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Art Review | 'From Byzantium to Modern Greece'
Under the Ottomans, Greece at Work
By GRACE GLUECK
Published: December 30, 2005
For nearly 400 years after 1453, when the Ottoman Turks invaded Constantinople, finishing off the Byzantine Empire, Greece was among the countries that languished under their regime. Ottoman repressions finally led to the Greek war of independence in 1821, resulting, after nine years, in a hard-won Greek victory.
Benaki Museum, Athens
Art featured in the show includes a 17th-century gold pendant.
Benaki Museum, Athens
El Greco's "Adoration of the Magi."
Benaki Museum, Athens
"View of Marathon" by Edward Lear.
Yet the very troubles brought about by the occupation - constant battles between the Ottomans and the Venetians that killed men and destroyed monuments; forcible conversions to Islam; Greek migrations to the West; and struggles against the invaders by those who stayed - helped to strengthen a sense of national identity and bolster Greek culture.
That story is told in "From Byzantium to Modern Greece: Hellenic Art in Adversity, 1453-1830," a show assembled by Angelos Delivorrias, director of the Benaki Museum in Athens. Selected from the Benaki's collection, and now appearing at the Onassis Cultural Center in New York, it is a busy, ambitious hodgepodge that sets out to present all aspects of the visual art in Greece during this period. The range spans wonderful early paintings and icons, like a panel by the youthful El Greco; examples of domestic crafts practiced by Greek women; jewelry and church ornaments; and maps and charts.
Two constants - the ancient, beautiful Greek language and the unifying power of the Orthodox Church, the only Byzantine institution to survive the Ottoman conquest - kept Hellenism alive and helped shape its self-awareness in the modern world, Mr. Delivorrias wrote in the show's catalog. The language, of course, fostered a sense of nationhood, and the church, besides serving as spiritual and judicial authority, was the major patron for works of art.
So if political self-determination did not flourish over the four centuries, the arts of civilization did, nourished by Byzantine tradition, European achievements, Western fashion, Ottoman ornamentation and the classical Greek past. As much a history show as an art exhibition, "From Byzantium to Modern Greece" may be lacking in masterpieces, but it gives a vivid picture of the period.
First there are the icons and panel paintings, whose most brilliant examples came from the Venetian-held island of Crete, a dynamic artistic community where traditional Byzantine painting met the styles of late Gothic and Renaissance Italy. The Crete-born painter Domenikos Theotokopoulos (1541-1614), better known as El Greco, was trained in the Byzantine tradition, but strong Italian influences appear in his small panel painting, "The Adoration of the Magi" (circa 1560-67). It puts the Virgin and Child, attended by the wise men, in the ruins of a Renaissance-style building meant to suggest the decadent old order, which the Child will overturn.
"Icon of the Virgin of Tenderness," a much larger panel from the early 17th century by Emmanuel Lambardos, looks back to a purer Byzantine tradition. This highly stylized but gentle image of a dark-skinned Virgin and Child, in which she presses her face against his as he touches hers with his hand, is magnificently painted on a gold ground. The artist was a member of the Lambardos family of painters renowned in Candia (the capital of Venetian Crete) during the 16th and 17th centuries.
An important part of the show deals with the Greek Enlightenment and the war of independence that it eventually helped bring about. By the 18th century, trade was flourishing between Greek merchants and the West - touched on here by navigational charts, paintings of ships and small votive offerings in the form of sailing vessels - promoting liberal ideas and strengthening national consciousness.
Greece was fertile territory for the progressive ideas of the European Enlightenment, which were conveyed in part by the books of Greek men of letters who lived abroad, some of which are displayed here. And the big bang of the French Revolution reverberated in Greek ears. What's more, although European governments were generally pro-Ottoman, the Greek cause found solid support among their citizens. A movement known as philhellenism gained momentum, which supported the thrust to liberation materially as well as philosophically.
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824), the English Romantic poet, was among the more than 1,000 volunteers who arrived in Greece after the bloody war of independence began in 1821. Through his poetry and utterances, he had played a vigorous role in promoting Greek culture and was a severe critic of the removal of sculpture from the Acropolis by Lord Elgin, the British ambassador to the Ottoman Court, in 1806.
A member of the Philhellenic London Committee, Byron was dispatched in 1823 to Missolonghi, known as the bastion of Greek freedom and then under siege by the Turks, to lend his services. His death there of a fever the next year further amplified European awareness of conditions in Greece. A full-length portrait of him in Greek dress, done in 1830 by an unknown artist, shows him standing before the ruins of the Acropolis.
During the second Turkish siege of Missolonghi, from 1825 to 1826, the population, much reduced by disease and starvation, made a pitiful attempt at escape. Only a third of the soldiers and a handful of women and children achieved it. The aged, feeble and wounded left behind took refuge in the gunpowder magazines, which they lighted when the enemy approached.
