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Joseph Receiving the Rod Which Marks Him as The Favorite Suitor

Joseph receiving the rod which marks him as the favorite suitor

Constantinople;  Church of the Chora; Mosaic:  Joseph receiving the rod which marks him as the favorite suitor;
Brooklyn Museum Archives, Goodyear Archival Collection

Kariye Camii is the best sample we have of late Byzantine art

Byzantine Renaissance

Byzantine Renaissance
The Moslem followers of Mohammed the Conqueror who triumphantly stormed Constantinople in 1453 were so successful in covering up all traces of Christianity that for almost five centuries Byzantine art—once the glory of Eastern Christendom—could be judged only through the examples that survived outside the Moslem world. Then, in 1935, Turkey’s Kemal Ataturk declared Istanbul’s Church of St. Sophia a historical monument, and cleared the way for Western experts to remove the plaster and paint that pious, iconoclastic Moslems had daubed over the great Christian mosaics. Since then each fragmentary restoration has added new proof of the power and achievement of Byzantine religious art between the 4th and 15th centuries A.D.

Five years ago a task force financed by Boston’s Byzantine Institute carefully eyed the walls in another Istanbul church, Kariye Camii, rebuilt on an older structure in the early 14th century and later converted into a mosque. With official blessing, the restorers went to work, soon realized that they had found a new jewel case of Byzantine art. With the job only three-fourths completed, their most significant find has been a set of 18 mosaic panels depicting the life of the Virgin Mary. Says Professor Paul A. Underwood, field director of the Istanbul project, who this week reports on the restoration work to the World Byzantine Congress in Istanbul: “Kariye Camii is the best sample we have of late Byzantine art.”

Kariye Camii was rebuilt in the early 1300s as a monastery church within Constantinople’s mighty walls, at the order of a wealthy courtier, Theodore Metochites. All evidence indicates that the church was decorated by mosaic masters who were buoyed up by the same fresh new breeze of discovery that in the West heralded the first stirrings of the Renaissance. Into the rigid Byzantine forms that had governed Eastern religious art for almost a thousand years, Byzantine artists poured a new warmth drawn from revived classic models.

For subject matter they turned to the Apocryphal New Testament for scenes from the life of Mary. One of the best preserved panels (see color page) shows the child Mary installed as a handmaiden in the temple as a thanksgiving offering by her parents. According to the Apocryphal Book of James: “And Mary was in the temple of the Lord as a dove that is nurtured; and she received food from the hand of an angel.” To portray Mary the artist used gentle modulations of beige, blue and gold, which achieve the soft tones of tempera painting. Little effort was made to indicate perspective, but the turning movement of the figures, the flowing robes of Mary and her handmaiden and the swirling movement of the angel break away from the stiff formalism of earlier Byzantine art.

In Italy this refreshed, humanized vision was carried one step further by Giotto, who incorporated into Western art the nobility of classic models. But in the East, with the growing threat of invasion looming over Constantinople, Byzantine art recoiled into familiar formalism. The murals of Kariye Camii stand revealed as the high point of Byzantine humanism, possibly the last great testimony of Byzantine art in its final flowering.

Monday, Sep 12, 1955 – Time

Chora Church, while was using as masque

Chora Church 19th Century

Black and white photo from the era Chora Church were using as masque, 19th century

St. Savior in Chora (Kariye Müzesi; formerly the Kariye Camii)

Chora Church Istanbul

Much of what remained in the coffers of the Byzantine Empire was invested in the embellishment of this church, one of the finest preserved galleries of Byzantine mosaics as well as a detailed account of early Christian history. The original church was built in the 4th century as part of a monastery complex outside the city walls (chora zonton means “in the country” in Greek), but the present structure dates to the 11th century. The interior restoration and decoration were the result of the patronage of Theodore Metochites, Grand Logothete of the Treasury during the reign of Andronicus II Paleologos, and date to the first quarter of the 14th century. His benevolence is depicted in a dedicatory panel in the inner narthex over the door to the nave, which shows Metokhites presenting the Chora to Jesus.

