Hagia Sophia and the Byzantine Aesthetic Experience

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Release : 2016-04-22
Genre : Art
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Book Rating : 146/5 ( reviews)

Hagia Sophia and the Byzantine Aesthetic Experience - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Hagia Sophia and the Byzantine Aesthetic Experience write by Nadine Schibille. This book was released on 2016-04-22. Hagia Sophia and the Byzantine Aesthetic Experience available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Paramount in the shaping of early Byzantine identity was the construction of the church of Hagia Sophia in Constantinople (532-537 CE). This book examines the edifice from the perspective of aesthetics to define the concept of beauty and the meaning of art in early Byzantium. Byzantine aesthetic thought is re-evaluated against late antique Neoplatonism and the writings of Pseudo-Dionysius that offer fundamental paradigms for the late antique attitude towards art and beauty. These metaphysical concepts of aesthetics are ultimately grounded in experiences of sensation and perception, and reflect the ways in which the world and reality were perceived and grasped, signifying the cultural identity of early Byzantium. There are different types of aesthetic data, those present in the aesthetic object and those found in aesthetic responses to the object. This study looks at the aesthetic data embodied in the sixth-century architectural structure and interior decoration of Hagia Sophia as well as in literary responses (ekphrasis) to the building. The purpose of the Byzantine ekphrasis was to convey by verbal means the same effects that the artefact itself would have caused. A literary analysis of these rhetorical descriptions recaptures the Byzantine perception and expectations, and at the same time reveals the cognitive processes triggered by the Great Church. The central aesthetic feature that emerges from sixth-century ekphraseis of Hagia Sophia is that of light. Light is described as the decisive element in the experience of the sacred space and light is simultaneously associated with the notion of wisdom. It is argued that the concepts of light and wisdom are interwoven programmatic elements that underlie the unique architecture and non-figurative decoration of Hagia Sophia. A similar concern for the phenomenon of light and its epistemological dimension is reflected in other contemporary monuments, testifying to the pervasiveness of these aesthetic values in early Byzantium.

Hagia Sophia and the Byzantine Aesthetic Experience

Download Hagia Sophia and the Byzantine Aesthetic Experience PDF Online Free

Author :
Release : 2016-04-22
Genre : Art
Kind :
Book Rating : 154/5 ( reviews)

Hagia Sophia and the Byzantine Aesthetic Experience - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Hagia Sophia and the Byzantine Aesthetic Experience write by Nadine Schibille. This book was released on 2016-04-22. Hagia Sophia and the Byzantine Aesthetic Experience available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Paramount in the shaping of early Byzantine identity was the construction of the church of Hagia Sophia in Constantinople (532-537 CE). This book examines the edifice from the perspective of aesthetics to define the concept of beauty and the meaning of art in early Byzantium. Byzantine aesthetic thought is re-evaluated against late antique Neoplatonism and the writings of Pseudo-Dionysius that offer fundamental paradigms for the late antique attitude towards art and beauty. These metaphysical concepts of aesthetics are ultimately grounded in experiences of sensation and perception, and reflect the ways in which the world and reality were perceived and grasped, signifying the cultural identity of early Byzantium. There are different types of aesthetic data, those present in the aesthetic object and those found in aesthetic responses to the object. This study looks at the aesthetic data embodied in the sixth-century architectural structure and interior decoration of Hagia Sophia as well as in literary responses (ekphrasis) to the building. The purpose of the Byzantine ekphrasis was to convey by verbal means the same effects that the artefact itself would have caused. A literary analysis of these rhetorical descriptions recaptures the Byzantine perception and expectations, and at the same time reveals the cognitive processes triggered by the Great Church. The central aesthetic feature that emerges from sixth-century ekphraseis of Hagia Sophia is that of light. Light is described as the decisive element in the experience of the sacred space and light is simultaneously associated with the notion of wisdom. It is argued that the concepts of light and wisdom are interwoven programmatic elements that underlie the unique architecture and non-figurative decoration of Hagia Sophia. A similar concern for the phenomenon of light and its epistemological dimension is reflected in other contemporary monuments, testifying to the pervasiveness of these aesthetic values in early Byzantium.

The sensual icon

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Genre : Art
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Book Rating : 846/5 ( reviews)

The sensual icon - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook The sensual icon write by Bissera V. This book was released on . The sensual icon available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. "Explores the Byzantine aesthetic of fugitive appearances by placing and filming art objects in spaces of changing light, and by uncovering the shifting appearances expressed in poetry, descriptions of art, and liturgical performance"--Provided by publisher.

Performing the Gospels in Byzantium

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Release : 2021-05-13
Genre : History
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Book Rating : 872/5 ( reviews)

Performing the Gospels in Byzantium - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Performing the Gospels in Byzantium write by Roland Betancourt. This book was released on 2021-05-13. Performing the Gospels in Byzantium available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Tracing the Gospel text from script to illustration to recitation, this study looks at how illuminated manuscripts operated within ritual and architecture. Focusing on a group of richly illuminated lectionaries from the late eleventh century, the book articulates how the process of textual recitation produced marginalia and miniatures that reflected and subverted the manner in which the Gospel was read and simultaneously imagined by readers and listeners alike. This unique approach to manuscript illumination points to images that slowly unfolded in the mind of its listeners as they imagined the text being recited, as meaning carefully changed and built as the text proceeded. By examining this process within specific acoustic architectural spaces and the sonic conditions of medieval chant, the volume brings together the concerns of sound studies, liturgical studies, and art history to demonstrate how images, texts, and recitations played with the environment of the Middle Byzantine church.

Architecture of the Sacred

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Release : 2014-10-13
Genre : Architecture
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Book Rating : 29X/5 ( reviews)

Architecture of the Sacred - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Architecture of the Sacred write by Bonna D. Wescoat. This book was released on 2014-10-13. Architecture of the Sacred available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. In this book, a distinguished team of authors explores the way space, place, architecture, and ritual interact to construct sacred experience in the historical cultures of the eastern Mediterranean. Essays address fundamental issues and features that enable buildings to perform as spiritually transformative spaces in ancient Greek, Roman, Jewish, early Christian, and Byzantine civilizations. Collectively they demonstrate the multiple ways in which works of architecture and their settings were active agents in the ritual process. Architecture did not merely host events; rather, it magnified and elevated them, interacting with rituals facilitating the construction of ceremony. This book examines comparatively the ways in which ideas and situations generated by the interaction of place, built environment, ritual action, and memory contributed to the cultural formulation of the sacred experience in different religious faiths.