"Missolonghi Fugitives" (circa 1830), by the French romantic artist Jean Michel Mercier (1788-1874), shows a family of survivors on a fishing boat, fleeing the flaming city. Two younger men row, as a man with a musket stands in the boat's prow. A woman sitting in front of him holds a child on her lap while tending to a baby lying beside her. Representations like this of war-ravaged humanity played powerfully on the emotions of 19th-century viewers.
The depredations of revolution are not apparent in a beguiling section of foreign artists' idyllic scenes. Among them is a lyrical "View of the Plain of Marathon" (1854) by the British watercolorist (and nonsense poet) Edward Lear. He lived on Corfu from 1847 to 1864 and did more than 3,000 paintings of Greece. This one depicts the vast stretch of the plain, site of the Greek victory over Persia in 490 B.C., bathed in an almost liquid light, while in the foreground a stand of tall, elegant trees provides shelter for what might be a group of picturesque picnickers.
Nor are hard times evident in the displays of church ornaments and secular jewelry that help enliven the show. Among the former, a bishop's miter of gilt-silver (1739) from the church of St. George at Argyroupolis, is spectacular. Heavily worked with gold embroidery, embossed religious scenes and portraits, its ornamentation includes filigree floral motifs, semiprecious stones and nailheads.
Secular standouts include a drop-dead bridal diadem from Epirus (late 18th century), worked in an amazing variety of materials and techniques indicative of the new-rich tastes among the merchant class of Epirus; intricate pendant earrings whose drops take the form of ships; heavy belt buckles richly paved with stones and filigree. Women's garb, too, was given careful attention, as is evident in the elaborate costumes shown in paintings and on mannequins.
A bay of the gallery is devoted to the home, the main theater of aesthetic expression during the diminished public life and social curtailments of the Ottoman regime. Weavings and embroideries, ceramics, carved wooden chests and panels are among the striking objects here, their mixed motifs deriving from Byzantine tradition, European Baroque and Rococo tendencies, and nature-inspired Ottoman decorations.
Over all, this show, nicely packed into the relatively small space of the Onassis Center, offers, in small bites, an enlightening glimpse of Greek achievement during unpropitious times.
"From Byzantium to Modern Greece: Hellenic Art in Adversity, 1453-1830" continues through May 6 at the Onassis Cultural Center, 645 Fifth Avenue, at 52nd Street; (212) 486-4448.
Under the Ottomans, Greece at Work
By GRACE GLUECK
Published: December 30, 2005
For nearly 400 years after 1453, when the Ottoman Turks invaded Constantinople, finishing off the Byzantine Empire, Greece was among the countries that languished under their regime. Ottoman repressions finally led to the Greek war of independence in 1821, resulting, after nine years, in a hard-won Greek victory.
Benaki Museum, Athens
Art featured in the show includes a 17th-century gold pendant.
Benaki Museum, Athens
El Greco's "Adoration of the Magi."
Benaki Museum, Athens
"View of Marathon" by Edward Lear.
Yet the very troubles brought about by the occupation - constant battles between the Ottomans and the Venetians that killed men and destroyed monuments; forcible conversions to Islam; Greek migrations to the West; and struggles against the invaders by those who stayed - helped to strengthen a sense of national identity and bolster Greek culture.
That story is told in "From Byzantium to Modern Greece: Hellenic Art in Adversity, 1453-1830," a show assembled by Angelos Delivorrias, director of the Benaki Museum in Athens. Selected from the Benaki's collection, and now appearing at the Onassis Cultural Center in New York, it is a busy, ambitious hodgepodge that sets out to present all aspects of the visual art in Greece during this period. The range spans wonderful early paintings and icons, like a panel by the youthful El Greco; examples of domestic crafts practiced by Greek women; jewelry and church ornaments; and maps and charts.
Two constants - the ancient, beautiful Greek language and the unifying power of the Orthodox Church, the only Byzantine institution to survive the Ottoman conquest - kept Hellenism alive and helped shape its self-awareness in the modern world, Mr. Delivorrias wrote in the show's catalog. The language, of course, fostered a sense of nationhood, and the church, besides serving as spiritual and judicial authority, was the major patron for works of art.
So if political self-determination did not flourish over the four centuries, the arts of civilization did, nourished by Byzantine tradition, European achievements, Western fashion, Ottoman ornamentation and the classical Greek past. As much a history show as an art exhibition, "From Byzantium to Modern Greece" may be lacking in masterpieces, but it gives a vivid picture of the period.
