Introduction to the Art of the Period

his is what we admire in works of art, exactly as in the case of natural beings, that is to say the insight of the Mind that has created and creates them every day... fills us with the greatest admiration concluded the scholar and diplomat Manuel Chrysoloras in a letter of his in 1411, referring to the artistic creation and the role of the artist.

This attitude towards the creator of a work of art is one of the new parameters of cultural activity in the Late Byzantine period. The return and imitation of the classical forms, the realism but also a mystifying and transcendent atmosphere are also included in the new achievements of the art of the period, which is divided into two phases: the period of the Latin domination (1204-1261) and the period of Palaiologoi (1261-1453).

Our acquaintance with the late Byzantine art through its forms, and also through the monuments in different sites of the Byzantine state and those under its cultural influence will complete the picture of the turbulent, last period of Byzantium and É "will fill us with the greatest admiration".