1557 represented the spiritual expression of people who endeavored,
by maintaining their cultural traditions, to preserve their faith and
the awareness of their ethnic roots.
A good example of this is an icon from the Old Church in Sarajevo done
by Andrija Raičević, a prominent early seventeenth-century Serbian painter,
representing St. Nicholas (fig. 25). The icon bears no trace of
Western art. St. Nicholas is presented in the traditional way, as seen
in Byzantine art from the twelfth century on: a very high forehead with
stylized wrinkles, framed by a narrow wreath of white hair that continues
along the sunken cheeks and ends in a rounded beard. The icon representing
the Deesis composition with the enthroned Christ flanked by the Virgin
and the Baptist (fig. 28) is similar; done by Jovan, it rejects the soft
modeling and humanized facial expressions of the Western Renaissance and
depicts an abstract type of saint, belonging to the classical tradition
of Byzantine art.
The majority of icons preserved in Bosnia before the civil war was done
by Serbian monk artists who traveled through all the lands of the former
Serbian kingdom and worked for churches and monasteries. Specimens of
Serbian icon painting from Bosnia illustrate almost all the major stylistic
and iconographic features of Serbian art from the time of Ottoman rule.
Although they are mostly works of anonymous icon painters, sometimes they
are signed by some of the best Serbian masters of the period. The earliest
preserved signature dates from 1568 and is found on the icon of the Virgin
Hodegetria (fig. 5) from the collection of the Art Gallery of Bosnia
and Herzegovina in Sarajevo. Signed and dated by Tudor Vukovic from Maine
near Budva, it is the only known work by this iconographer, who probably
came from Dubrovnik or Kotor.
Much more is known about the Peć monk Longin, the most talented and educated
of the painters who worked in Serbia after the restoration of the Patriarchate
at Peć in 1557. He was a poet and a prolific artist who left many signed
icons and frescoes, literary compositions, and painted textiles for church
use. All of his works are dated between 1563 and 1597. Longin enjoyed
a fine reputation and received commissions from the heads of the greatest
monasteries. His most famous works were done for the monasteries of Dečani
and Piva, the churches of Velika Hoča (Kosovo) and St. Nicholas at Bijelo
Polje (Montenegro), and in central Bosnia, where he painted and signed
frescoes and icons for the monastery of Lomnica (figs. 7-16). Inspired
by the best traditions of Byzantine fourteenth century painting, Longin
fused them with the present. His skills recalled those of medieval masters,
while his bright colors in complementary and contrasting juxtapositions
or the delicate gradations of tone show him as an exceptionally original
artist. Longin's work strongly influenced a number of Serbian painters
from later generations.
Many more signed works were produced in the seventeenth century. The
most famous Serbian painters of this period, such as Georgije Mitrofanović,
Jovan, Andrija Raičević and Radul, came from Serbia to work for Orthodox
churches in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The celebrated Hilandar monk Georgije
Mitrofanović, an accomplished artist who had been trained on Mount Athos
and had come to work for churches and monasteries in Serbia in the first
quarter of the seventeenth century, did all the frescoes for the monasteries
of Dobrićevo and Zavala (fig. XIII) in Herzegovina. He also painted icons
for the monastery of Žitomislić (fig. XI - XII), and the icon of the Holy
Trinity at Foča (fig. 17). The work attributed to Jovan (fig. 26-28)
is sometimes connected with a painter who signed his name in cryptic writing,
usually read as "Kozma". The somewhat mysterious Jovan-Kozma is credited
with many icons dating between 1605 and 1632, found in the famous Serbian
monasteries of Morača, Hilandar, Dečani, Piva, and many other churches.
Jovan rejected all the influences of the contemporary Cretan school, apparent
in Georgije Mitrofanović's work, and showed his immense respect for Longin
as a teacher. The same is true of Andrija Raičević and Radul. Andrija
Raičević (figs. 19-25) was born in the village of Toci near Pljevlja and
worked in old Herzegovina from 1638 to 1673, undertaking commissions for
the Patriarch of Peć and other high church dignitaries. One of the last
painters who remained faithful to the bounds of Serbian medieval tradition
was Radul (figs. 30-41). He also worked for the Patriarch of Peć, the
spiritual center of the Serbs from Bosnia, where in the Monastery of the
Holy Apostles monks were trained in painting and woodcarving. It was probably
Patriarch Maximus who suggested that Radul should be trusted with the
execution of the richly carved and gilded iconostasis for the Old Serbian
Orthodox Church in Sarajevo in 1674 (fig. XIV), which replaced the one
burned in 1656. His work can be traced for some twenty years, beginning
in 1665, and most of it is preserved in Serbian churches in Montenegro.
