ON THE QUESTION OF CLASSICAL THEMES IN THE ART OF PRE-MONGOL RUSSIA

A narrow range of Byzantine texts, primarily chronographic ones, containing classical themes and images, were translated in Russia starting from the 11th century.These texts became the literary basis of secular and ecclesiastic art. Several iconographic motifs from mythological stories and the “Ascension of Alexander the Great” entered the art of pre-Mongol Russian. Byzantium was the main source of the antique elements in Old Russian culture. Some motifs were also adopted in Old Russia from Romanesque art, through close contact with Western Europe. The tradition of using ancient subjects for the decoration of churches in relief, which was widespread both in Byzantine and in Romanesque art, was continued in Russian monuments. Сlassical subjects on the walls of churches served as apotropaic images, but their symbolism could also include other aspects. Antique motifs are encountered even in the frescoes of monastery churches which followed a strict, ascetic iconographic programme in spite of the general orientation of Old Russian art towards the monastic culture of Byzantium. The author deals with the problem of specific samples. It is unlikely that objects of applied art could have served as models for church sculpture.

La portada de la navidad en la iglesia románica de Santo Domingo De Silos (Burgos): análisis de un programa iconográfico románico inspirado por la liturgia hispana = The Christmas Portal in the Romanic Church of Santo Domingo de Silos (Burgos): Analysis of a Romanesque Iconographic Program Inspired by the Hispanic Liturgy

La puerta septentrional de la iglesia románica de Silos, hoy desaparecida, contaba con un programa decorativo único en el arte románico. El presente trabajo pretende analizar la forma en la que la antigua liturgia hispana fue capaz de condicionar su mensaje iconográfico. Para esto se propondrán relaciones entre los relieves y los manuscritos hispanos que, finalmente, nos permitirán considerar el ciclo de la Navidad del antiguo rito como la inspiración del programa decorativo.AbstractThe north entrance of the Romanesque church of Silos, now disappeared, had a unique decorative programme in Romanesque art. The present work seeks to analyze the way in which the ancient Hispanic liturgy was able to condition its iconographic message. To this end, we propose relationships between the sculptures and Hispanic manuscripts, which will finally allow us to consider the Christmas cycle of the ancient rite as the inspiration for the decorative programme.

«Descubrir» y «descubrirse» en el románico: un ejemplo catalán de patrimonio de la humanidad

The aim of this work is to present a case study on the identification between Romanesque art and national identity in Catalonia, an association that emerged in the framework of the emergence of national movements at the end of the 19th century, but that was recovered a century later when the process for the declaration of the Romanesque churches of the Boí Valley as a world heritage site by UNESCO began. The identification of the Romanesque with a «national art» is reinforced in this case because it is a Romanesque art located in the heart of the Pyrenees, with the strong symbolic value of the mountain as the «cradle» of the Catalan nation. We will analyse the World Heritage process and its effects in the context of a small territory, with a scarce population and dependent to a great extent on the seasonality of tourism.

Becoming Leo. Steinberg e l'Institute of Fine Arts di New York: dall’eredità dei professori tedeschi allo sviluppo di un nuovo criticism

Leo Steinberg, born in Moscow in 1920 but raised in Berlin and London, arrived in New York in January 1945. Trained as an artist in London in the early 1950s, when he was already in his thirties, he decided to study art history at the Institute of Fine Arts (IFA), where he was educated by Jewish-German refugee art historians such as Richard Krautheimer, Wolfgang Lotz, and Erwin Panofsky. This essay reconsiders Steinberg’s work, which is well-known for its unconventional and revisionist inter- pretations, through the lens of his academic formation and the legacy of German Kunstwissenschaft in postwar America. Taking into account unpublished material (including university course notes and papers and an abandoned dissertation on the afterlife of Romanesque art), I point out how Steinberg’s first scholarly works, while respecting the methodologies of his professors, at the same time tried to “resist” their heritage. His engagement with contemporary art, for example, led him to challenge the biases of his professors, sometimes to their annoyance, as was the case with his Ph.D. dissertation on Borromini’s church of San Carlino, which was contested by his adviser Richard Krautheimer. The essay argues that during the IFA years Steinberg had already developed some of the concepts that would characterize his later intellectual trajectory: the dialogue between Old Master art and contemporary experience, the emphasis on the beholder’s physical and psychological response to artworks, the epistemological reevaluation of subjectivity, the priority of visual data over texts, and the hermeneutical validity of ambiguity and multiple levels of meaning. Through these means, Steinberg achieved a personal synthesis between historical investigation and criticism, anticipat- ing the rethinking of the methodological tradition in the 1960s and 1970s.

Of Archers and Lions: The Capital of the Islamic Rider in the Cloister of Girona Cathedral

In the south gallery of the cloister of the Cathedral of Santa María, Girona, we find one capital that is differentiated from the rest because of its formal as well as its iconographic characteristics. The four faces of capital no. 4 contain two repeated and two alternating motifs: the archer on horseback and the lion attacking a bull. Both the dress of these horsemen and their physical traits identify them as Muslim horsemen. This identification creates an interpretive context for the capital as a whole that also conditions the reading of the conquering lion. Both images will be examined within their constructive context in the light of events and legends that surrounded the cathedral of Girona in the twelfth century. Moreover, we will trace the origin of these motifs that have their parallels in ivories of the art of the caliphal and taifa periods as well as in Catalan Romanesque and Sicilian-Norman art. This overview will enable us to interpret the meaning and significance of the capital in its historical-artistic context and enrich our knowledge of the artistic transfers between Andalusian and Romanesque art.