Sugawara Hirofumi, The Transformation of the Christological Cycle in Byzantine Churches and the Iconographic Program of Sveti Nikola in Varoš, Macedonia

Sugawara Hirofumi, 

«The Transformation of the Christological Cycle in Byzantine Churches and the Iconographic Program of Sveti Nikola in Varoš, Macedonia», Waseda Rilas Journal 1 (2013), p. 43-53. 

Waseda 2013

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Λέξεις κλειδιά: Πρίλεπ, Ζωγραφική, Τέχνη, Εικόνες, Βυζαντινή τέχνη, Χριστολογικός κύκλος, Άγιος Νικόλαος

Keywords: Prilep, Painting, Art, Icons, Byzantine Art, Christological Cycle, Saint Nicholas

Summary

The aim of this paper is to consider how the elaborate iconographic program of Sveti Nikola in Varoš, Macedonia (1200/1289), was established. It is the artistic tendency of 13th-century Byzantine churches to interpolate new images, such as the Ascension to the Cross were interpolated into the existing Passion Cycle.

 

 This enlargement of the Passion Cycle was already well underway in the middle Byzantine period through liturgy and literature. After the age of Iconoclasm (730–843), the preachers wrote the dramatic and sentimental homilies that related to the Passion of the Christ in order to defend His human nature. Such Passion homilies were introduced to the liturgy of Passion Week in 11th century and became sources of images relating to the Passion such as the Lamentation of the Virgin.

 

During the 11th and 12th centuries, the Byzantines took inceasingly more interest in classical Greek literature. Christos Paschon (11th - 12th century) was written as an imitation of ancient Greek tragedy, and may have been read as a literary study among devotees of the classics. Mystery of the Passion, a practicable scenario of the Passion play, was written by the 13th century and covered all Passion episodes beginning with the Resurrection of Lazarus. These works demonstrate that the story of Christ’s Passion was well popularized out of the context of the Church by the 13th century.

 

 In Byzantium, new imagery had been introduced into literature first, then into art. In light of this picture, it could be said that the enlargement of the Passion Cycle in 13th-century churches was brought about popularization of the Passion in middle Byzantine era. Painters enlarged the Passion cycle in accordance with the new images to dramatize the images impressively. The Passion Cycle in Sveti Nikola can be seen as the culmination of such ingenuity of 13th-century and as a major turning point."