All of those seventeenth-century Serbian painters lived and worked in
an environment that did not want anything to do with the artistic achievements
of western Europe. Isolated in their faith and their rejection of everything
that did not spring directly from the pure tradition of medieval Serbia,
these talented artists found their inspiration in the distant past of
their country's art.
The great upheavals and terrors of the Austro-Turkish wars of the seventeenth
century and the alliance of the Serbs with Austria ended the revival of
Serbian medieval art and led to the vast national migration of 1690. From
the southern regions of Kosovo and Metohija, ordinary people, together
with their Patriarch, clergy, and monks, moved north across the Sava and
Danube rivers into a new homeland. This migration meant a bitter parting
from their old hearths and sanctuaries, their fields, and the graves of
their forefathers. The inevitable encounter with the laws, politics, and
religion of Austria, whose subjects they now became, brought the Serbian
populace to a spiritual crossroads. Historical events following the great
migration of 1690 and the subsequent social changes among the Serbs who
lived in the new environment of the Austro-Hungarian lands, inevitably
led to the abandonment of the medieval Byzantine tradition and its replacement
by new Baroque elements in sacral art.
In the first half of the eighteenth century icon painters from Srem,
a region north of the Sava river, created Serbian early Baroque art. With
prominent local characteristics which made it into a national style of
painting, it differed from what was going on in contemporary Orthodox
art in other territories, like Greece and Russia. A new decorative system
was created in Serbian icon painting that flourished on the territories
under the jurisdiction of the Archbishop of Karlovci in Srem, to which
the seat of the Patriarch was transferred from Peć. This new trend basically
lasted between 1690 and 1750.
Two clearly different styles, the Byzantine before the migration of 1690
and the Baroque a half a century after it, coalesced in the works of painters
from Srem (figs. 60-70). This created a unique hybrid style in Serbian
icon painting during the period of transition in the last decade of the
seventeenth and the first half of the eighteenth centuries, the so-called
zographic style. Most icon painters from this period were still
monks. Many icons that illustrate the birth and the development of this
transitional style have been preserved in Bosnia. Since this region was
still under the Turkish occupation, the local clergy were much more conservative.
Therefore the zographic style lasted somewhat longer in Serbian
churches in Bosnia than in the Austro-Hungarian lands. Most of the painters
from Srem did not sign their icons, but on some icons from Bosnia we can
recognize the hand of the same unknown artist that worked for the churches
in Srem. One such example is the "Mohovo painter" (figs. 62-63). The name
of Nikola on a Deesis icon (fig. 65) is a rare example of a signed work.
A few icons from Bosnia (figs. 67-70) can be attributed to Stanoje Popović,
a priest from Martinci, whose signed works are found in churches in Serbia.
He was among the best early Baroque painters from Srem right before the
zographic style - to which he belonged - came to an end.
Beginning with the mid-eighteenth century, the first educated lay painters
familiar with Western art began to emerge. Their role was especially important
because they directed Serbian church art toward Western ideals. These
artists finally abandoned old Byzantine traditions, the traces of which
were slight but still apparent in the transitional style. Therefore, in
the eighteenth century we observe two different patterns in the development
of icon painting among Serbian painters. Namely, the autochthonous, zographic
style was followed in the second half of the century by a style influenced
by Baroque elements imported from Russia or, more precisely, the Ukraine.
The Archbishop of Sremski Karlovci decided that Russian Baroque icon painting
should become the standard in the Serbian Church as well. With the appearance
of educated lay Baroque painters, zographic icon painting came
to an end as Serbian art in Pannonia[3] was decisively incorporated
into the Western trends of the period. This change is seen in a number
of icons from Serbian churches in Bosnia, such as the works of Teodor
Stefanović Valjevac (fig. 83), Janko Halkozović (fig. 84), Dimitrije Bačević
(fig. 85), Simeon Lazović and his son Aleksije (figs. 87-88), Risto Nikolić
(fig. 90), and others.
Serbian icons that were preserved in Bosnia before the current war are
an important part of the art which was fostered by Balkan Orthodoxy after
its states were conquered by the Ottoman Empire. They testify to the religious,
spiritual, and artistic life of the Balkans, which found a vigorous expression
among the Serbs throughout the long period of foreign rule, beginning
in the fifteenth century and lasting until the Balkan Wars of 1912-1913.
