We’re excited to share our love of icons with you. Want to learn more? The Classical Iconography Institute is dedicated to training iconographers, capable of writing liturgical icons for the church. This entails teaching students a comprehensive circumscription of the saint or subject matter to learn the saint’s history, underlying theology or message of the icon, and the subject’s depiction throughout the centuries in conjunction with today’s message. Visit our CLASSES pages to learn how you can start your journey into becoming an iconographer. No prior art skills are required!

Egg tempera icons are so luminescent because of the glazing process that slowly builds color with nearly transparent layers. Icons may have 100 or more thin layers of thin pigment glazes. This many layers painted with water require extensive time for the wood to dry. This is one of the many factors that contributes to the length of time it takes to create a well-executed liturgical egg tempera icon. Larger icons may take a year or more.

The average 8”x10” beginning icon may be completed in 40 hours, assuming there are few areas requiring correction.

The Classical Iconography Institute instructs in the ancient method of Egg Tempera Iconography, remaining true to authenticity by using historic materials and methods as part of its mission to preserve this cultural heritage. Our supplies are derived from animal, vegetable and mineral sources. Natural pigments from ground stone, mineral and earth are bound with egg emulsion to create pigments that have lasted for many centuries. Our painting surface begins with wood, on which a linen substrate holds gesso made from ground marble and rabbit skin glue.

Egg tempera Iconography is one of the oldest Christian liturgical arts. Some say it dates to St. Luke, who painted the Virgin and child. It is the process of binding natural pigment of earth and ground minerals with egg yolk, red wine vinegar and water, applied to a natural wood panel.

One of the terms for this calm, neutral, steady gaze is “bright sadness” or “sad brightness” known in Greek as “harmolipi.” In his work, Great Lent, Fr. Alexander Schmemann describes “Sad brightness” as “the sadness of my exile, of the waste I have made of my life; the brightness of God’s presence and forgiveness, the joy of the recovered desire for God, the peace of the recovered home.” It is the ability to hold both joy and sadness in one’s heart simultaneously. A neutral facial expression enables us to calmly pray before an icon without the pressure of a facial expression we must interpret.

Icons of Our Lord, the Mother of God, angels and saints are depicted in their transcended states from the beyond, where there is no need to express human emotion through facial expressions. Being in God’s presence removes all human passions. Their direct gaze in icons is intended to engage and invite the viewer into a calm and prayerful conversation.

While the proportions may initially seem “off,” exaggerated features or “distortion” are visual devices used in iconography to call your attention to a saint’s hagiography. For example, in this Icon of St. John the Baptist displayed in the Writing the Divine Exhibition, you will notice extremely thin arms that seem proportionally off for the size of his chest. This strategy conveys John the Baptist’s personal characteristics – he was an ascetic who lived off locusts and honey, evidenced by the thinness of his arms and gaunt facial features. He was the forerunner of Christ, making the way straight through preaching – represented by the great chest of an athlete or Warrior for God, who doesn’t tire or quit, with lung capacity to proclaim the word loudly, without ceasing.

Iconography employs exaggerated proportions to call your attention to something important. For example, in the Theotokos & Jesus icons, Mary’s long fingers point you to the Christ child on her lap – the focus. And that huge forehead on Saint Nicholas – it represents wisdom. “Symbols and gestures indicate a saint’s role, while facial features indicate a saint’s character and salient qualities.” (Aidan Hart)

A painting is a record of a single event captured in color. We only see the surface of the oil or acrylic paints because light cannot penetrate the matter. With icons, one is engaged in a dialogue with what is presented. Since Christ took human form to draw all things to his Father, through icons we can join in the story. The perspective in inverse, so the “Vanishing Point” is behind us not in the distance, so we are drawn into the story. How do we engage? With our own stories joined to the subject, story or saint presented, we continue to “tell” the story.

We “write” an icon because the origin of icons is in “…and the Word became Flesh, and dwelt amongst us.” Since all icons refer to the “Word”, what do you do with words? You speak them, hear them, and most importantly write them.

In writing an icon, care is taken to symbolically show the spiritual state of creation. Light, the sign of God’s presence and action, shines from within the holy figures, representing their transcendence into the realm of the divine. Black is used to call attention to the action of evil in the world. It is used to represent the ultimate absence of God’s presence— Hell.

For example, the cave of the Nativity icon is black to remind us of the tomb that Christ will be laid in. It was for this He came, to die for our salvation. To further make this point, the infant is swaddled as in a shroud and laid in a sarcophagus shaped manger. Devils, like those seen fleeing into the Gerasene swine re usually portrayed as black stick figures with no real dimension beyond their evil blackness.

It is a truism that you need to experience darkness before you can see the light. In icons that means the light of the subject comes from within, from the indwelling of God’s light. Darkness is seen as the representation of evil, not just shadows but real darkness, black darkness. It is the absence of light and therefore the absence of the good.

In the Roman world, an artist was considered a craftsman, a hireling, who had no importance of his own. It was the same in the early church. It was the clients who told the artist what to paint and what colors to use, sometimes even where he was to buy them. He was of no importance personally except as his talent might be recognized by his superiors. The painters were usually monks who sought no fame.

Gradually, certain writers began to achieve a certain renown, like Theophanes the Greek or his apprentice and later collaborator St. Andrei Rublev, but even they were only recognized by their style not their autograph. Gradually, especially with the influence of Western artists who came to the Byzantine world, some artists began to sign their work. While a few signed the front of their icons or cleverly embedded their signature into a pattern of a garment, or shield, today it is more common for the icon writer to sign his or her work on the back to avoid draw attention away from the mystery proclaimed.

Originally, it would have been considered an act of pride, as the purpose of the icon is to glorify God and not the icon writer. The writer was considered as one who was bearing the gift of the vocation of iconography for God; therefore, any credit should go to the giver of the gift, not the messenger.

The Second Person of the Trinity took flesh “…and dwelt among us.” While the early

Church disapproved of images, the pagans who converted to Christianity had no such scruples about images. Through many councils and controversies, the Church allowed the development of images since the Word could be seen and touched;

(“..that which we have seen with our eyes; that we have watched and touched with our hands: The Word…” 1 John)

By sharing our humanity, Jesus allowed His image to be made. And those saints who lived in Him were considered a continuation of that permission, which is why we write the images of saints. All honor is paid to subject of the icon, not the icon itself. Since all the saints portrayed the life of Christ, honor to them is honor to our Lord.

It is only because the “Word was made Flesh” that the Church, after much controversy, allowed Christ’s depiction in art. St. John of Damascus wrote a compelling argument that we can portray what we have seen, and through the Incarnation, we have seen God and His humanity. This is why we can portray Christ’s humanity, but not his Godhood. Every icon is based on this premise. As a saint is an embodiment of Christ in the world, their lives, too, show forth the Word at work in creation. Therefore, to write an icon of them is to write of Christ in their lives.