The Influence of the Ontology of Orthodox Christian Art on Music and Icon Painting

Abstract

The social institution of the Orthodox Christian Church penetrates into all the aspects of artistry (icon painting, church singing, church rituals), supporting individual thinking. However, it is only in the present day than the integrity of this thinking is becoming comprehensible. The methods of iconography, musicology, and singing paleography, the meticulous reading of the theological utterances of St. John of Damascus and the other Church Fathers, analysis of the historiography of the works of such authors as Father Pavel Florensky, Yuri Lotman, Alexei Lidov, Sergei Averintsev, and Nikolai Mikhaltsov allow us to understand the deep ontology of Orthodox Christian art. The author of the article presumes that the concept of St. John of Damascus, expressed in the concept of perichorisis, reflecting the idea of the “mutual exchange of energies,” should be interpreted not only christologically, but as being the most important ontological basis of the entire legacy that accompanies church service. It is perichorisis that provides the synergy of the artistic means: the color scheme of images and the color model of the chant text for the icon, as well as the melodic formulas of the chant merge in unity. As a result of this, a unique set of regulator-techniques of the expressivity of ecclesiastic art is formed, which also exerts an impact on modern art. The article provides examples of such influence in the work of Georgy Sviridov.

Keywords: ontology of Orthodox Christian art, iconography, color rendering of the stichera text, melodic formulas, Georgy Sviridov