Chora Church Byzantine Museum
When the church was converted into a mosque in the 16th century, the mosaics were plastered over. A 19th-century architect uncovered the mosaics but was ordered by the government to re-cover those in the section of the prayer hall. American archaeologists Whittemore and Underwood finally uncovered these masterpieces during World War II, and although the Chora became a museum in 1947, it is still often referred to as the Kariye Camii.

In total there are about 50 mosaic panels, but because some of them are only partially discernible, there seems to be disagreement on the exact count. Beginning in the exonarthex, the subjects of the mosaic panels fall into one of four themes, presented more or less in chronological order after the New Testament. Broadly, the themes relate to the cycle of the life of Christ and his miracles, stories of the life of Mary, scenes from the infancy of Christ, and stories of Christ’s ministry. The panels not included in these themes are the devotional panels in the exonarthex and the narthex, and the three panels in the nave: The Dormition of the Virgin, Christ, and the Virgin Hodegetria.

The Paracclesion (burial section) is decorated with a series of masterful frescos completed sometime after the completion of the mosaics and were presumably executed by the same artist. The frescoes reflect the purpose of the burial chamber with scenes of Heaven and Hell, the Resurrection and the Life, and a stirring Last Judgment with a scroll representing infinity above a River of Fire, and a detail of Jesus saving Adam and Eve’s souls from the devil.

Frommer’s Turkey 4th Edition

Chora Church (Kariye Museum)

The Kariye Museum (Church of the Holy Savior in Chora, Chora Church) has the best Byzantine mosaics in the region. If you can spare two hours, you must see them.

As the Kariye / Chora Church is out-of-the-way, one of the best ways to visit is on a half-day Istanbul city tour that also visits the nearby city walls, Tekfur Sarayi, Yedikule, etc. More…

Originally built in the 4th century as the ‘Church of the Holy Savior Outside the Walls’ or ‘in the Country’ (chora), it was indeed outside the walls built by Constantine the Great.

The building you see was built in the late 11th century, with lots of repairs and restructuring in the following centuries. Virtually all of the interior decoration—the famous mosaics and the less renowned but equally striking mural paintings  (dates from about 1320).

The mosaics are breathtaking. The first ones are those of the dedication, to Jesus and Mary. Then come the offertory ones: Theodore Metochites, builder of the church, offering it to Jesus.

The two small domes of the inner narthex have portraits of all Jesus’s ancestors back to Adam. A series outlines Mary’s life, and another, Jesus’s early years. Yet another series concentrates on Jesus’s ministry.

In the nave are three mosaics: of Jesus, of Mary as Teacher, and of the Dormition of Mary (turn around to see this one-it’s over the main door you just entered).

South of the nave is the Parecclesion, a side chapel built to hold the tombs of the church’s founder and relatives. The frescos, appropriately, deal with the theme of death and resurrection.

The church was enclosed within the walls built by the Emperor Theodosius II in 413, less than 100 years after Constantine, so the church ‘outside the walls’ has in fact been ‘in the city’ for 1550 years.

For four centuries after the Ottoman conquest of Istanbul it served as a mosque (Kariye Camii), and is now a museum (Kariye Müzesi) because of its priceless mosaics.

To get to the Kariye Museum (closed Wednesday), if you don’t take an Istanbul city tour, a taxi is easiest but most expensive.

You can save money (but not time) by taking any bus that stops at Edirnekapi.

When you reach Edirnekapi, ask for directions by saying Kariye (KAH-ree-yeh) to anyone you see. The museum is only a five-minute walk east of the boulevard. Neighborhood people will happily point the way through the maze of tiny streets.

On the south side of the Kariye Müzesi is the Kariye Oteli, housed in a renovated Ottoman mansion. Asitane (AH-see-TAH-neh, an Ottoman sobriquet for Istanbul), the hotel’s garden restaurant, features fine Ottoman cuisine and excellent service in a refined atmosphere, at suitably lofty prices.

The building facing the Kariye Museum was once the Kariye Muhallebicisi or Pudding Shop, an old Istanbul institution.

From Kariye, head west to the city walls, then north again, and you’ll soon come to the Palace of Constantine Porphyrogenetus, the Tekfur Sarayi (tehk-FOOR sar-rah-yuh), closed in 2006 for restoration and still closed in early 2009.