Justin Willson

“Epistemology of the Printed Icon” explores the conceptual underpinnings of printed icons in the Balkans. Focusing on works from Samokov and Belgrade, it investigates how the transferal of icons to the page raised questions about the nature of an image support, and how print’s division of labor complicated icon theology, including the notion of agency, or authorship. Studying how printers retooled Byzantine forms, applying washes and devising explanatory inscriptions, the project probes how the paper support gave rise to a new, early modern relation to ostensibly timeless Byzantine forms—a facet of their ephemerality yet to be fully explored. Paradoxically, this study argues that painters used a quintessentially modern method of replication—printing—to preserve and document Byzantine antiquities.