What you need to know about icons.

A1 The core of Christian doctrine is the redemption of man

Wouldn't it be clearer if we had a few paintings hanging in the church of Christ on the cross, the birth, his portrait, and that of Mary? So that you could see before you the whole story of the redemption of mankind? Well, so that happened and those are the icons. There was already a tradition of portrait painting on a board and now those became portraits of Christ, Mary and the saints.

Only: the whole West doesn't participate in that. Murals yes, but always different and with the fashion and later they put statues in the church, and that was exactly what was not allowed in Greece, because a statue reminded them too much of the paganism of the ancient Greeks.

A2 What is an icon essentially?

Technically, the formula is: a wooden board, covered with linen, primed with gesso and painted with egg tempera. This is the icon in the narrower sense, and so it has its specific conditions for the painter.

Art historically, the formula is: depictions of Christ, Mary and the saints, biblical scenes and scenes from written sources, as long as it has been seen by human eyes. The Church must give its approval to any new icon. After all, it must fit into tradition.

The eastern branch of the church accepted icons. There was a bloody iconoclasm in the 7th-8th century, just like ours. All the icons were destroyed. Then John Damascene put into words: theologically and devotionally, the formula is that the icon acts as a conduit to the eternal world, so that in the icon man can venerate the model in heaven, or send a prayer, or ask for help. Worship of the icon is not an issue because the icon is only matter.

A3 The icons did not change because they were venerated

However, the icon does unwittingly take with it the atmosphere and fashion, the subtle sense of life of the time. Thus we can date them approximately. Remains as a variable the painter, who is given very little space. Even an eye, nose, mouth, hand, cheek is only painted in one particular way. By learning to paint perfectly, the painter does the saint most honor. And that gives them an appropriate intensity. Because they were venerated, there is also a material conservatism.