拍品专文
Russian icons representing the First Ecumenical Council are rare. There are two examples in the collection of the Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, (inventory numbers 14413 and 14440), both of which date to the second half of the 17th Century (see V.I.Antonova and N.E. Mniova, Katalog Drevnerusskoi Zhivopis, Moscow, 1963, Vol.2, No.766, pp.297-298, pl.100, and No.770, p.300). There is also an example in the State Russian Museum, dated to the late 16th Century.
V.N. Lazarev believed that the oldest extant icon of the First Ecumenical Council is on a tabletka from the Saint Sophia Cathedral in Novgorod, painted not earlier than the mid 16th Century. It seems probable that the offered icon is also a tabletka that has been set into a panel. However, stylistic analysis would suggest that it should be dated to the first half of the 16th Century. It therefore predates all of the known examples and should be considered the earliest panel icon of the First Ecumenical Council to have come to light.
The iconography of the Ecumenical Councils was elaborated in Byzantine Art of the 13th-14th Century, particularly in Serbian wall-painting - at Sopocani (1263-1268), Arilje (1296), and later in Decani and Pec. The earliest example in Russia was produced in 1502 by Dionisii for the wall paintings of the Ferapontov Monastery.
Arius, a junior priest from Alexandria, proclaimed that as Christ was begotten by the Father, he is not himself unbegotten, and is therefore not fully divine. This indirectly denied the main dogma of Christianity - the incarnation of God, and the possibility for man to share in divine life or salvation. Emperor Constantine the Great convened an Ecumenical Council of Bishops at Nicaea in the spring of 325 at which Arianism was condemned and Christ was defined as 'consubstantial' or homoousios with the Father.
The scene on the left of panel represents the vision of St. Peter, Bishop of Alexandria. St. Peter, although the bishop who ordained Arius as deacon, was an early oponent of his heresies. Martyred in 311, he experienced a vision whilst in prison awaiting execution. he saw a young boy in torn clothes, and when he asked 'Who has torn Thy tunic, Lord?', the boy, who was the Emmanuel, replied: 'Senseless Arius has entirely torn me apart'.
Interest in this subject probably rose in response to heresies which, under western influence, were current in Russia at the time. A group of heretics questioned the incarnation of God and were persecuted by Genadi, Archbishop of Novgorod. They fled to Moscow where they were received sympathetically by the Grand Prince who even advanced the ordination of one of their number, the Metropolitan Zosima. The dubious position of the Grand Prince towards the heresy, seemed to echo that of the Emperor Constantine who oscillated between Orthodoxy and Arianism, and who was in fact baptised on his deathbed by an heretic Arian bishop.
These historical parellels might also be an explanation of an iconographical peculiarity of Russian icons of the First Ecumenical Council - where the Emperor Constantine is depicted twice: above, seated on a throne as representative of divine power on earth; and below, when confused by Arius's teaching he voices his doubts to the bishops. The underlying meaning of the icon addresses the relationship between the Church and the state.
The icon will be published as the jacket illustration of Alvyn Pettersen's Athanasios, in the Outstanding Christian Thinkers series published by Geoffrey Chapman, London, 1995.
V.N. Lazarev believed that the oldest extant icon of the First Ecumenical Council is on a tabletka from the Saint Sophia Cathedral in Novgorod, painted not earlier than the mid 16th Century. It seems probable that the offered icon is also a tabletka that has been set into a panel. However, stylistic analysis would suggest that it should be dated to the first half of the 16th Century. It therefore predates all of the known examples and should be considered the earliest panel icon of the First Ecumenical Council to have come to light.
The iconography of the Ecumenical Councils was elaborated in Byzantine Art of the 13th-14th Century, particularly in Serbian wall-painting - at Sopocani (1263-1268), Arilje (1296), and later in Decani and Pec. The earliest example in Russia was produced in 1502 by Dionisii for the wall paintings of the Ferapontov Monastery.
Arius, a junior priest from Alexandria, proclaimed that as Christ was begotten by the Father, he is not himself unbegotten, and is therefore not fully divine. This indirectly denied the main dogma of Christianity - the incarnation of God, and the possibility for man to share in divine life or salvation. Emperor Constantine the Great convened an Ecumenical Council of Bishops at Nicaea in the spring of 325 at which Arianism was condemned and Christ was defined as 'consubstantial' or homoousios with the Father.
The scene on the left of panel represents the vision of St. Peter, Bishop of Alexandria. St. Peter, although the bishop who ordained Arius as deacon, was an early oponent of his heresies. Martyred in 311, he experienced a vision whilst in prison awaiting execution. he saw a young boy in torn clothes, and when he asked 'Who has torn Thy tunic, Lord?', the boy, who was the Emmanuel, replied: 'Senseless Arius has entirely torn me apart'.
Interest in this subject probably rose in response to heresies which, under western influence, were current in Russia at the time. A group of heretics questioned the incarnation of God and were persecuted by Genadi, Archbishop of Novgorod. They fled to Moscow where they were received sympathetically by the Grand Prince who even advanced the ordination of one of their number, the Metropolitan Zosima. The dubious position of the Grand Prince towards the heresy, seemed to echo that of the Emperor Constantine who oscillated between Orthodoxy and Arianism, and who was in fact baptised on his deathbed by an heretic Arian bishop.
These historical parellels might also be an explanation of an iconographical peculiarity of Russian icons of the First Ecumenical Council - where the Emperor Constantine is depicted twice: above, seated on a throne as representative of divine power on earth; and below, when confused by Arius's teaching he voices his doubts to the bishops. The underlying meaning of the icon addresses the relationship between the Church and the state.
The icon will be published as the jacket illustration of Alvyn Pettersen's Athanasios, in the Outstanding Christian Thinkers series published by Geoffrey Chapman, London, 1995.