Posts by Fr. Silouan Justiniano
Institute of Sacred Arts hosts academic round-table on “Tradition and Innovation in the Arts of the Orthodox Church”
The Institute of Sacred Arts (ISA) at St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary (SVS) is currently privileged to have Dr. George Kordis as its inaugural artist in residence for the Spring of this academic year. On Thursday, March 17, a group of distinguished scholars gathered around him at St. Vladimir’s Seminary for an academic round-table…
Continue reading »Poetry as Theology: Reflections on Ephrem the Syrian and Richard Wilbur
Introduction Blessed is He who has appeared to our human race under so many metaphors![i] Asked to reflect on the relationship between poetry and theology, I always reach for the above lines of Ephrem the Syrian’s. In some respects, all my thoughts on this matter are circular, starting from and returning to the…
Continue reading »Every Human Being is a Creator: An Interview with Davor Džalto
Dr. Davor Džalto is professor of Religion, Art and Democracy at Saint Ignatios College in Sweden. His research focuses primarily on the exploration of human freedom and creativity, as metaphysical, political, as well as aesthetic concepts. All of these concerns come together in his book, The Human Work of Art: A Theological Appraisal of Creativity and…
Continue reading »Introducing the Orthodox Arts Festival
Although the arts play an inextricable part in the embodiment of Orthodox faith and culture, it is rare, at least in the anglophone world, to find events that draw together artists from a variety of disciplines into a single international event in support of their work. Indeed, the effort and support necessary for the organization…
Continue reading »The Epiphany of the Eye
“The eye is, to be sure, a small organ in size, but it is more important than all the rest of the body. […] Actually, of course, everything in us is a proof of the wisdom of God, but the eye is so more than any other organ. In truth, it governs the entire…
Continue reading »Canon: Time for a Paradigm Shift…Part IV
How to Conceive a Paradigm Shift? In the end, of course, we cannot naïvely expect that this change of paradigm can be imposed by some “official directive.” As the “chair and apple” example shows, such change happens neither easily nor suddenly. The need for change can be voiced, or even generated by an individual,…
Continue reading »Canon: Time for a Paradigm Shift…Part III
On the Need for the New Paradigm First, the suggested shift in paradigm is not just playing with words, nor is it merely for amusement or for increasing our vocabulary. Neither are we following some fashionable intellectual trend. From the conventional meaning of the term paradigm, I would emphasize its ‘active’ semantic aspects. These suppose…
Continue reading »Canon: Time for a Paradigm Shift…Part II
Are There Rules and Where to Find Them? However, how can we discuss the concept of a list of icon-painting rules if there is the slightest possibility that it might be imaginary? First, let us recall that imaginary entities can define our behavior just as much as physically existing ones. Let us…
Continue reading »Canon: Time for a Paradigm Shift
Editorial note: This post is the first of a series of four which touch on the topic of “canonicity” in icon painting. The series consists of an expanded version of an article previously published in Serbian and in Russian. * The author, Todor Mitrović, is one of the foremost representatives of the icon painting revival…
Continue reading »The Icon Painting of Fr. Stamatis Skliris: A Call for Authenticity
It could be said that Fr. Stamatis Skliris ranks as one of the most important, albeit idiosyncratic and challenging, contemporary iconographers residing in Greece today: idiosyncratic, because his style stands out in a category of its own, in its personal, expressive potency and unique, at times odd, pictorial synthesis; challenging, because he often breaks all…
Continue reading »