Painting: 1204-1261

he boundary between the art of the 12th and 13th century is not completely clear. The occupation of Constantinople by the Crusaders in 1204 played a decisive role in artistic development. An important question when studying the painting of this period is the determination of the centre from which the new currents and aesthetic trends emanated. The lack of surviving monuments from Constantinople and from the Empire of Nicaea constitutes a serious obstacle when attempting to answer this question.

It is probable that there was no single centre but that the new conditions allowed important artistic movements to develop in most of the regions of the old Empire. Thessalonike, a city with a great artistic tradition, was certainly a place of creation and dissemination of stylistic tendencies. The few samples of wall paintings in the basilica
of the Acheiropoietos at Thessalonike (dating from after 1224) are the first examples of the monumental-plastic tendency that we later find in the frescoes of the church of the Ascension in Mileseva, Serbia, founded by the Serb kralj Stefan Vladislav (1233-42). Related to this style are the wall paintings of the third layer of the Episkopi in Eurytaneia, which are now housed in the Byzantine Museum in Athens.

The monumental tendency, characterised by large figures with flowing drapery and expressive faces, is developed in the wall paintings of the church of the Holy Apostles in Pec, Serbia, which was founded by the archbishop Arsenios (1233-63). Arta, the capital city of the state of Epiros, must also have been an important artistic centre. The relatively recent discovery of wall paintings of exceptional quality in the church of Blachernai, the burial place of the ruling family of the Komnenodoukai, appears to confirm this view.

Together with the progressive plastic style may be observed a conservative return to the stylistic tendencies of Late Komnenian art. It is mainly encountered in provincial monuments in the Latin-occupied areas, although there are monuments funded by high-standing patrons, such as the double church of Sts. Nicholas and Panteleemon at Bojana in Bulgaria, founded by the sebastokrator Kalojan (1259), which follow the same trend.