The image of God in Byzantine Cappadocia: an investigation of its relation to divine and human in fourth-century Cappadocian thinking.

The project is an interdisciplinary exploration of how Byzantine mural paintings in a number of churches at Göreme, Cappadocia, from the iconoclastic 8th-/9th-centuries to the 13th-century Latin Empire, depicted both that “God is” (not what God is) and that “God acts”. By means of a unique and new method Byzantine aesthetics will be mapped out on basis of dogmatic models of explanation of God´s transcendence (divinity, immateriality, invisibility), and God´s immanence (humanity, materiality, visibility) in texts by the 4th-century Cappadocian Fathers.

The project is supported by Riksbankens Jubileumsfond (The Bank of Sweden Tercentenary Foundation).

 Select Publications

Monographs:

Karahan, Anne, Byzantine Holy Images – Transcendence and Immanence. The Theological

Background of the Iconography and Aesthetics of the Chora Church (Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta, 176), Leuven/Paris/Walpole, MA: Peeters Publishers, 2010. ISBN 978-90-429-2080-4. 366 p.

 Karahan, Anne, Byzantine Holy Images and the Issue of Transcendence and Immanence. TheTheological Background of the Late Byzantine Palaiologan Iconography and Aesthetics of the Chora Church, Istanbul (unpublished doctoral thesis). Printed at Intellecta DocuSys: Stockholm, 2005. 352 p.

 Introduction:

Karahan, Anne, introduction to Johannes Damaskenos. Tre försvarstal mot dem som förkastarde heliga bilderna (John Damascene. Contra imaginum calumniatores orationes tres/Three Treatises Against those who Repudiate the Icons), Swedish translation from Greek by Olof Andrén, Skellefteå: Artos & Norma bokförlag, 2008. ISBN 978-91-7580-372-2. pp. 7–41.

Articles:

Karahan, Anne, “Bildning och uppfostran: Interaktion mellan ord och bild i bysantinbildvärld,” in: Svein Rise (ed.), Danningsperspektiver. Teologiske og filosofiske syn på danning i antikken og i moderne tid, Trondheim: Tapir Akademisk Forlag, 2010. ISBN 978-82-519-2652-2. pp. 91–109.

 Karahan, Anne, “The Issue of περιχώρησις in Byzantine Holy Images,” in: J. Baun, A.Cameron, M. Edwards and M. Vinzent  (eds.), Papers presented at the Fifteenth International Con­ference on Patristic Studies held in Oxford 2007, Studia Patristica, vols. XLIV-XLIX (2010). ISBN 978-90-429-2370-6, pp. 27–34.

 Karahan, Anne, “Balans i briljans: bilden av Guds kosmos i Bysans heliga bilder,” in:J. Heldt, I. Nilsson and D. Westberg (eds), The Swedish Byzantine Society, Bulletin 26 (2008), ISSN 1102-674X, pp. 33–52.

 Karahan, Anne, “Bysans heliga bilder: en patristikens semiotik?,” in: O.-C. Bråten (ed.), the Norwegian theological journal Laere og liv 1 (2008), ISSN 0809-9219, pp. 18–25.

 Karahan, Anne, “Erythmos – en idé kopplad till ethos,” in: Föreningen för en svens  antiktidskrift (publ.), Stockholm, Medusa 3 (2007), ISSN 0349-456X, pp. 24–33.

 Karahan, Anne, “Munnen – den immateriella tankens budbärare eller förförare,” in: B. Klinge(Responsible of project), M. Larsen Dennis (Head of project) and A.Lundin (ed.), Förlagshuset Gothia: Stockholm, 2001, ISBN 91-7205-342-9, pp. 68–70.

 Karahan, Anne, “Den heliga modern och Gudsriket: Chorakyrkan i Istanbul,” in: B. Schlyter(ed.), Annual published by the Swedish Research Institute in Istanbul and Föreningen Svenska Istanbulinstitutets vänner, Dragomanen 3 (1999), ISSN 1402-358X, pp. 48–59.

 Karahan, Anne,”Bokmåleri under den osmanska perioden,” (Miniature Painting in theOttoman Era) in: Exkursion till Turkiet 1996, printed by the Department of Art History, Stockholm University, in collaboration with The Swedish Research Institute in Istanbul, 1997, pp. 99–125.

