Christmas Pot-Pourri, Volume 13 #6

Madonna Inside Out and Outside In

For centuries the church was the great patron of art and a favourite theme was the Madonna and Child. In Eastern Christianity, Mary was Theotokos--the God Bearer. In the Western world, especially at the time of the Renaissance, Mary was also a human mother in whom everyone could recognize qualities of warmth and compassion. The two Madonnas I have chosen for consideration are masterpieces of painting from each tradition. Representing the West is the Madonna of the Meadow, painted between 1505 and 1516 by Giovanni Bellini, while the Eastern tradition is represented by the Virgin of Vladimir, painted by an anonymous artist at the beginning of the twelfth century.

Both painters use the Incarnation as a starting point. The Word was made flesh. Bellini emphasizes the flesh that the Word inhabited and the involvement of all creation in this event. He paints from the outside in, probing the mystery. The Eastern artist emphasizes the Word that was made flesh, and paints from the inside out. Convinced of the centrality of the divine indwelling, he strips away the externals and in the icon he unveils the inner mystery shining forth. We who carry this treasure in earthenware jars are indebted to the great artists of both traditions. Each of these paintings is a unique contribution to the history of art and to the rich heritage of the whole Church of Christ.

Around 1300, the realism and naturalism of Giotto triumphed in Italy over the "maniera greca" or Byzantine style. Two centuries later, Leonardo da Vinci described the problems facing the realistic painters who followed in Giotto's footsteps: "A good painter has two chief objects to paint--man and the intention of his soul. The former is easy, the latter hard, for it must be experienced by gestures and movements of the limbs."

Consider the task facing Giovanni Bellini (ca. 1430-1516) in painting the Madonna and Child. He must paint humanity and divinity because this Child of Mary is also the Son of God. He is required to portray a woman who is at the same time virgin and mother. And because he believes in the Incarnation and its ramifications for all created nature, he has to portray the familiar and the sublime. Bellini was ideally suited to the task in both piety and skill. Albrecht Dürer, at the time the greatest artist in northern Europe, visited Bellini in Venice in 1506. "All men tell me what an upright man he is," Dürer wrote, "so that I am very friendly with him. He is very old, but still the best painter of them all."

Whether by temperament, design or both, Bellini's painting depicts a reflective and sober mood. The landscape and figures are poised and still. A ground-level viewpoint allows the viewer to enter into the scene. The repetition of horizontal lines impart a great calm to the painting. The triangular shape for the composition of the virgin and child gives the painting a strong sense of stability. Bellini was a master of light who responded to nature in all its times and seasons. The meadow seems to be bathed in the cool light of a spring morning. The colour is mainly a mixture of blues and complementary earth tones, with a patch of red in Mary's robe enlivening the whole scheme. The relatively low saturation of the colours gives the effect of sombre and restrained harmony.

While Bellini doesn't use a halo to suggest the supernatural, he imbues the Virgin with radiance and sacramental solemnity as she joins her hands in prayer. Mary stares in awe at the divine Child who is her Son and Creator. In this Madonna, done late in his life, Bellini has successfully integrated the Mother and Child into a beautiful landscape and brought them into everyday life.

In the Byzantine world, a new style of art developed in the tenth and eleventh centuries, spread mainly through manuscript miniatures and icon panels. An interest in humanism appeared and a more intimate manner was portrayed.

The Virgin of Vladimir, perhaps the most famous icon in Russian history, was brought from Constantinople to Kiev around 1183. About twenty years later it was moved to Vladimir, where it stayed until 1395. Although the icon has been in Moscow for the past six centuries, it is still referred to as the Virgin of Vladimir. Patriarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church were consecrated before this icon, tsars were crowned in its presence, and it was carried in procession in times of national crisis. A living symbol of Christian culture and Russia up to the Revolution, copied by generations of Russian painters, it was the image of the compassionate tenderness so loved by Russians.

Since the icon is an external expression of the transfigured state of a person--of his or her sanctification by the Divine Light--the artist depicts the cosmic significance of the light that permeates all things. Light becomes the background of the icon. When we examine the Virgin's face, we see that her large eyes are hypnotic, but it is impossible to make eye contact with her. Her eyes look outward but beyond the surface of things, and inward as well. While at first sight Mary is the dominant figure in the icon, on closer inspection we see that the strong diagonals delineating the child and snapping across the folds of his garment indicate great strength and energy. Henri Nouwen interprets the powerful neck of the Child as a sign of the Holy Spirit.

Since Christianity is a revelation not only of the Word of God but also of the Image of God, the iconographer and the evangelist have similar tasks. The Gospel writers described what the kingdom of God was like by using parables. The iconographer uses figurative and symbolic images to represent spiritual reality. The evangelist does not preach his own ideas, but the good news of salvation proclaimed by Christ. The iconographer is not expected to give his own ideas, but a description of what is contemplated.

Fasting and prayer went along with the painting of the icon. Since the work was done for God's glory and not the glory of the artist, an icon was not signed. This is one more reminder that icons, by their very meaning, transcend the limits of time and place and usher us into a realm whose inner content is accessible only to the spiritual eye and the heart of faith. The Virgin of Vladimir invites us, as she has invited generations of Russians, to enter into that realm, to ponder the mystery and to share in eternal life.

Thomas Roach is chair of the art department at St. Francis Xavier University in Antigonish, Nova Scotia.