Michael Damaskinos
Michael Damaskinos | |
---|---|
Born | 1530/35 Crete |
Died | 1592/93 Crete |
Nationality | Greek |
Movement | Cretan School |
Michael Damaskenos or Michail Damaskenos (Greek: Μιχαήλ Δαμασκηνός, 1530/35–1592/93) was a leading post-Byzantine Cretan painter. He is a major representative of the Cretan School of painting that flourished in the 16th and 17th centuries. Painters Georgios Klontzas and Damaskenos were major contributors to the Cretan School during the same period. Damaskinos traveled all over the Venetian Empire painting. He remained loyal to his Greek roots stylistically but incorporated some Italian elements in his work. He was strongly influenced by the Venetian school. He painted parts of the Cathedral of San Giorgio dei Greci. Damaskenos has 100 known works. He influenced the works of Theodore Poulakis.[1][2][3]
Life and work[]
Damaskinos was born in Candia (Herakleion), his father was . According to legend, Damaskinos spent some time living and working in Vrontisi Monastery, where six of his icons were kept until 1800. Damaskinos moved to Venice in the 1560s, while he was there he learned miniature painting.[4]
He traveled extensively throughout Italy.[5] From contracts we know he briefly stayed in Sicily from 1569 to 1571. Afterward, he traveled back to Venice. He was a member of the Greek Brotherhood of Venice from 1577 to 1582. He painted icons for the Greek Orthodox Cathedral of San Giorgio dei Greci in Venice. He tried to become a member of the council of the confraternity. He was unsuccessful. During the same period, he worked for both Catholic institutions and executed private commissions.[6]
He became friends with sculptor Alessandro Vittoria. He sold a collection of drawings to him which he amassed from other Italian artists. Namely the Mannerist Parmigianino. He was also familiar with Palma Giovane and may have had some contact with the workshop of Tintoretto. Some of his works are clearly influenced by Paolo Veronese, Tintoretto and Titian. Many of the Greek painters were influenced by the Venetian school. He returned to Candia around 1583.[7]
His only daughter Antonia married painter Ioannis Mavrikas-Mandouphos or Yannas Mantoufos. Damaskinos stayed in Greece and worked mainly in Crete and the Ionian Islands. He was invited to return to Venice by the Greek Orthodox Confraternity. They wanted to commission him to paint the dome of San Giorgio dei Greci. He declined the invitations for personal reasons.[8] Extensive work was later completed at the church San Giorgio dei Greci by famous painter Emmanuel Tzane-Bounialis. He was influenced by Damaskinos.[9]
Damaskinos works were characteristic of the traditional Byzantine style. He used a particular rose color that characterized his paintings, his figure dimensions were defined by only a few brush strokes.[10] He drew on wood but never marble thrones which was typical in the Cretan School.[11] Damaskinos was also the first artist to introduce paler flesh tones to post-Byzantine painting and it was one of the stylistic features of his work which proved highly influential from the second half of the sixteenth century and onwards.[12]
Damaskinos signed his works: ΧΕΙΡ ΜΙΧΑΗΛ ΤΟΥ ΔΑΜΑΣΚΗΝΟΥ or ΧΕΙΡ ΜΙΧΑΗΛ ΔΑΜΑΣΚΗΝΟΥ, ΔΑΜΑΣΚΗΝΟΥ ΜΙΧΑΗΛ ΧΕΙΡ or even ΠΟΙΗΜΑ ΜΙΧΑΗΛ ΤΟΥ ΔΑΜΑΣΚΗΝΟΥ (creation of Michael Damaskinos).[13] Damaskinos worked extensively on the Ionian Islands. He contributed to the fusion of the Cretan and the Heptanese School of painting. He influenced the works of Theodore Poulakis. Famous Greek Painter and theorist Panagiotis Doxaras in his book The Art of Painting published in 1720 considered Damaskinos to be one of the most important painters.[14]
Gallery[]
Traditional[]
Four military saints
John the Angel of Desert
Saint George and Saint Demetrius
Saint Athanasius
Saint Luke and the Virgin Mary
Divine Liturgy
The First Council of Nicea
Arius - detail of Byzantine icon depicting the First Council of Nicaea
Venetian Cretan School[]
The Wedding of Cana
The Beheading of St John the Baptist
The Last Supper
The Crucifixion of St Andrew
Saint Justine
See also[]
External links[]
- Museum of St. Catherine/Museum of Christian Art in Heraklion
- The painter Michael Damaskenos
- Cretan Icon Painting up to the Fall of Candia
- The work of Michael Damaskinos by S. Peponakis-in Greek
- Istituto Ellenico di Studi Byzantini and Postbyzantini di Venezia
- Collection of Agia Aikaterini of Sinai
- Byzantium: faith and power (1261-1557), an exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art (fully available online as PDF), which contains material on Damaskinos (see index)
References[]
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Michael Damaskenos. |
- ^ Patrick Comerford (June 27, 2009). "The Cretan School of Icons and its contribution to Western Art". An Online journal on Anglicanism, Theology, Spirituality. Retrieved May 25, 2021.
- ^ Speake, Graham (2021). Michael Damaskinos Encyclopedia of Greece and the Hellenic Tradition. London And New York: Rutledge Taylor & Francis Group. p. 443-444.
- ^ Eugenia Drakopoulou (June 18, 2021). "Damaskinos Michail". Institute for Neohellenic Research. Retrieved June 18, 2021.
- ^ Speake, 2021, p. 443-444
- ^ Greek Icon Painting (1927) J. Stuart Hay, Leonard Bower The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs, 51,(292);pp: 8-9 and 12-14
- ^ Speake, 2021, p. 443-444
- ^ Speake, 2021, p. 443
- ^ Speake, 2021, p. 443-444
- ^ Speake, 2021, p. 443-444
- ^ Speake, 2021, p. 443-444
- ^ 2000_ΑΥΓΟΥΣΤΟΣ-ΜΙΧΑΗΛ ΔΑΜΑΣΚΗΝΟΣ Archived 2007-09-28 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ A winged St John the Baptist icon in the British Museum (2003) Angeliki Lymberopoulou Apollo
- ^ "Cretan portable icons". Archived from the original on 2007-09-28. Retrieved 2007-07-31.
- ^ Speake, 2021, p. 443-444
- 1530s births
- 1590s deaths
- Greek painters
- Artists from Heraklion
- Cretan Renaissance painters
- 16th-century Greek people
- 16th-century Greek painters