Cretan icons represent the second largest group of sacral paintings found
in Serbian churches in Bosnia. They were imported to Bosnia and Herzegovina
throughout the whole creative period of the Cretan School, from the fifteenth
to the seventeenth centuries. In fact, considering all other parts of
former Yugoslavia, the greatest number of Cretan icons is to be found
in Dalmatia and Bosnia. This can be explained by strong trade and cultural
connections between Crete and Venice, thanks to which many merchant ships
stopped at different Dalmatian ports. At the same time, important trade
roads from Bosnia led over Herzegovina to Dalmatia. During the Turkish
occupation of Bosnia, many rich Serbian merchant families donated Cretan
icons to their churches. This was especially the case in larger centers
such as Sarajevo and Mostar, where the largest number of Cretan icons
was in fact to be found.
Reproductions of Cretan icons from Greek, Italian and Russian collections
have been extensively published in the last twenty years. However, with
a few exceptions, the hundreds of Cretan icons that were preserved in
Serbian churches in Bosnia before the current war, have not been studied
so far.
After the fall of Constantinople in 1453, the island of Crete, which
had been under Venetian occupation since 1204, became the most important
artistic center in the Greek world. Many scholars and artists who had
fled from Turkish occupied territories to Crete even before the fall of
Constantinople, contributed to this blossoming. The development of a style
which is a direct descendant of the more idealizing and classicizing tendency
of Constantinopolitan painting can be traced from the beginning of the
fifteenth century. Cretan painters turned almost exclusively to the production
of portable icons. They created an independent "Post-Byzantine" school
which is the only one of the Orthodox artistic schools that had
a legitimate claim to the title during the period from the fifteenth to
the mid-eighteenth century. They received many commissions from foreign
traders, mainly Venetians, from Catholic bishops in the Greek territories
occupied by Venice, from Orthodox monasteries and churches, as well as
from Greek and Venetian nobles and other citizens of the Venetian Republic.
The development of art on Crete was directly dependent on the development
of Cretan towns as important commercial and shipping centers.
Works of the most important Cretan painters who laid the foundations
of icon painting on Crete, such as Andreas Ritzos and his son Nikolaos,
from the fifteenth century, have been preserved in Ston (Dalmatia), Mostar,
and Sarajevo. Cretan fifteenth century painters created icon prototypes
based squarely on the Paleologan and earlier Byzantine traditions. The
Deesis icon from Sarajevo, a work of Nikolaos Ritzos (fig. 91), is valuable
evidence of the crystallization of certain iconographic types and stylistic
principles of the Cretan school at the end of the fifteenth century. This
characteristic type of a Deesis composition, derived from the art of the
Paleologans and introduced into Cretan painting by Ritzos and others,
was followed in the next century by many icon painters on Crete. Two Deesis
icons from the sixteenth century who specifically followed Nikolaos Ritzos'
fifteenth-century model are kept in the Princeton Art Museum and the Athens
Museum.
Representations of St. John the Baptist with large wings, as seen on
the Sarajevo icon (fig. 110), were very popular in Cretan painting from
the fifteenth to the seventeenth centuries, as well in the whole post-Byzantine
art of Greece, Russia, and other parts of the East Christian world, with
variations showing only in details. Giving the messenger of the Messiah
the appearance of an angel, the iconographers followed the Prophet Malachi,
who referred to the Forerunner as an angel announcing and preparing the
way of the Lord on the earth. This iconographic type appeared in Serbia
in a fresco as early as the thirteenth century, but icons of the Forerunner
with wings gained particular popularity on Crete. The ascetic, exotic,
exceptionally tall figure with a certain elegance of posture and gesture,
placed in the long and narrow composition, is considered to be a more
personal contribution of one of the best Cretan painters, Michael Damaskinos,
and was accepted by his contemporaries and followers. The icon from Sarajevo
is remarkable both for its simple color harmony of deep olive-green, blue,
and blue-gray, and for the precision of the drawing. Elegant and graceful
lines preserve the stylistic tradition of the fifteenth century. The large,
chestnut colored wings of the Baptist are covered with a dense fine golden
striation. His face is delicately modeled with white highlights, and his
features and wrinkles are strongly outlined to give him a more impressive
character. Due to these characteristics the icon can be dated to the second
half of the sixteenth century and attributed to someone in the school
of Damascinos.
