38
39
divine Jacopo Bassano lapis lazuli miniature from
the 1500s; the Rhodes Missal of 1504 (a richly
illuminated manuscript on vellum); a Breughel
masterpiece Madonna and Child with St John
the Baptist in a Landscape; 17
th
and 18
th
century
prints from the Bible Museum inAmsterdam; and
a Konstantinos Parthenis work of humble beauty
(entitled simply
Madonna and Child
) which was
the artist’s gift to his own daughter on her 21
st
birthday.
And complementing the outstanding artworks
are pieces from three great photographers:
Stelios Kallinikou, Matt Crossick and Guillaume
Onimus. Commissioned to approach afresh
the historical representations of the Nativity
– exploring the interaction between viewer,
image and text – the trio worked independently,
photographing famous paintings of the Nativity
in churches, museums and a number of other
institutions, as they identified the ways viewers
and the environment converse with these famous
works.
“One of the photographers, for example,
focused on the idea of religious places that are
also monuments, such as UNESCO churches,”
Katerina clarifies. “Another turned a picture
of a famous, religious-themed painting into a
diptych – a traditional format for Christian art –
highlighting the artistic layers of interpretation
and reinterpretation.”
Interspersed throughout the paintings, the
photographers’ work serves to accentuate what
is truly a glorious – and topical – exhibition; the
ideal seasonal getaway when you need an hour or
two of quiet beauty.
By Alix Norman (Cyprus Mail newspaper)
The Rhodes Missal
The Rhodes Missal was presented to the Order
of St John in 1504, as the gift of a Senior French
Knight, Fr. Charles Aleman de Rochechenard,
Prior of Saint-Gilles, whose arms are included
frequently in the illuminated decorations.
Containing the Catholic service of the Eucharist,
the Missal includes two full-page miniatures,
depicting the Crucifixion and God the Father. In
addition, there are 26 half-page miniatures that
illustrate the significant services of the Catholic
religious calendar. The folios shown here depict
the Annunciation to the Shepherds, the Adoration
of the Shepherds and the Nativity.
The Order of St John, also known as the Knights
Hospitaller and the Knights ofMalta, was founded
in Jerusalem in the 11
th
century. As a religious
military order, the Knights cared for sick pilgrims
and fought in the Crusades. Following successive
defeats by Islamic forces, the Order slowly
retreated westwards across the Mediterranean,
settling in Cyprus, then Rhodes and finally in
Malta, where they remained from 1530 until the
invasion of Napoleon in 1798. Today, the Order
continues the tradition of caring for the sick, as
an exclusively humanitarian organisation with an
enduring religious foundation.
Painting by Spinello Aretino
This scene, painted by SpinelloAretino, presents
the Virgin in the aftermath of childbirth, seated
in the heart of the composition, while two
midwives are preparing Christ’s first bath.
Angels hover in the upper-left hand corner of
the image, and Joseph and the two animals that
form a key part of the Nativity narrative imagery
are also present. There is a noticeable realism in
the scene, evident particularly in the poses of the
figures, such as the two midwives: the striking
angle of the down- turned forehead of the figure
in red, and the way in which the figure on the
right prepares to place the infant, feet first, into
the low basin.
Spinello Aretino was praised by Giorgio Vasari
for demonstrating remarkable skill as a painter
already in his youth; Vasari ascribed him with
a natural skill for painting that required little
teaching and with having a better hand before
reaching 20 years of age than many who had
trained under great masters.
Spinello di Luca Spinelli was born in Arezzo,
probably after 1345, and is recorded in the
Florentine physicians’ guild – where painters
were inscribed – by 1386; soon after, he was
receiving important commissions in the area,
both for panel and fresco paintings. Documented
as working, besides in Arezzo and Florence,
in Lucca, Siena and Pisa, he is acclaimed by
scholarship for his dynamic sense of narrative
and his style, which is seen to anticipate the
growing ‘realism’ of Early Renaissance painting
in the 15
th
century. (See S.Weppelmann, Spinello
Aretino e la pittura del trecento in Toscana,
Florence 2011, p. 264.)
For more information:
By Flemish Baroque painter Jan Brueghel the Younger
By Italian painter SpinelloAretino