 Karahan, Anne,”The Paleologan Iconography of the Chora Church and its Relation to Greek Antiquity,” in: Konsthistorisk Tidskrift/Journal of Art History, Volume 66, Issue 2 & 3 (1997), ISSN 0023-3609, pp. 89–95.

 Karahan, Anne, “Tankens genesis och hypotesens anastasis. Några tankar mot bakgrund avden bysantinska forskarkursen i Turkiet, oktober 1995,” in: Eidos 10 (1995), Department of Art History, Stockholm University (publ.), pp. 12–17.

 Abstracts:

Karahan, Anne, “The Crux Gemmata versus the Crucifixion Cross in Byzantine Cappadocia: Patristic Thought (Dogmata) and Theological Significance”, in: Proceedings of the 22nd International Congress of Byzantine Studies, Sofia, 22-27 August 2011, vol. III, p. 197. ISBN 978-954-8536-05-9. 

Karahan, Anne, “The Image of God in Byzantine Cappadocia and the Issue of God’s Supreme Transcendence”, Sixteenth International Conference on Patristic Studies at the University of Oxford, 8-13 August, 2011(www.patristics.org.uk/abstracts)

 Karahan, Anne, “Transition and Mediation of Ideas between Syria and Byzantium. John Damascene’s Polemics against the Iconoclasts and his Epistemic Impact on Byzantine Aesthetics,” short version printed in: A. Speer & P. Steinkrüger, 37. Kölner Mediaevisten-tagung 14. bis 17. September 2010, pp. 51–54 (“Knotenpunkt Byzanz. Wissenformen und kulturelle Wechselbeziehungen”), Thomas-Institut der Universität zu Köln.

 Karahan, Anne, “The Paleologan Iconography of the Chora Church and its Relation to Greek Antiquity,” abstract no. 5323, in: Abstracts, XIX International Congress of Byzantine Studies (Byzantium. Identity, Image, Influence), University of Copenhagen, August 18–24, 1996. ISBN 87-87879-08-5.

 Select Forthcoming Articles:

 Karahan, Anne, “Transition and Mediation of Ideas between Syria and Byzantium. John Damascene’s Polemics against the Iconoclasts and the Impact of Orthodox Epistemic on Byzantine Aesthetics,” in: Andreas Speer (ed.), Miscellanea Mediaevalia 36 (“Knotenpunkt Byzanz”, 37. Kölner Mediaevistentagung, 14.-17. September 2010, Universität zu Köln), Berlin/New York, Walter de Gruyter.

 Karahan, Anne, “Byzantine Iconoclasm and the Belief in eikon theou: An Issue ofChristology, or a Quest for Political Power?” in: Marina Prusac and Kristine Kolrud (eds.) (International Iconoclasm conference, University of Oslo, November 5–6, 2009), Aldershot, Ashgate Publishing.

 Karahan, Anne, the chapter on “John Damascene,” in: Antologi om kirkefedernes teologiskeSpråk (The Theological Language of the Church Fathers’), S. J. Kristiansen and P. Solberg (eds.), Novus forlag, Oslo, a scientifically accredited publisher, level 1.

 Karahan, Anne, “Beauty in the Eyes of God. Byzantine Aesthetics and Basil of Caesarea,” in:Byzantion. Revue Internationale des Études Byzantines, Belgique.

 Karahan, Anne, “In Quest of Dogmatic Understanding of Byzantine Aesthetics: Cappadocian Thinking and the Holy Images of Byzantine Cappadocia,” in: V. Cvetkovic (ed.), Icons. Theology in Colors (Series of lectures held at Aarhus University, Denmark 2009). Among the authors are also Professors A. Louth and T. Tollefsen.

 Karahan, Anne, “The Image of God in Byzantine Cappadocia and the Issue of God’s Supreme Transcendence”, in: Papers presented at the Sixteenth International Con­ference o Patristic Studies held in Oxford 2011, Studia Patristica, Peeters Publishers, Leuven/Paris/Walpole, MA.

 Karahan, Anne, “San Lorenzo in Lucina: A Lost Medieval Apse Decoration and Fragments of Mural Painting,” in: Opuscula Romana, Annual of the Swedish Institute in Rome, O. Brandt (ed.). Entry in volume devoted to the research project on the church of San Lorenzo in Lucina, Rome, at Istituto Svedese di Studi Classici a Roma, Italia.

 Karahan, Anne, “Early Byzantine Holy Images in Two Churches at Ravenna, Italy. An Iconographic and Aesthetic Investigation of the Implementation of Divine and Human.”