The "Noli Me Tangere" theme, representing the appearance of Christ to
Mary Magdalene after he had been crucified (fig. III), was also among
the most popular subjects of the Cretan school of painting. This composition,
that retained the perfection and poetic character of Paleologan art, was
repeated many times during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. On
the icon from Sarajevo, the signature of the painter, Ioannes Siropulos,
is written in red capital letters on the gold background, behind the Magdalene's
back.
However, the most popular subject recreated after the common models in
Cretan workshops was the representation of the Virgin, in the types of
Hodegetria. the Virgin of the Passion, or the Glykophilousa.
An order for nine hundred Virgin icons that Cretan painters received from
Venice in 1499 testifies to the popularity of this particular theme. The
iconographic types of the Virgin and Child, found in Serbian churches
in Bosnia, all belong to the types that were most popular in Cretan painting.
An icon from Tuzla (fig. 105) shows the oldest way of representing the
Virgin with Child in Byzantine art in general - the Virgin Hodegetria,
meaning the "Guiding Virgin" or "the Pointer of the Way". The earliest
depiction of the Hodegetria type that has come down to us is a
miniature of the Rabula Gospels from 586, which is based on a lost earlier
Greek source. This popular type reveals the traditional Byzantine idea
of Christ being almost self-contained and more spiritually than physically
connected with the Virgin. Instead of the complete frontality of the older
more hieratic type, on the icon from Tuzla the Child is turned in a three-quarter
profile towards the Virgin, while she inclines her head towards him. This
shift of postures and directions introduces a note of humanity, sorrow,
and an implied premonition. These motherly qualities are somewhat different
from the triumphant and superhuman impression made by the traditional
Hodegetria. Beginning in the twelfth and especially in the course
of the thirteenth century, there developed a representation of a closer
and more tender relationship between the Mother and the Child, which hints
at the Glykophilousa type (the Virgin of Tenderness).
This icon from Tuzla has all the hallmarks of a Cretan late fifteenth
- early sixteenth century masterpiece with strong roots in earlier Paleologan
art. The modeling of the face with elements of a Western sensitivity,
seen in the sad and serious gaze of the Virgin, her well-drawn brows,
broad cheeks, and the care shown in the shaping of her hands with their
long fingers, connect this icon with the art of Andreas Ritzos and his
immediate followers. A delicate floral pattern stippled on the haloes
is characteristic of a group of similar fifteenth-century Cretan icons.
Very significant is the Paleologan type of young Christ with large forehead,
short nose with rounded top, and chubby hands.
The Virgin of the Passion type became one of the most popular
subjects of Cretan painting in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,
when the icon with this subject from Sarajevo (fig. 124) was probably
made. The Child is grasping his mother's arm with both hands and turning
his head up towards an archangel holding the Cross in his veiled hands.
Another archangel holds the pot with vinegar, lance and reed with sponge.
All the movements and the gestures speak of Christ's fear and agitation.
This type of the Virgin holding the Child alarmed by the display of the
symbols of the Passion had been known in Byzantine painting since the
twelfth century at least. In the fifteenth century and afterwards this
theme is seen far more frequently; since its best examples bear the signature
of Andreas Ritzos, the invention of the type has been attributed to him.
The icon from Sarajevo closely follows the presumed Ritzos prototype.
On his famous Virgin of the Passion icons, Andreas Ritzos inscribed
a Latin text of a verse on the right side and an epithet for the Virgin
on the left. These inscriptions were later copied by Cretan painters but
they refused to use Latin script. Instead, they wrote the same text in
Greek letters, which is also the case on the Sarajevo icon. On the left
side we read AMOLYNTOS-meaning the pure or sinless Virgin. This
inscription might be connected with the name of the monastery which was
built in Constantinople in 1401 by the Empress Irene Paleologus. The verse
on the right refers to the Archangel Gabriel, who earlier announced to
the Virgin that she was pregnant and is now showing her the symbols of
her Son's Passion, while Christ, now having a mortal body, fears his destiny
as he looks at the signs of his torture. The gold background on the Sarajevo
icon was crudely overpainted later, but all the inscriptions were left
in their original state.
