Page 222 - Maxim_Painting_Monograph

Bishop Maxim (Vasiljević) of Los Angeles and Western America earned his doctorate from the University of Athens in the field of dog- matics and patristics in 1999 and was tonsured at the Holy Monastery of Tvrdoš in Bosnia and Herzegovi- na. He entertained a one-year post-doctoral course on Byzantine History and Theology at the Sorbonne in Paris from 2003-4. At the same time, as a visiting professor at the French Academy of Fine Arts (Beaux- arts) in Paris, he dealt with the theory and practice of painting. In addition to his tenure at the School of Orthodox Theology of the University of Belgrade, Bishop Maxim has served as a member of the faculty of the University of East Sarajevo (1998-2006) and currently teaches at the Holy Cross Greek Orthodox School of Theology. He has taught numerous courses on the writings of the Church Fathers and published widely in the field of patristics, hagiography, church history, and iconography. From 2005 to 2010, he was the editor of the Theology magazine, the official jour- nal of the Orthodox Theological Faculty in Belgrade. In 2006, he was elected bishop of the Western Amer- ican Diocese.
Bishop Maxim is the founder and editor of the publishing house St. Sebastian Press, which has pub- lished hundreds of books on theology, history, phi- losophy, and art of renowned writers (among others, by Justin Popović, John Zizioulas, Atanasije Jevtić,
Christos Yannaras, Stamatis Skliris, etc.). He is the founder and editor of The Serbica Americana founda- tion and website, The Holy Icon foundation and web- site (holyicon.org), as well as the website and maga- zine The Poetics of the Icon (https://poetics.holyicon. org).
In addition to archpastoral and academic work, he is engaged in painting. His paintings have been exhibited in Athens, New York, Boston, San Francis- co, Los Angeles, Belgrade, etc. He is the director and teacher at the Diocesan iconographic school inspired by Byzantine paintings and icons of Stamatis Skliris.
Bishop Maxim is the president of the Committee for Theological Education of the Assembly of Canon- ical Orthodox Bishops of the USA and one of the founders of The John Zizioulas Foundation.
Besides numerous scholarly articles, his bibliog- raphy includes: History, Truth, Holiness (Los Angeles: Sebastian Press, 2011), Diary of the Council (Los An- geles-Crete 2016), Theology as a Surprise (New York: St. Vladimir Seminary Press, 2018), Wonder as the Be- ginning of Faith (Brookline: Holy Cross Orthodox Press, 2022), Saved by Beauty: Dostoevsky and Ameri- ca (Los Angeles: Sebastian Press, 2022), Accomplish- ing the Future in Advance: Discernment and Interpre- tation in the Thought of St. Maximus the Confessor (Brepols – forthcoming).
Biographical Note
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