Page 354 - Uros Todorovic Byzantine Painting Contemporary Eyes

Byzantine Painting through Contemporary Eyes
The Late Byzantine Rothko
Based on the analyses in this chapter, we observe that in Rothko’s works of the classic period, the particular aesthetic result of the unique combination of theological kind of influences does not simply amount to a notion of the tragic, nor to a notion of the mere absence of the divine, but rather, it amounts to the paradoxical anti-absence of the divine – one which is profoundly related to the aesthetics of Late Byzantine painting. Thus, even when the divine seems absent, in Rothko’s somber paintings, the intensity of that absence evokes a notion of a missing entity, which in itself confirms the existence of that same entity, and therefore also its invisible presence.
Ultimately, however tragic, Rothko’s ascetic introspective contemplation of an en- lightened existence which takes place elsewhere, a contemplation which is conveyed through his Byzantine-like inner light, can be identified with a yearning for the absolute Other, and thus, in our opinion, divine otherness is the key notion in view of Rothko’s classic paintings. This particular understanding of the divine in Rothko’s work could also be interpreted as a Byzantine – and particularly mystical – apologia to Nietzsche’s athe- ism. Such an apologia could be summarised in the following way: God cannot be expe- rienced as absence unless He truly exists.
One may even wonder whether Rothko was in fact familiar even with aspects of the tradition of mystical theology which throughout the centuries significantly influenced the mystagogical nature of Byzantine painting. We say this because certain core aspects of that theological discourse coincide with Rothko’s mission to see the dim light within the dark void. For example, when in the 6th century Dionysius the Pseudo-Areopagite speaks of the divine darkness, he does not speak of ignorance, something that would place an emphasis on the necessity of intellectual kind of learning about God, but he understands this darkness as the Light which cannot be seen because it transcends hu- man logic.73 Therefore, the “darkness of God” implies that man’s logic is limited, which is why the term gnofos (γνόφος), which Dionysius uses for darkness in this context and which was used before him in a like manner by Gregory of Nyssa, is an antithetic term that actually means darkness of the light (γνόφος τοῦ φωτός). More particularly, accord- ing to Dionysius, it is only by transcending the realm of logic that one can begin to ex-
73 Διονυσίου Ἀρεοπαγίτου, Ἐπιστολαί, V, 1621–3 (PG 3, 1073Α): «Ὁ θεῖος γνόφος ἐστὶ τὸ ‘ἀπρόσιτον φῶς’, ἐν ᾧ κατοικεῖν ὁ θεὸς λέγεται, καὶ ἀοράτῳ γε ὄντι διὰ τὴν ὑπερέχουσαν φανότητα καὶ ἀπροσίτῳ τῷ αὐτῷ δι’ ὑπερβολὴν ὑπερουσίου φωτοχυσίας.»
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