A comparative study of wall paintings at the Cypriot monastery of Christ Antiphonitis: one artist or two?

Abstract

The central church of the monastery of Christ Antiphonitis near Kalogrea, within the district of Kyrenia in Cyprus, is decorated with wall paintings that date from the last decades of fifteenth century. Two large and elaborate scenes, the Last Judgement and the Root of Jesse, had been preserved in the church until the Turkish invasion (1974) after which they were cut into tetragonal pieces, separated, and sent by looters to Germany for selling at illicit markets. The German Police returned thirty-two of the pieces to the Archbishop Makarios Foundation in Nicosia. This present analytical study, combining μRaman and FTIR spectroscopy, optical microscopy (OM) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM/EDS), of ten of the fragments was conducted within the framework of the InfrArtSonic Project funded by the 6th FP. Eight pigments were identified in the painting of both scenes: calcite, carbon black, yellow ochre, red ochre, green earth, cinnabar, red lead (minium) and smalt. The stratigraphy and scale of the paint layers, however, along with the composition of the plaster, vary significantly in the two representations. This would suggest the activity of two artists, who may well have belonged to different studios and worked independently, possibly even in different periods. Moreover, interpretation of the results allowed identification of several degradation phenomena, namely: i) smalt discolouration and loss; ii) degradation of red lead from orange Pb 3O 4 to black PbO 2; and iii) presence of resin (restoration material) and of oxalates in the paint surface, all of which resulted in a marked impact on the aesthetic of the representations.