Byzantine Art and Italian Panel Painting
The Virgin and Child Hodegetria and the Art of Chrysography

Jaroslav Folda traces the appropriation of the Byzantine Virgin and Child Hodegetria icon by thirteenth-century Crusader and central Italian painters.

Jaroslav Folda (Author), Lucy J. Wrapson (With)

9781107010239, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 28 July 2015

492 pages, 48 colour illus.
26.2 x 18.5 x 3.1 cm, 1.42 kg

The Virgin and Child Hodegetria was a widely venerated Byzantine image depicting the Virgin holding and pointing to her son as the way to salvation. In this book, Jaroslav Folda traces the appropriation of this image by thirteenth-century Crusader and central Italian painters, where the Virgin Mary is transformed from the human mother of god, the Theotokos, of Byzantine icons, to the resplendent Madonna radiant in her heavenly home with Christ and the angels. This transformation, Folda demonstrates, was brought about by using chrysography, or golden highlighting, which came to be used on both the Virgin and Child. This book shows the important role played by Crusader painters in bringing about this shift and in disseminating the new imagery to Central Italy. By focusing on the Virgin and Child Hodegetria, Folda reveals complex artistic interchanges and influences extending across the Mediterranean from Byzantium and the Holy Land to Italy.

1. Introduction: radiance and reflection: chrysography in Byzantine icons
2. The radiance of Byzantine icons: the reinvention of chrysography after iconoclasm
3. The introduction of chrysography on Crusader icons
4. Icon or altarpiece in the Latin East and Tuscany: innovative panels in the third quarter of the thirteenth century
5. Images of the Virgin and Child Hodegetria enthroned with chrysography by central Italian painters: Coppo di Marcovaldo to Guido da Siena
6. Images of the Virgin and Child Hodegetria enthroned with chrysography by central Italian painters: Duccio and Cimabue
7. Techniques for chrysography in thirteenth-century panel painting Lucy J. Wrapson
Addendum: chrysography investigation: report summary on XRF tests conducted at the National Gallery of Art on three panels Adele Wright.

Subject Areas: Crusades [HBWC], Medieval history [HBLC1], European history [HBJD], Religious subjects depicted in art [AGR], History of art: Byzantine & Medieval art c 500 CE to c 1400 [ACK], History of art / art & design styles [AC]