While the Virgin Hodegetria points to the Child who symbolizes
the way to be taken by the faithful (representing therefore a Christological
doctrine), and the Passion type shows a prefiguration of Christ's
Passion, the Glykophilousa type, in all its variants, stresses
Mary's maternal side. On the icon from Tuzla (fig. 118) the Child puts
his cheek upon his mother's and grasps her hand. In this representation
of the Mother and Child shown cheek to cheek (an element that determines
the Glykophilousa type), Byzantine art achieved a more human relationship
between them than in any other type. The meaning of the icon is centered
upon the Virgin's love and grief. This subject became very important for
Cretan painters who identified the Virgin's grief with their own in the
historically difficult times of slavery under the Turks.
The Virgin had been represented as Glykophilousa even before the
iconoclastic period, but in the Comnenian and Paleologan periods the Constantinopolitan
image of the Virgin of Tenderness was highly esteemed. This type of
Glykophilousa is directly associated with the Virgin of the Passion
type as established by the Ritzos workshop Christ's pose and the position
of his hands and feet are the same. The most famous examples of the Glykophilousa
that served as prototypes for numerous Cretan Virgins, as well as for
the ones from Bosnia (figs. 118, 144), were again painted by Andreas Ritzos
and are preserved in Milan and Belgrade.
Cretan icons of the Glykophilousa type offer an amazing variety
of poses, movements and placements of hands, while the common meaning
of the subject always remains the same. A variety of details that characterize
this theme makes it very difficult to specify when exactly these changes
took place. This difficulty becomes even greater because of the fact that
Cretan painters repeated even the slightest details of their prototypes
for more than two hundred years.
Example of such variations is the icon from Sarajevo (fig. 109) where
Christ is holding a scroll in one arm and caressing his mother's chin
with the other. The vivacity inherent in the Child's posture reflects
a type of Glykophilousa which is often characterized by a playful
attitude and greater liveliness in the Child. Such representations of
the Playing Child are usually characterized by Christ grasping the edge
of his Mother's maphorion instead of her face, as seen on another icon
from Sarajevo (fig. 119), both symbolizing his need for her protection.
The earliest representations of Christ pressing his cheek to the Virgin's
and caressing her chin are found in Italy in a number of fourteenth century
panels. The Child's body is absorbed within the outline of his Mother's
form, and its complicated posture with the upward and downward pressures
of hand and foot reveals an unusual degree of dynamic force, in contrast
with the quiet tenderness of Mother as she presses her Child to her breast
and touches his cheek.
This type became very popular in Crete in the fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries. The above mentioned icon (fig. 109) is a particularly fine
work of Cretan early sixteenth century painting in which faces are modeled
with soft drawing and a subtle rendering of the light. The Virgin, who
is referred to as "bottomless well of grace and source of compassion"
in Church poetry, on this icon conveys such a thoughtful and sad expression,
which only great masters are able to achieve. Her sorrow is emphasized
by Christ's innocent and playful gesture of reaching for her face. A slight
iconographic peculiarity is seen in the folded top part of Christ's himation
fluttering behind his back. This element has its origin in a mosaic representation
of the Virgin and Child from the Kariye Djami (Church of the Saviour in
Chora) at Istanbul made at the high point of Paleologan an, around 1320.
Apart from usual abbreviations of names, there are two written epithets
of the Virgin on the Sarajevo icon. One of them reads KIRIA. meaning
Our Lady, and the other reads PHANEROMENI. Most of the time the
Virgin's epithets are of a mystic or poetic nature, but some of them,
like this one, indicate Virgin icons that were venerated in celebrated
religious establishments. The epithet Phaneromeni is connected with the
icon celebrated on the 15th of July, that was believed to be miraculous
and that comes from the Kapudag peninsula in the Sea of Marmara. Otherwise,
Phaneromeni is a name frequently used for many villages in Greece and
Anatolia, where, according to a legend, the Virgin used to show her miraculous
powers.
A further example of the Glykophilousa variant (fig. 114) shows
the Virgin holding the Child in a distorted, unnatural position. This
icon from Sarajevo belongs to the Pelagonitissa prototype which
became popular somewhere in Pelagonia in the vicinity of Bitola (Macedonia)
and was often replicated. Some of these icons had the toponym Pelagonitissa
inscribed, others did not. This theme, seen in a Sinai icon from the period
of the Crusades, is also known from fourteenth-century Serbian icons and
frescoes. The Child is very lively, with his back turned towards the viewer
and both arms stretched around the Virgin's face. His himation was once
richly decorated with gold webbing, now seen only in traces. From the
late twelfth century onwards, in many depictions of the Virgin with Child,
Christ's traditional antique garb gave way to this more intimate attire
suitable for an infant. Christ's unconstrained posture and affectionate
gestures reflect the close relationship with his mother. His human nature
is further enchanted by the absence of a halo, which is usually the case
on similar representations. The Virgin, absorbed in thoughts, is tenderly
leaning towards the Child and directing her eyes at the observer. The
moving mixture of the Child's playful innocence and his Mother's deep
anxiety, seen in her silent sorrowful look, lends distinctive psychological
tension to this iconographic type.
