Богородица и Младенец
Virgin and Child
- история:
- story:
- Icons of Virgin holding Her Son Jesus have been popular since the Council of Ephesus in 431 solemnly declared Maria to be the "Theotokos" or Mother of God.
- Except in the scriptural scenes in which she plays a part, and in the Deesis, the Virgin is usually seen with the Child.
- This association of mother and infant is found in the frescoes of the Catacombs; but Smirnoff has suggested that the personification of Pietas Augusta on Roman coins may have influenced the type.
- Others believe that it was affected by the Egyptian representations of Isis and Horus, and certainly the resemblance is so strong as to be almost convincing.
- The place consecrated to the Virgin, in the apse of the church, was alredy hers early as the fifth century. In the representations of this period the frontal position is rigidly maintained.
- The famous pictures of the Virgin in Various churches and monasteries, often regarded as miraculous or 'not made with hands', established certain definite types which remained popular for centuries in Byzantine art.
- Among these the Hodegetria and the Blacherniotissa are the most widely known.
- The ideal Madonna of early Italian art was suggested by Byzantine types; and in many Italian pictures of the thirteenth century we may still note the absence of any close and human relation between Mother and Child.
- The Child makes the gesture of benediction, and preserves the serious attitude of an adult. But although the usual Byzantine representation is of a somewhat formal hieratic character, the human aspect of their relationship was occasionally expressed.
