Sophia, students often kept their voices low during brief interviews about their experience, so as not to disturb others who were creating their icons. “Iconography is a special way to approach God and a special way to create instruments for others to approach God,” he said. Photo courtesy of Wesley Theological Seminary Philip Davydov, a Russian iconographer, teaches an iconography class at Wesley Theological Seminary, a United Methodist-affiliated school in Washington, D.C. However, it does speak to and lead people into a spiritual journey.” “Not everybody who takes the class converts to Orthodoxy. “Every person sees hundreds of images a day and the icon is beginning to speak to people in a way that it hasn’t before,” Hull said. Hull, a Presbyterian convert to Orthodoxy, thinks icons are attractive to people in an age that is more secular and more image-driven than the past. Lynette Hull, an iconographer with the Prosopon School of Iconology, a “school without walls” that offers iconography classes, said a six-day intensive course was started by school founder and Russian native Vladislav Andrejev 28 years ago. Sophia Greek Orthodox Cathedral.Įxperts say the growth in interest - and diversity of religions involved - has been building over the last couple of decades. “Lord Jesus Christ, God of all, enlighten us, imbue the soul, the heart, the intellect of Your servant,” they prayed, standing before easels in a bright, window-filled room steps away from the sanctuary of St.

It was printed on a sheet for the students to read together before picking up their paintbrushes to “write” an image of the Christ child embracing his mother. The artistic process taught in iconography classes is bathed in prayer, both individual and corporate.īefore his history lesson, Papadopoulos began the workshop Schalk attended with an iconographer’s prayer.

It is not ‘artistic expression,’ it is expectation of salvation.” It’s about a reality that is revealed in the image, revealed in the holy Scriptures, revealed in the sacrament, and it’s something that one needs to recognize as very special.” “The Byzantine Orthodox iconography is not just an ‘art,’ it’s a sacred art,” said iconographer Theodoros Papadopoulos. “It says the spirit is not about three dimensions. “The two-dimensional image denies three-dimensional presence,” he said. The flatness of the image, its stillness, the large eyes of its figures and the often symmetrical style are all intentional ways of distinguishing between the ordinary world and a heavenly realm.

Banksĭavid Morgan, a religion scholar and art historian at Duke University, said the iconography tradition, which dates to the early centuries of Christianity, is designed to be distinct from more naturalistic art, which became more common in the Renaissance period. From left to right are Lara Neri of Dallas Paula Magoulas of Washington, D.C. Sophia Greek Orthodox Cathedral in Washington, D.C., in June 2016. Iconographer Theodoros Papadopoulos works with students in his iconography class at St.

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