The identity of a famous Byzantine painter has been discovered through handwriting analysis of a medieval illuminated manuscript. Associated Press Report this week.
Known as Manuel Panselinos, the artist was a contemporary of Giotto and was equally influential in Byzantine art for his additions to otherwise rigid Orthodox religious works. Awareness of humanity, including facial expressions and greater attention to proportion and depth.
However, when experts were unable to determine the artist’s life, they began to suspect that Panselinos (meaning “full moon” in Greek) was simply a pseudonym. The artist’s works from the late 13th and early 14th centuries are considered among the most beautiful works of the period in the region.
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Byzantine art decorated churches in Greece, Serbia, and other Orthodox countries, including the Eastern Roman Empire and later the Ottoman Turkish Empire. It is characterized by highly stylized and elongated figures, abstract forms, flat colors and sharp outlines – often decorated in gold.
Pancelinos and his contemporaries are known for creating a Renaissance style that revived ancient forms and techniques.
Research by the Greek monk and philologist Cosmas Simonopetritis links Panselinos to the Macedonian School painter Ioannis Astor from the northern Greek city of Thessaloniki. Lapas connects. Handwriting expert Christina Sotirakoglou later compared the fonts in the Astrapas manuscript to those on church paintings at Panselinos in northern Greece right.
Early research linked Astrapas to an artist and scholar who wrote and illustrated the early 14th-century Green Text Codex Marcian GR 516, which dealt with everything from astronomy to music theory. theme. In fact, the illustration shows a full moon.
Sotirakoglu told the outlet that the analysis was “very difficult because the text on the mural is in capital letters and the painters suppressed their own personal handwriting to fit” the traditional format. Associated Press. In contrast, “the Massian codex is written in very small lower case letters.”
However, artist signatures were uncommon at the time, and analysis of more of Panselinos’s works will be needed to confirm this finding.
