Page 67 - Uros Todorovic Byzantine Painting Contemporary Eyes

Chapter I
In the beginning, the painting of the Post Byzantine period survived as a marginal art.67 Unfortunately, in Greece, as well as generally in the Balkans, very few decorations from the mid 15th century remain and most of them are not entirely preserved.68 In the examples of the late 15th century fresco painting which still survive in the Balkan region, Western, Gothic, and other more subtle influences were detected – evident mainly in distinct iconographical motifs.69
In the second half of the 15th century, Cypriot painters followed earlier local traditions of painting which was in its early stages of becoming emancipated. It is with the arrival of painters who in this same period came to Cyprus with waves of refugees, such as the painter who worked in the narthex of the Monastery of St John Lampadistis, who came from Constantinople, that the new aesthetic developments were clearly manifested.70
However, in Cyprus, the isolation of the island after the fall of Constantinople in 1453, and the absence of the Orthodox artistic centres, led to a new orientation towards artis- tic trends of the West.71 As Garidis observes, the clear adoption of Gothic and Renais- sance aesthetic tendencies and their collision with medieval Byzantine tradition are ex- pressed as a particular and characteristic artistic tendency which by the end of the 15th century morphed into the so called “italo-byzantine” school of painting, whose expan- sion however remained limited.
The most comprehensive group of frescoes representative of this “italo-byzantine” style rendered at the end of the 15th century, is preserved in the so called “Latiniko Parek- klisi” (Latin Chapel) which is built at the north side of the main church of the Monastery of St John Lampadistis in Kalopanagiotis (in Cyprus). As noted by Garidis, here the in- fluence of the Italian Renaissance is felt in the drawing, in the rendering of form, in the landscapes, as well as in the third dimension applied in the architectural elements of the background.72 However, in spite of the Italian, and the additional Gothic influence which is obvious in the decorative elements in the vaults, most of the compositions in this chapel remain faithful to Byzantine iconography.73
67 Μίλτος Γαρίδης, Μεταβυζαντινή Ζωγραφική (1450–1600). Η εντοίχια ζωγραφική μετά την πτώση του Βυζαντίου στον Ορθόδοξο κόσμο και στις χώρες υπό ξένη κυριαρχία. Μετάφραση: Αγγελική Γαρίδη (Αθήνα: Εκδόσεις Κ. Σπανός, «Βιβλι- οπωλείο των βιβλιοφίλων», 2007), 3.
68 Ibid., 77. 69 Ibid., 77–130. 70 Ibid., 67. 71 Ibid.
72 Ibid., 65. 73 Ibid.
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