Искусство Армении. Черты историко-художественного развития

Khatchkars played an important and varied role in the life of medieval Armenia. They were built for many different reasons: a victory, the foundation of a village, the completion of a church or a viaduct, and so on. They were used as landmarks, or could be donated to a monas ‐ tery by a devout parishener. But most commonly khatchkars were gravestones. Khatchkars be ‐ longed to memorial sculpture in the widest sense, and the finest of them served as models for several generations of sculptors. For all their diversity, the basic design was always the same — the Cross treated as the Tree of Life growing from a grain or the solar symbol, often decorated with an ornamental core and offshoots. Sometimes the cross rests on a stepped pedestal, suggesting the original symbolism of khatchkars which were designed as a memento of the Passion, of Crucifixion and Calvary . The majority of khatchkars , are essentially ornamental in their treatment. The cross stands out against the background of elaborately ornamented stone. Yet, some of the surviving khatchkars display figurative compositions with Christ, the Virgin, etc. (“All Saviour” khatch ‐ kars ). The study of khatchkars reveals another facet of Armenian art — a devotion to ornament almost unique in Christian culture. The exuberant imagination of Armenian miniaturists, too, is realized in the luxuriant decor of the illuminated Gospels. But sculptors and miniature painters alike were far more reticent and restrained when it came to representing the human figure. By the 13th century certain changes occurred in the sculptural decor of monastic buildings. While earlier sculptural reliefs merely emphasized the crucial structural points, after the 13th century they acquire a more important role. Often the sculpture becomes the focal point of the whole building, realizing its inner significance and revealing underlying ideas, while the building itself serves as a kind of background for the sculpture. Bas ‐ reliefs and frescoes lead us to another important aspect of medieval art — the illumi ‐ nated manuscript which is undoubtedly another important phenomenon in Armenian art his ‐ tory. The largest collection of Armenian manuscripts is at the Matenadaran (a research centre for old manuscripts and manuscript library) in Yerevan. The Matenadaran has a collection of 16,000 manuscripts, 2,500 of them illuminated. Impressive collections have been also assem ‐ bled in Venice, London, Paris, Vienna and in the USA. Early Armenian miniatures are remarkable for their festive grandeur, they make one feel the infinite power of art and the universality of its language. These illuminations also demon ‐ strate a continuity that links the Middle Ages in Armenia with the earlier periods: with the late antiquity and ancient Oriental art whose deep impact on Armenian culture and consciousness has never quite faded. Such were the artistic sources of medieval Armenian book painting which inspired the earliest of surviving Gospel manuscripts. The history of Armenian illumination began when in 405 – 406 AD Messrop Mashtotz in ‐ vented the Armenian alphabet, and Armenian scribes began to copy and translate Christian texts. Armenia’s closest neighbour, Syria, already had a manuscript illumination tradition, and as soon as she had acquired an alphabet. Armenia made her contribution. Even the earliest dated miniatures, the old folios scattered all over the world and the 7th ‐ century miniatures in the Echmiadzin Gospels bear evidence of experience, and display a unique fusion of eastern and western trends. The tradition of manuscript illumination established at a very early date, required a particu ‐ lar layout in which the main text was preceded by the khorans . The obvious architectural proto ‐ types of khorans go back to late antiquity. These decorations in the introductory folios of Armenian manuscripts, conceived as a kind of entry to the Gospels were not accidental: the columns of this symbolic arch enclosed the Canon tables which were supposed to confirm the authenticity of the four Gospels.