Overview

Emerging Iconographies of Medieval Rome examines the development of Christian iconographies that had not yet established themselves as canonical images, but which were being tried out in various ways in early Christian Rome. This book focuses on four different iconographical forms that appeared in Rome during the eighth and ninth centuries: the Anastasis, the Transfiguration, the Maria Regina, and the Sickness of Hezekiah—all of which were labeled “Byzantine” by major mid-twentieth century scholars. The trend has been to readily accede to the pronouncements of those prominent authors, subjugating these rich images to a grand narrative that privileges the East and turns Rome into an artistic backwater. In this study, Annie Montgomery Labatt reacts against traditional scholarship which presents Rome as merely an adjunct of the East. It studies medieval images with formal and stylistic analyses in combination with use of the writings of the patristics and early medieval thinkers. The experimentation and innovation in the Christian iconographies of Rome in the eighth and ninth centuries provides an affirmation of the artistic vibrancy of Rome in the period before a divided East and West. Labatt revisits and revives a lost and forgotten Rome—not as a peripheral adjunct of the East, but as a center of creativity and artistic innovation.

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9781498571159

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This study examines Rome as a center of new artistic production, a laboratory of emerging iconographies. This is in contrast with the views of some prominent scholars who made an a priori assumption of a bifurcated East and West, which turned Rome into a peripheral adjunct of the East. Annie Montgomery Labatt uses new applications of evolutionary thinking to appreciate the significance of `good tries’ that had a momentary `fitness.’ In other words, individual iconographies operated in a `complex adaptive system’ that led some imageries to be replaced by other, more successful ones. Through this lens, the book explores more specifically art in Rome during the eighth and the ninth centuries and four innovative and creative iconographies: the Anastasis, the Transfiguration, the Maria Regina, and the never-recurring Sickness of Hezekiah, the only one of its kind. The book offers a close analysis of the earliest surviving examples of these different iconographies that have been traditionally called proto-Byzantine and shows how their Roman presence is essential, and considers the placement of the different examples in the different spaces of the churches as a way of showing the experimentation occurring. In so doing, the book provides an innovative look at the artistic vibrancy of Rome that was a fertile design landscape, a Rome that allowed varied and vital evolutionary experimentation. Labatt’s insightful reflections break new ground in how scholars should think about Rome in the early medieval period. -- Grazia Maria Fachechi, Urbino University

This study examines Rome as a center of new artistic production, a laboratory of emerging iconographies. This is in contrast with the views of some prominent scholars who made an a priori assumption of a bifurcated East and West, which turned Rome into a peripheral adjunct of the East. Annie Montgomery Labatt uses new applications of evolutionary thinking to appreciate the significance of `good tries' that had a momentary `fitness.' In other words, individual iconographies operated in a `complex adaptive system' that led some imageries to be replaced by other, more successful ones. Through this lens, the book explores more specifically art in Rome during the eighth and the ninth centuries and four innovative and creative iconographies: the Anastasis, the Transfiguration, the Maria Regina, and the never-recurring Sickness of Hezekiah, the only one of its kind. The book offers a close analysis of the earliest surviving examples of these different iconographies that have been traditionally called proto-Byzantine and shows how their Roman presence is essential, and considers the placement of the different examples in the different spaces of the churches as a way of showing the experimentation occurring. In so doing, the book provides an innovative look at the artistic vibrancy of Rome that was a fertile design landscape, a Rome that allowed varied and vital evolutionary experimentation. Labatt's insightful reflections break new ground in how scholars should think about Rome in the early medieval period. -- Grazia Maria Fachechi, Urbino University

Author Information

Annie Montgomery Labatt is associate professor of visual arts and director of the galleries at Sweet Briar College.

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