Continuing my photojournalism series highlighting Balkan churches, this post features an especially beloved monastery in North Macedonia – The Monastery of Saint Naum. Saint Naum was a disciple of Saints Cyril and Methodius, and participated in their mission to spread Christianity and literacy in Europe. After completing the Moravian mission, he settled in Bulgaria and joined the literary school in Preslav. Yeats later, he moved to Ohrid and worked with Saint Clement, running the Ohrid school from 893 to 900. He then retired across the lake and built the monastery that bears his name ..read more

Sharing our teaching method, I invite fellow iconographers to share their views on teaching, as only by approaching this subject from several sides can we foster a new generation of iconographers who will be better than us. Iconography course taught by fr. Andrey Davydov in Abbazia di Praglia near Padova, Italy. 2000 The teaching method my wife Olga Shalamova and I now use took its shape gradually. In Italy in 1994 I started as an interpreter and assistant to my dad. His method was mainly built on two key aspects: sharing his knowledge in theology, history of iconography and art and showin ..read more

Resuming my photojournalism series highlighting Balkan churches, this post features an especially interesting and beautiful church in North Macedonia – The Church of Saint George in the village of Staro Nagoričane. The church bears a unique form and history. It was originally built in the 10th century, almost certainly as a three-aisle basilica. It was likely later abandoned and ruinous, if indeed it had ever been completed. The monastery was refounded and rebuilt by Serbian King Stephan Milutin in 1312 or 1313. At that time the church was rebuilt as a domed cross-in-square plan – typical fo ..read more

(Editor’s Note. This essay builds upon our earlier article about Fr. Zinon by Aidan Hart. This article explores Fr. Zinon’s often original and controversial beliefs about the Church, and how his independent thinking inspired his art. By posting this article, the OAJ does not mean to imply endorsement of Fr. Zinon’s ideas, but rather to explore the motivations of this highly influential iconographer. It is well worth considering that many of the recent archaizing fashions in Orthodox liturgical do not exist in isolation from ecclesiology.)  Fr Zinon (Teodor) Fr Zinon (Teodor) is widely ..read more

After a fantastic tour of the Balkans last June, the Orthodox Arts Journal is sponsoring a second art and architecture package tour. This tour will last 2 weeks, and will visit all the key sites for medieval architecture, frescoes, and liturgical art in the Republic of Georgia. It will begin in Tbilisi on June 3rd, 2024, and end on June 15th. Price for the tour is $2,700 per person (shared accommodations), or $3,100 for single-room accommodations. Transportation to Tbilisi is not included. Leading the tour will be Andrew Gould, American church designer and liturgical artist, and founder ..read more

­ The subject of this article — the “Znamenny Chantlet Database Project” — is a continuation of a proposal[1] initially unveiled by the author at the 2014 Pan-Orthodox Symposium on Orthodox Composition, held at Northern Kentucky University, and in a paper[2] given in 2015 at the Conference of the International Society of Orthodox Church Musicians in Joensuu, Finland, titled “Creating Liturgically: Hymnography and Music.” Introduction When modern-day Orthodox church musicians in North America gather, the subject often turns to the question of the future directions that liturgical singing in th ..read more

I would like to introduce you to my new project, Katrusya Studio, which was established to teach people Medieval ecclesial pictorial embroidery. What is pictorial embroidery? The term “pictorial embroidery” refers to any embroidery depicting faces and figures of people. Ecclesial pictorial embroidery encompasses figures of saints, scenes from their lives, and famous historical events. The roots of this type of embroidery go back to very ancient times. We know of its existence not just from surviving embroideries, which, being perishable, are very rare, but also other art forms–sculpture, carv ..read more

This talk was offered as part of the Fall Retreat at Holy Annunciation Orthodox Church in Rolla, Missouri. It explores the theme of community life being expressed through liturgical art – a sort of do-it-yourself guide to building an artistic culture of worship and hospitality in church, village, and home: Annunciation Fall Retreat – October 7, 2023 from Rolla Creative on Vimeo ..read more

An exciting centre for training liturgical artists and inspiring commissioners was officially launched on the September 14th, 2023. It is called the Chichester Cathedral Workshop for Liturgical Art. It is based at the ancient cathedral in the south of England,which stems from a monastery founded by St Wilfrid in 681. You can learn more about the Workshop and view the first seven of its video discussions on liturgical art at www.chichesterworkshop.org. By virtue of its foundation by an Anglican cathedral, except for myself the Workshop is currently operated and supported mainly by and for Ang ..read more

I’m very pleased to announce that I’ve partnered with the Sacred Arts Institute at Saint Vladimir’s Seminary to produce a major book featuring the best of North America’s Orthodox Liturgical Arts. This will be a high-quality art book focused on presenting excellent color images. We will feature historic and contemporary churches, icons, furnishings, metalwork, textiles, manuscripts, and more. The focus will be on works of great beauty that adapt Old-World Orthodox tradition to New-World culture and contexts. We need your help! With this announcement, we are making a continent-wide call for su ..read more