"Vision of Holiness" - an exhibition of Eastern Christian icons by Ms. Solrunn Nes, a Norwegian iconographer, was presented in "The House of Djura Jaksic" gallery in Belgrade in June 2005.
19/09/2005 :: This is the first exhibition of icons from Norway in Belgrade. It is indeed a discovery to have icons coming from the Northwest of Europe, but painted in a tradition of the Eastern Orthodox Church. Here in Serbia such an iconography has been practiced in the course of many centuries, but until today there has not been any opportunity to see the fruits of such a profound and genuine interest for icon-painting in Norway. A similar growing concern for the ‘theology in colours" is also visible in many other countries worldwide, witnessing a process of encounter, and opening of new areas for dialogue, sharing, intercultural learning and cooperation. Such an interest for traditional Orthodox Church art is especially noticeable in the Roman-Catholic milieus.
The iconographer and art historian Ms. Solrunn Nes has been fascinated by the art of the Byzantine cultural sphere for more then two decades; she is professionally practicing icon-painting in her home town of Bergen on the western Norwegian coast. Her artworks have been exhibited throughout Norway and the Western Europe, as well as in Australia and Asia. This is her first exhibition in the Balkans. Ms. Solrunn Nes will also deliver a lecture about the Medieval Iconography in Norway at the Gallery. The director and curator of these exhibitions is Mr. Lazar Predrag Marković.
This project represents a part of the Balkan Icons Exhibition Programme, which will introduce a collection of contemporary icons from the Balkan countries in Bergen from mid-June to August (at the 12th Century Korskirken church), and afterwards - over the Christmas period - at the Stavanger Art Centre Kulturhus.
Contacts of the Gallery: +381 11 323 03 02 (visiting address: Skadarska 34).
This project was supported by The Royal Norwegian Embassy in Belgrade.
"VISIONS OF HOLINESS - The iconographer Solrunn Nes", article by Fr. Addison Hart
"SOLRUNN NES has represented the authentic tradition of Christian sacred art for two decades. The essence of that tradition is best expressed in the words of the Seventh Ecumenical Council (787 A.D.), which stated:
The making of icons was not the creation of the painters, but an accepted institution and tradition within the universal Church... The idea and tradition came from the fathers, not from the painters. Only the art belongs to the painter, whereas the form without doubt comes from the fathers, who founded the Church.
In other words, the common classical heritage of Christian iconography is embedded
In an objective tradition, one which is conventional, canonical, dogmatic, didactic, and liturgical.
Solrunn Nes, being herself a Norwegian belonging to the Roman Catholic Church, possesses a profound knowledge and love of Eastern Christianity, and can be recognized as a true representative of the tradition expressed preeminently at Nicaea II. She studied icon painting in Finland with Father Robert de Caluwé (1983), and in Athens, at the Academy of Fine Arts under the supervision of Professor Konstantin Xinopoulos (1985), and has traveled extensively in Greece, Turkey, the former Yugoslavia, Russia and Egypt. Highly regarded as an iconographer of considerable skill in western Europe, and especially in her native Norway, where she for several years lectured at the University of Bergen, she now works as a freelance iconographer, writer, and occasional lecturer.
All her icons are striking and luminous, recognizably her own, and yet fully in accord with the objective canonical tradition. Her work -- which she classifies as ‘New Byzantinism’ -- reveals how one committed prayerfully to the latter can nonetheless produce art of obvious creativity. Her icons are bright, spare, free of busy-ness and visual “noise”, and immediate to the beholder. Perhaps it is the provenance of Nes’s work, painted in the land of fjords and the Aurora Borealis, that inspires its luminosity and vibrancy of color. It appears “written” in runes of hued Nordic sunlight, yet in true Byzantine style.
The icon is an expression of her faith. The tradition in which she paints is not concerned with the subjective perception of what is true, beautiful, and good. On the contrary, the faith of the Church is expressed through certain formal norms and with clarity of objective definition of the good and the true: it comes from God and leads to God. The highest compliment that can be paid her work is that it inspires one to pray and to conceive a desire for the True Beauty reflected there.
She has produced two books of interest to the art historian, theologian, and layman seeking a deeper understanding of iconography. Her lavishly illusatrated The Mystical Language of Icons is an introduction that describes in admirable detail, yet with clarity and simplicity, the technique of draughting holy images. She shows how Eastern Christian icons are not simply religious art, as has predominated in the west since the Renaissance (that is to say, they are not merely ”pictures” of religious scenes or biblical stories), but function as liturgical, dogmatic, venerable, and prayerful objects of sacred character. Every page of The Mystical Language of Icons is itself a work of her own iconic art, and she takes us through page after page of iconographic motifs with enlightening explanations of each.
Her other book, The Uncreated Light, is a fascinating blend of theological insight and art history. In it she traces the depiction of the Gospels’ accounts of the Transfiguration of Christ, revealing the various and rich iconographic emphases that theological currents and controversies spanning roughly a thousand years drew out of the event. Pages of relevant biblical and patristic quotations round out the work, showing a deft intertwining of theological knowledge, spiritual insight, art history, and a trained ”detective’s” mind that picks up the subtle clues for interpretation of each work of art under her scrutiny."