First there are the icons and panel paintings, whose most brilliant examples came from the Venetian-held island of Crete, a dynamic artistic community where traditional Byzantine painting met the styles of late Gothic and Renaissance Italy. The Crete-born painter Domenikos Theotokopoulos (1541-1614), better known as El Greco, was trained in the Byzantine tradition, but strong Italian influences appear in his small panel painting, "The Adoration of the Magi" (circa 1560-67). It puts the Virgin and Child, attended by the wise men, in the ruins of a Renaissance-style building meant to suggest the decadent old order, which the Child will overturn.
"Icon of the Virgin of Tenderness," a much larger panel from the early 17th century by Emmanuel Lambardos, looks back to a purer Byzantine tradition. This highly stylized but gentle image of a dark-skinned Virgin and Child, in which she presses her face against his as he touches hers with his hand, is magnificently painted on a gold ground. The artist was a member of the Lambardos family of painters renowned in Candia (the capital of Venetian Crete) during the 16th and 17th centuries.
An important part of the show deals with the Greek Enlightenment and the war of independence that it eventually helped bring about. By the 18th century, trade was flourishing between Greek merchants and the West - touched on here by navigational charts, paintings of ships and small votive offerings in the form of sailing vessels - promoting liberal ideas and strengthening national consciousness.
Greece was fertile territory for the progressive ideas of the European Enlightenment, which were conveyed in part by the books of Greek men of letters who lived abroad, some of which are displayed here. And the big bang of the French Revolution reverberated in Greek ears. What's more, although European governments were generally pro-Ottoman, the Greek cause found solid support among their citizens. A movement known as philhellenism gained momentum, which supported the thrust to liberation materially as well as philosophically.
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824), the English Romantic poet, was among the more than 1,000 volunteers who arrived in Greece after the bloody war of independence began in 1821. Through his poetry and utterances, he had played a vigorous role in promoting Greek culture and was a severe critic of the removal of sculpture from the Acropolis by Lord Elgin, the British ambassador to the Ottoman Court, in 1806.
A member of the Philhellenic London Committee, Byron was dispatched in 1823 to Missolonghi, known as the bastion of Greek freedom and then under siege by the Turks, to lend his services. His death there of a fever the next year further amplified European awareness of conditions in Greece. A full-length portrait of him in Greek dress, done in 1830 by an unknown artist, shows him standing before the ruins of the Acropolis.
During the second Turkish siege of Missolonghi, from 1825 to 1826, the population, much reduced by disease and starvation, made a pitiful attempt at escape. Only a third of the soldiers and a handful of women and children achieved it. The aged, feeble and wounded left behind took refuge in the gunpowder magazines, which they lighted when the enemy approached.
"Missolonghi Fugitives" (circa 1830), by the French romantic artist Jean Michel Mercier (1788-1874), shows a family of survivors on a fishing boat, fleeing the flaming city. Two younger men row, as a man with a musket stands in the boat's prow. A woman sitting in front of him holds a child on her lap while tending to a baby lying beside her. Representations like this of war-ravaged humanity played powerfully on the emotions of 19th-century viewers.
The depredations of revolution are not apparent in a beguiling section of foreign artists' idyllic scenes. Among them is a lyrical "View of the Plain of Marathon" (1854) by the British watercolorist (and nonsense poet) Edward Lear. He lived on Corfu from 1847 to 1864 and did more than 3,000 paintings of Greece. This one depicts the vast stretch of the plain, site of the Greek victory over Persia in 490 B.C., bathed in an almost liquid light, while in the foreground a stand of tall, elegant trees provides shelter for what might be a group of picturesque picnickers.
Nor are hard times evident in the displays of church ornaments and secular jewelry that help enliven the show. Among the former, a bishop's miter of gilt-silver (1739) from the church of St. George at Argyroupolis, is spectacular. Heavily worked with gold embroidery, embossed religious scenes and portraits, its ornamentation includes filigree floral motifs, semiprecious stones and nailheads.
Secular standouts include a drop-dead bridal diadem from Epirus (late 18th century), worked in an amazing variety of materials and techniques indicative of the new-rich tastes among the merchant class of Epirus; intricate pendant earrings whose drops take the form of ships; heavy belt buckles richly paved with stones and filigree. Women's garb, too, was given careful attention, as is evident in the elaborate costumes shown in paintings and on mannequins.
A bay of the gallery is devoted to the home, the main theater of aesthetic expression during the diminished public life and social curtailments of the Ottoman regime. Weavings and embroideries, ceramics, carved wooden chests and panels are among the striking objects here, their mixed motifs deriving from Byzantine tradition, European Baroque and Rococo tendencies, and nature-inspired Ottoman decorations.
Over all, this show, nicely packed into the relatively small space of the Onassis Center, offers, in small bites, an enlightening glimpse of Greek achievement during unpropitious times.
"From Byzantium to Modern Greece: Hellenic Art in Adversity, 1453-1830" continues through May 6 at the Onassis Cultural Center, 645 Fifth Avenue, at 52nd Street; (212) 486-4448.