As the maternal side of the Virgin's personality was developed on icons,
she became even more accessible, similar to an ordinary woman who understood
humankind. The intimacy between the mother and child and their emotional
interaction are conveyed through movements or gestures, such as feeding
(fig. 137), embracing (figs. 109, 118, 119) or playing (fig. 114). Numerous
types were established for the image of the Virgin, as manifestations
of different human feelings - from calm grandeur (Hodegetria or
the Virgin Enthroned), melancholy, serenity, and tenderness (Glykophilousa
or Galaktotrophousa), to suffering and compassion (Virgin of
Passion). Each of these themes, in its own way exists still on another
level - they are all to be "reflected incessantly on the mirror of the
beholder's soul, to keep that soul pure, to lift those who bend down,
and to give them hope, for they contemplate the eternal prototype of beauty",
as suggested in a medieval Painter's Manual.
A group of Cretan icons closely followed Western iconographic traditions
and used Latin inscriptions. Such is the icon of the Nativity (fig.
121), in the manner of a Western image of adoration, or two Pieta icons
(figs. 127, 147). While such works must have been extremely popular among
conservative Roman Catholic circles, their presence in churches and monasteries
of Patmos attests that Cretan icons of Italian origin also appealed to
an Orthodox clientele. In the period of mysticism, the word pietas
signified a religious attitude which was imbued with a self-surrendering
love of God and reverence, and which sought mystical union with Christ.
The first Pieta came into existence around 1300 in German convents. It
was a new creation in art: these sculptures grew out of a meditative contemplation
of Christ's suffering in his Crucifixion and served to edify the faithful.
The concept of "lying in his Mother's lap" is an expression of trust,
faith, surrender, and union in the mystical sense. This subject, which
is the Western parallel of the Byzantine Lamentation at the Tomb, became
known to Sienese, Florentine, and Venetian painters, by traveling German
artists, from the fourteenth century onwards.
Another typical example of a Cretan icon with obvious Italian characteristics
is the icon of St. Catherine (fig. 136). Renaissance elements are seen
in the contrapposto movement between the lower part of the body and the
head, in her dress made of Venetian brocade, her cloak with the ermine
fur, and the minute golden monochromes decorating the throne and the bookstand.
The oldest known icon of this iconographic type is a work of the famous
Cretan painter Ieremias Palladas from 1612 on the iconostasis of St. Catherine's
monastery at Sinai.
One of the major characteristics of Cretan icon painting was the repetition
of certain iconographic themes and patterns in a large number of icons.
This is also true for all the above-mentioned examples from Bosnia. However,
some of the most creative artists would at times produce an iconographically
unique solution, which was never repeated afterwards. Such is the motif
of the Liturgy of the Righteous and Sufferings in Hell icon (fig.
138) by the famous Cretan painter, Georgius Klondzas. Together with his
contemporary, Michael Damaskinos, Klondzas contributed to the short renaissance
of late Cretan painting. His name was first mentioned in 1562, and he
died in 1608. He distinguished himself through his inclination towards
the treatment of original themes, such as that of the Sarajevo icon. The
icon shows the inside of an Orthodox church full of believers, some dressed
in the contemporary Venetian fashion, attending a divine liturgy with
angels, a prophet, two holy priests of high rank, and finally, in top
center, Christ himself. Above Christ and to his left and right side, there
is an inscription on the gold background which reads: "the Lord is present
at the entering of the bishops". The appearance of the iconostasis depicted
on the icon was inspired by an iconostasis and Cretan icons painted by
Klondzas' contemporaries, some of which did in fact decorate the Church
of St. George the Greek in Venice. The idea of the Second Coining is implicit
in all of three horizontal sections. Numerous inscriptions written on
the icon also transmit the message that charity is the road to salvation
and that believers have to show utmost respect and humility if they do
not want to find themselves in hell. The composition of the icon has a
double meaning. It carries a message that any holy temple where liturgy
and prayer are held is considered to be a church. At the same time, the
icon represents the entire church community and the complex bond between
the people and the Church as the only legitimate representative of the
Lord.
