Lights and splendors of Armenian Book Illumination
Date:
October 27, 2011 - 17:30 - 19:00 Room:
Nador utca 13, Room 001 Event type:
Lecture Event audience:
Open to the Public External presenter(s):
Levon Chookaszian CEU host unit(s):
Religious Studies Program CEU host unit(s):
Center for Eastern Mediterranean Studies (CEMS) CEU contact person:
Esther Holbrook Phone:
327-3000 ex 2170 E-mail:
Email contact form 
Central European University's
Religious Studies Program
in association with the
Center for Eastern Mediterranean Studies
cordially invite you to a lecture by
Dr. Levon Chookaszian
(Yerevan State University)
Lights and splendors of Armenian Book Illumination
October 27, 2011
5:30 pm
Nador 13, Room 001
Abstract
The history of Armenian culture manuscripts illumination is unique and ancient. Its oldest specimens are date back to the 6th and 7th centuries: fragments that have been traced back to a manuscript which had been inserted at the end of the famous Ejmiacin Gospels of 989. The oldest dated and illuminated manuscript is the Gospel of Queen Mlke of 862. Various styles of Armenian book illumination can also be found in Armenian miniature painting.
Generally, illuminated manuscripts have fifteen pictures depicting Christian themes; ten of them will be full-page dimensions. Gospels illumination consists also of portraits of the four Evangelists accompanied by a headpiece dominating the first lines of the text along with marginal ornaments, canon tables, small miniature portraits of saints and other geometrical, animal and floral motifs. Full-page illuminations represent major events in Christ’s life. Miniatures make up one of the most important branches of Armenian art. Armenian miniaturists throughout the centuries created works which, judged by their variety, their intrinsic value, and often by their originality, hold an important place in the art of the Christian East.
Dr. Levon Chookaszian was born in 1952 in Yerevan, Armenia. He graduated from Yerevan State University in 1974 with a degree in philology and is the author of two monographs. He has published over two hundred articles and reviews on Armenian art, painters, sculptors, and architects for the Armenian Soviet Encyclopedia, the Armenian Question Encyclopedia, the Armenian Abridged Encyclopedia, and the Saur Allgemeines Kunstlerlexikon (Germany, Munchen Leipzig). He and his brother, Garegin Chookaszian, founded the Armenian Art Database. He is director of the UNESCO Chair of Armenian Art History at Yerevan State University, which he established in 1996. He has delivered lectures on Armenian art to institutions around the world was well as advising on 12th through 13th century Armenian illuminated manuscripts found in the U.S..