Lebanon - The Eyes Have It
Nishee
Warren Singh-Bartlett meets the man who brings back the dead
The door on the fifth floor is kept tightly locked. There is one key and
it belongs to Father Lammens. The door opens on to a small, well-lit
room, dominated by an immense table. Brown pharmaceutical bottles full
of chemicals sit in two neat rows against the back wall. The near end of
the table is strewn with scalpels, cotton swabs, pincers and X-rays. At
the far end of the table a microscope and a comically large magnifying
glass are clamped to the tabletop. In between lie several large,
shrouded objects. In this small room, minor miracles take place.
Since November last year, at the Lebanese Academy for Fine Arts (ALBA)
in Sin al-Fil, Father Antoine Lammens has been teaching his team of
seven all the skills they will need to bring centuries-old religious
icons back to their former glory.
For hours on end, the trainees stroke, swab and scrape away at the
brittle brown crust which lies over the beautiful faces of angels and
saints. The accumulated grime of centuries of smoke from incense and
candles and centuries of grease from lips and fingers.
For a country with as many icons as Lebanon, this group is the first to
be trained locally. Before the center opened its doors last year,
prospective plastic surgeons to the saints had to learn their trade
abroad. And it’s come not a moment too soon: “The icons of Lebanon need
to be taken care of,” Father Lammens says emphatically. “They’re
disintegrating.”
It’s a painstaking process and even the smallest icons can take several
months to complete. The trainees must work with precision, a single slip
of the scalpel or a drop too much alcohol on the swab and a timeless
beauty might be badly disfigured, perhaps even damaged beyond repair.
Times have changed. At the end of the 19th century, restoring an icon
simply meant repainting it. Sometimes the restorer was less concerned
about remaining faithful to the original creation than they were about
creating something wholly original. “Haram,” moans Father Lammens.
“Entire schools of iconography were lost.”
At the end of the 20th century, restoration has become a science.
Consequently, today’s would-be restorers need to understand chemistry as
well as art history and iconology. They must also possess a tremendous
degree of patience.
Before restoration can begin, the icon has to be carefully examined. A
series of close-up photographs are taken of certain sections, especially
of any inscriptions and the details of the hands and face. It is vital
that nothing be changed particularly the position of the hands because
each gesture has a meaning. Then a further series of photographs are
taken using different light sources. Ranging from UV and infrared to
sodium light, each light reveals details that may be impossible for the
eye to see.
Finally, the icon is X-rayed. This makes it possible to see if the
uppermost layer is the original or if the icon has been repainted in the
past. Often the X-rays reveal inscriptions or background details that
have been obscured by the ravages of time or by previous “restorations.”
Sometimes the results are startling, the X-rays revealing the ghostly
outline of an older icon beneath. Until recently, such a discovery would
have required some tough decision-making. Should the older image remain
hidden or was it sufficiently valuable in spiritual and artistic terms
to warrant erasing the newer image? Thanks to modern technology, this
kind of decision is no longer necessary. Today’s experts are able to
remove the upper layer of the icon and transfer it intact onto a new
canvas, once again exposing the original to the light of day, perhaps
for the first time in centuries.
Once the icon has been photographed, it must be carefully documented.
Often the owner knows little or nothing about the icon’s history or
meaning, so this is where the restorer becomes a detective. The
inscriptions, sometimes Greek, sometimes Russian and sometimes Arabic,
are translated. This often reveals a lot of information about the icon
and its origin. And by examining the style, the color scheme and
composition of the icon as well as the kind of paint used, an expert can
usually but not always determine where, if not when, the icon was
painted.
“Most icons are anonymous,” says Father Lammens. “The painters worked
for God.” They were painted in workshops and were often the work of
several painters. It wasn’t until the 19th century that iconographers
began to date and sign their work.
Iconography is found in most religions. It was introduced into
Christianity through the Orthodox Church sometime around the fourth
century AD. The art form grew out of mosaic and fresco tradition of
early Byzantine art but it is also highly likely to have been strongly
influenced by the funerary art of Fayoum in Egypt.
The subject of a recent international exhibition, the Greek inhabitants
of Fayoum combined Egyptian burial techniques with Greek traditions of
painting. The mummies and sarcophagi they left behind have vivid
life-like portraits painted on them, faces that look out expectantly
from the shrouds, awaiting a return from the dead. By the sixth century
people believed that praying before an icon ensured that the saint would
intercede and their prayers would be heard.
The bulk of the icons that exist today were painted after the 10th
century AD. Countless early examples were destroyed during the artistic
holocaust of eighth and ninth centuries AD.
From the 10th century onwards, iconography enjoyed renewed popularity
and today icons can be found from Ethiopia to Finland. Byzantine icons
were produced in large numbers until the fall of Constantinople in 1453,
when the practice was transplanted to Russia, the inheritor of the
Orthodox mantle.
“The value of an icon is not just artistic. It’s spiritual,” says Father
Lammens. “We mustn’t forget that this is a cult object, full of theology
and symbolism. It just can’t be put anywhere.”
This is why some ecclesiastical authorities object to icons being
displayed except in holy places.
Father Lammens blue eyes sparkle as he warms to his topic. His hands
begin to trace fleeting arabesques in the air; a single finger is raised
for emphasis, and an open palm is an entreaty to listen carefully.
“The icon represents a theology of light,” he explains. “God created
with light so the iconographer paints with light.” He gestures at the
pictures around him: “Look, the light comes from within the painting,
from inside the figure,” he says pointing to a Madonna and child. “This
is not created light; it’s a spiritual light.”
It is the desire to capture this inner light that fuelled the
development of the icon. It is why so much gold was used and it’s why
the eyes are unnaturally large. “It allows the soul to shine through.
The eyes contain life. When they no longer see the light, we are dead.”
This is why, as in Buddhist iconography, the eyes are the last part of
the icon to be painted, for once they are added, the icon is brought to
life.
“We used to think that there were no icons in Lebanon before the 17th
century,” he says “but now we have found one in Kaftoun from the 11th
century and a Cretan icon in Tripoli from the 15th century.”
More than just plastic arts surgeons to the saints, Father Lammens and
his team are helping to rewrite history as old becomes new and the
forgotten heritage of Lebanon’s churches emerges from the grime of
centuries of devotion.
A display of icons under restoration will be held at ALBA in Sin al-Fil
until Dec. 9. The exhibition is open from 10 a.m. until 7 p.m. For
further information call 01.500 779