Apart from the Cretan icons, a number of icons painted in Greek workshops
from the mainland also reached the Serbian churches in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
One of the most valuable examples, the Deesis icon signed by Neophytos
the monk (fig. 157), is the only sample that might have originated on
Mount Athos. A figure of the kneeling donor dressed in contemporary Venetian
fashion, represented in the lower left, was painted later by a different
artist, who was far less skillful. A Greek inscription in the lower right,
which reads: "Prayer of the servant Neophytos the monk", either refers
to the donor who is presenting his prayer or to the painter who is donating
the icon as his prayer. If the name of the monk Neophytos is the name
of the painter of the icon, it could be connected with a monk of the same
name from Mount Athos, who was a son of the famous Cretan painter, the
monk Theophanes Strelitzas. Neophytos the monk painted and signed the
richly carved iconostasis in Protaton, the church in Karyes, which is
the capital of the Holy Mountain. Works by Theophanes Strelitzas and his
two sons, Symeon and Neophytos, were strongly rooted in the Paleologan
tradition and they show all the main features of the Cretan school which,
even away from its home base, in the employ of a community of monks, was
able to function at a high level of artistry. Greek icons dating from
the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries found in Bosnia remain close to
the methods of the late Byzantine Paleologan painting traditions that
were still preserved in Cretan painting. Thus the influences of the Cretan
style, such as linearly accented features and strong highlights, are apparent
in a few high quality icons, like those representing the meeting of the
apostles Peter and Paul (figs. 155 and 158) or St. Luke the Evangelist
(fig. 160).
With the exception of the small number of icons done in the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries, most of the Greek icons preserved in Bosnia
date from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. They show the features
of the conservative icon-painting and of the Levantine Baroque and imply
a sign of the creative ossification and decline of late post-Byzantine
art. It is not surprising that after two and a half centuries of creative
endeavors of the Greek artists who took refuge on Crete, icon painters
lost their inspiration when that last stronghold of Byzantine culture
fell to the Turks at the end of the seventeenth century. Virtuosity and
the subtle technique of Cretan painters were replaced on later Greek icons
with broader and more simple linear treatment, as seen on the icons from
Bosnia. A separate entity is seen in a group of the so-called "Jerusalem
paintings", which were done on canvas in oil, as opposed to wooden icons
painted in the traditional tempera technique. Such popular images (figs.
180 and 181) were made during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries
and were preserved in many Serbian churches in Bosnia. Depicting different
holy places in Palestine and often large in size, such icons were brought
back by Serbian pilgrims as a proof of their journey.
Russian icons from Bosnia, like the Greek ones, are mostly serial works
from provincial workshops, rarely older than the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries. Since they were intended for the conservative market of Orthodox
believers still living in Turkish-occupied territories, they do not reflect
a real development of Russian icon painting during the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries. Late Russian icon painting was actually under the
strong influence of Western European realism that had already started
penetrating into the Ukraine in the second half of the seventeenth century.
Instead of the stylistic principles of the Baroque that characterized
Russian icon painting of the time, Russian icons from Bosnia and Herzegovina,
as well as from some other parts of Eastern Orthodox world, were characterized
by the simplified and often crude treatment of volume and the rejection
of any kind of modernism coming from the West.
A rare exception is the sixteenth century icon of the Virgin of Vladimir
from Sarajevo (fig. 184), which follows the iconographic prototype of
a famous twelfth- century icon now in the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow.
The famous, often repeated prototype of the characteristic portrayal of
tenderness and loving kindness was painted in Constantinople and around
1131 sent to Kiev. From there it went to Vladimir, where it received the
toponym Vladimirskaya, and finally came to the Kremlin in 1315.
The icon from Sarajevo conveys all the helplessness and sadness of the
Mother embracing her Child. Her face expresses the deepest compassion,
both for the sufferings awaiting her son and all the misfortunes of humankind.
The silver cover of the icon is decorated with stamping, filigree, and
semi-precious stones. The carved and gilded wooden frame is of later date
and originally was not made for this icon.
