86 Anthony Ugolnik. The Illuminating Icon. (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 1989), p. 55.
87 Coniaris, 1982, p. 177.
88 Michel Quenot. The Icon: Window on the Kingdom. (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1991), p. 84.
Iconography is “… a creative activity in which the artist has no initiative, in which he finds the problems and their solutions long since formulated, in which he conforms to a well- established hieratic canon and expresses neither his personal emotions nor the beauty of nature.”89 Icons are never painted from the imagination of the painter or from a living model.90 Rather, iconographers used existing icons as points of reference. This affirms the Orthodox commitment to tradition. However, Ouspensky suggests that to paint icons as the ancient iconographers painted them did not mean to imitate their style, but rather to imitate their lives, as Paul imitated Christ. This was accomplished not by copying gestures and words but imitating life. ”…to follow the sacred tradition, to live the tradition.”91
Icons have a unique beauty that is also significantly different to ideas of beauty in the West. Beauty in Orthodox understanding is not the beauty of the creature but the potential beauty when God will be “…all in all.”92 The icon does not represent corruptible flesh but transfigured flesh. This is divine beauty. In this way, there is a clear distinction between a portrait, which focuses on the corruptible flesh, and an icon which focuses on that which is transfigured.93
Much of this focus on the eternal is accomplished through the use of color and, especially, light. What the Gospel proclaimed by words, the icon proclaimed by color.94 Sometimes there is a darkness at the bottom of the icon representing evil and a brightness at the top representing the Divine Presence. Sometimes there is a ladder indicating the possibility of a journey into light.
89 Mircea Eliade. (Ed. by Diane Apostolos-Cappadona), Symbolism, the Sacred and the Arts. (New York, NY: Crossroad Pub. Co., 1986), p. 76.
90 Ouspensky, 1992, p. 170.
91 Ibid, p. 11.
92 Ibid, p. 160.
93 Ibid, p. 161-162.
94 Clendenin, 1994, p. 80.
Sometimes there is a hand at the top of the icon representing God.95 Light permeates the icon like light permeates heaven. There are no shadows. Often, the color gold represents the idea that “…light is called the background of the icon.”96 The body of Christ became luminous and in the same way, the bodies of the saints are portrayed as luminous in icons.97 The halo or nimbus is also used to convey the idea of the eternal. “The gold nimbus or halo around the head symbolizes the brilliance of Divine Light in the person who lives in the intimacy of God.” – more interest in soul than body.98 This is divinity brighter than the sun.99 If the icon has a square halo, it indicates that the icon was painted when the person was still alive.100
Some Physical Features of Icons
Because the intent of iconography was that the artwork be usable in the church for many years, even centuries, a unique process of iconography was developed to ensure preservation. Many layers, consisting of loosely woven linen, a glue and chalk mixture, gold, and egg tempera paint using earth tones, make up the icon. “The icon is an image painted in tempera, with pigments of natural colors mixed into egg yoke. It is painted upon the surface of a wooden board covered with a preparation of plaster mixed with glue.”101
