Cloud of witnesses
Orthodox icons are a window into the heavenly kingdom
When Mike Skinner worships at St. Nicholas Orthodox Church in Springdale, he’s surrounded by the saints.
Crowned with halos of gold, images of saints throughout the ages adorn the walls. Known as icons, these aren’t simple paintings or photographs, but sacred images that play a vital role in Orthodox worship.
“We are told we have to have icons for worship,” said the Rev. John Atchison, priest of the church. “Icons set an important mood for us because they go beyond a symbol. These icons are our heroes.”
The word “icon” comes from the Greek word “eikon,” or image. In the Orthodox tradition icons are images of Christ, Mary, angels and saints, as well as scenes from the Bible.
They are most often two-dimensional paintings, but can also be mosaics or bas-relief. Icons are never depicted as sculptures because they aren’t meant to be realistic representations, and instead are intentionally distorted. The idea is to draw attention beyond the painting to the world beyond, Atchison said. For that reason icons are often called “windows to heaven.”
At St. Nicholas, an icon of Christ looks down on the congregation from a dome in the ceiling. The icon, Christ Pantocrator or “ruler of all,” is a common sight in the domes of Orthodox churches worldwide. It depicts Christ with his right hand raised in blessing. An iconostasis, a wall of icons, stretches across the front of the sanctuary, and features Christ, Mary, St. Nicholas, St. John the Baptist and other saints, as well as archangels Michael and Gabriel.
Atchison said the use of icons is often misunderstood by non-Orthodox worshippers, who confuse the veneration of icons with worship. Orthodox Christians don’t pray
to the icons. Instead, the icons are a spiritual tool to aid in worship and prayer.
According to the HarperCollins Dictionary of Religion, the use of icons was attacked in the eighth and ninth centuries by those who considered the practice idolatry. Iconoclasts or “image breakers” destroyed untold numbers of icons at that time.
“They thought people were worshipping them,” Atchison said. “We highly respect them, but it’s not God. It’s a window.”
The Rev. Joseph Bittle, priest at Holy Trinity Orthodox Church in Little Rock, said icons are highly symbolic.
“What we are trying to encounter is not so much what we can see with our eyes but what we can see with our eyes combined with what we cannot see,” he said. “They are always giving us theological content and presenting to us an image of another world that is not readily accessible to our eyes.”
That partly explains the intentional distortions, such as reversed perspective or unnatural proportions. For example, in some icons of Mary with Jesus, though he is the size of a child, he has the appearance of a miniature man.
“It’s a reminder that we are looking at something with new eyes, something that, though real and see-able, is not accessible to our normal sight,” Bittle said.
Icons in an Orthodox church are meant to present the idea of stepping into the kingdom of God, he said.
“They also help us be consciously aware of the presence and fullness of the communion of saints, so that just as the person standing beside me is part of the communion of saints, so too are those who have gone before and are present with us,” he said. “So we decorate with icons of various canonized saints and it’s a pictorial representation of that ‘cloud of witnesses’ as referred to in Hebrews.”
The icons at Holy Trinity are a mixture of original icons and reproductions of historical ones, which Bittle hopes to eventually replace with hand-painted originals. The icons in the sanctuary and on the iconostasis are all hand-painted originals done by an iconographer in New Hampshire.
“Sometimes iconographers will come to a church and, over a period of time, they will get up on ladders and scaffolding and do the work directly on the wall,” Bittle said. “In our case, so far, they’ve always been done on canvas that is then adhered to the wall or to wooden panels like on the iconostasis.
“The goal of every Orthodox church is to have all originals.”
Skinner is an artist and iconographer. Painting or “writing” icons, as it’s traditionally known, is a time-consuming process, especially if done in the ancient way — on specially prepared wood with layer upon layer of gesso (a mixture of glue, chalk and pigment) and using egg tempera for paint. Egg tempera is made from egg yolks, water and white wine, along with natural sources for pigmentation. It’s a medium Skinner uses for some of the icons he paints.
Once the wood is prepared (or purchased already prepared), Skinner begins by making a pencil drawing of the saint or image. Then he paints, starting with the dark colors first and ending with the lighter colors to focus attention on the light in the icon. Twenty-four-karat gold leaf is then applied for the halos and for other special touches, and the icon is sealed with a mixture of linseed and walnut oil.
Skinner also paints icons on canvas using acrylic paint. He sells some of his work, gives some away and accepts commissioned projects. He said smaller icons take about 50 hours to complete, while an iconostasis can take up to 250 hours. He’s working on one now and hopes to be able to provide new Orthodox mission churches with hand-painted icons at a reasonable price. Most new churches can’t afford hand-painted icons and start off with reproduced prints on wood. That’s the case at St. Nicholas, which has only a handful of original icons.
The church has offered icon painting workshops in the past and Atchison said he hopes to offer the workshops more frequently. He participated in one and painted a small icon of St. Nicholas and found it to be a moving experience.
“It was one of the most spiritual times in my life,” he said. “It put me in a real wonderful mood.”