Michele,
Please forgive my obtuseness. As you outline the development (below), it
does seem to make sense.
pat sloane
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> >You seem to be assuming Luke could have actually made, or did actually
> make,
> >the paintings attributed to him, and that he actually was an artist.
This
> >makes it necessary to answer certain questions.
>
> I am saying absolutely the opposite; as I have tried outlined in previous
> messages, the first sources mentioning Luke as a painter pertain to the
> early 8th century and their emergence is closely related to the
Iconoclastic
> controversy. The example of Luke was used as a good argument to oppose Leo
> III's and Constantine V's politics. About choosing Luke the physician as
the
> first Christian painter, I think the explication lies in the Prologue of
his
> Gospel, where he speaks about his scrupolous research for eyewitnesses as
> sources for his narration. His role as a scrupulous historian may be
> paralleled with the usage of the Greek word for 'writing history' and
> 'painting': 'historein', as well as 'graphein', were used both for
'writing'
> and 'painting'. Here lies, in my opinion, the original cause for chossing
> Luke as the initiator of the Christian practice of painting sacred images:
a
> scrupulous historian would also be a scrupulous author of portraits, and
his
> works would be considered believable reproductions of Christ's and the
Holy
> Virgin's faces. The desire for actual 'eyewitnesses' of the Lord's human
> features is also witnessed by analogous stories: in the 'Narratio de rebus
> Persicis' (6th century) the Three Magi order one of their servants to
> portrait the Child, as well as in many Vitas of the Apostles' disciples
the
> actual aspect of Christ, St. Peter, St. Paul or St. Andrew is provided by
> images thought of as made during the Saviour's lifetimes by some
eyewitness.
> The same is true for late 9th century Armenian legend recording St. Andrew
> portraying the Virgin, or the contemporaneous legend of St. Nicodemus
> painting an image of Christ in the night after the Saviour's crucifixion.
> For these reasons I think it is Luke's being a scrupulous writer concerned
> in searching believable sources, more than his activity as physician,
which
> stimulated the common perception of him as the initiator of Christian
> painting.
>
> Michele Bacci
>
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