Reviews : "Nectar and illusion : nature in Byzantine art and literature"

Reviews "Nectar and illusion : nature in Byzantine art and literature" by Henry Maguire (Oxford University Press, 2012). In "Nectar and Illusion" Henry Maguire returns to themes introduced in his 1987 study "Earth and ocean : the terrestrial world in early Byzantine art"...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Studies in iconography 2014-01, Vol.35, p.317-320
Main Author: Barber, Charles
Format: Article
Language:English
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:Reviews "Nectar and illusion : nature in Byzantine art and literature" by Henry Maguire (Oxford University Press, 2012). In "Nectar and Illusion" Henry Maguire returns to themes introduced in his 1987 study "Earth and ocean : the terrestrial world in early Byzantine art" and extends these into an analysis that embraces the representation in Byzantine art and literature of subjects taken from nature. This book is wide-ranging, encompassing materials from Late Antiquity through the late Byzantine era and from all parts of the ever-shifting territories of that empire. Although the texts presented are wide-ranging, it is theological writings, rhetorical set pieces, and church decoration that find a privileged place in this discussion. "Nectar and illusion" continues an interest that has shaped Maguire's extensive, influential, and important scholarship. More specifically, the topic that shapes this book invites us to pay attention to the sometime overlooked, perhaps marginal, play of nature in Byzantine art that is primarily considered in terms of its narrative, theocentric, and anthropocentric subject matter. [Revised Publication Abstract]
ISSN:0148-1029