Although many of the later Russian icons from Bosnia were mass produced
for trade purposes, some of them still preserve the elegant linearity
and fine, subtle modeling of drapery with gold, as seen on the icon of
the Four Scenes From the Life of the Virgin (fig. 185). A group
of icons richly ornamented with silver incisions and stamping (figs. 203-211)
is characteristic of the period. Such decorative elements, formed of geometrical
and floral stylization's, show a typical Baroque taste for ornamentation.
The strong decorative effects of these icons are somewhat subdued today,
because the yellowish varnish, which imitated gold on silver background
surfaces, is mostly gone. Originally, the black contours of the depicted
figures and ornaments, the incised lines and the stamping, effectively
stood out on bright yellow backgrounds.
Finally, a small group of icons of Western origin were preserved in the
Serbian churches in Sarajevo and Mostar. A very fine example of this kind
is an icon from Sarajevo done in Venice in the fifteenth century (fig.
233). It shows the half figure of a dead, naked Christ standing against
the cross in a sarcophagus. This representation is usually known as the
Man of Sorrows. The image of the Christ of the Passion was used
because of its liturgical meaning. It is connected with the Passion service,
extending from Maundy Thursday through Holy Saturday. Liturgical language
describes Christ as sleeping "the life-giving sleep". This is the death
of his human nature by which his divine nature becomes free to descend
to the world below. The usual type of this representation, Byzantine in
tradition, is rendered here according to Western models, especially those
which originated in Florentine and Venetian painting of the fourteenth
and fifteenth centuries. The modeling of Christ's flesh is very soft,
with a touch of brown shadow and with a transitional greenish tone, so
that the figure gives an impression of monochromy and a painterly feeling
as well. The exceptionally fine rendering of the wavy hair, Christ's elongated
arms and the geometrical perspective of the sarcophagus all derive from
an Italian prototype. This relation becomes even more obvious in the stressed
melancholy of the face.
The collections of icons from Serbian churches in Bosnia and Herzegovina
before the recent war were very heterogeneous and, as a rule, contained
specimens of both Serbian and foreign post-Byzantine icon painting. This
enormous diversity of icons imported from various parts of the world can
be accounted for by the position of Bosnia and Herzegovina as a border
land between the East and the West and by four centuries of life under
the Turks, when the centers of artistic, cultural, and spiritual life
for the Serbs in Bosnia were far away, first in the Patriarchate of Peć
in Kosovo, and from the end of the seventeenth century in Sremski Karlovci
in the Vojvodina.
Notes
1. Or eparchies, as they are called in Eastern Orthodox churches.
2. The earliest surviving portraits of Prince Lazar from Ravanica and
Ljubostinja, the churches he founded, date from the end of the fourteenth
century and represent him as a donor.
3. Panonia is the ancient name for Hungary and includes lands in the
northern party of today's Yugoslavia and Croatia.
The manuscript of this book was completed at the beginning of 1992 and
submitted for publication to the publishing house Svjetlost in Sarajevo.
In April of the same year I left my home town of Sarajevo in order to
shield my eight-year-old son Nikola from the horrors of civil war. A few
months later, my family and I found ourselves in the U.S. All that I had
taken with me from Sarajevo was my son's teddy-bear, some necessary clothes,
and a copy of the manuscript of this book. Everything else, including
our eighteenth century family icon of St. Nicholas, was left behind. A
year later, the photographer Zoran Dragoljević sent me copies of those
slides that he was able to rescue when he fled Sarajevo. In its original
form, the book included 297 color photographs and six black-and-white
photographs. All the material that Zoran was able to rescue is published
in this version of the book.
The text of the book has not been changed or new data incorporated; the
only exception is the English "Summary," written in June 1998. Therefore,
I feel obliged to include the original "Author's Note," written six years
ago. I hope that none of the people I mentioned then will object to being
included in my book today. Unfortunately, many of the icons are not to
be found at the locations cited in the book. In fact, a few of those locations
do not exist anymore, like the Serbian monastery of Žitomislić near Mostar.
Some of the icons have been destroyed, damaged, or simply have "changed
hands"; others have been moved to more secure places.
My dues for the publication of this book, which the war has postponed
for such a long time, go to the Institute for the Preservation of Cultural
Monuments in Belgrade, Svetlana Pejić helped with numerous technical problems.
The financial help of Franklin College, Indiana, obtained through the
understanding and support of Alien Berger, the Vice President for Academic
Affairs, Paul Marion, the President, and Richard Swindle, the Vice President
of Development, was invaluable.
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