“Always About to Take Place”: Glenn Peers on the Byzantine Fresco Chapel

The Research and Academic Program at the Clark Art Institute presents In the Foreground: Object Studies:  short meditations that introduce you to a single work of art seen through the eyes of an art historian.Originally adorning a small Greek Orthodox chapel in Cyprus, from 1997 to 2012 these Byzantine frescoes were installed in a specially built space, an “infinity box” that feels akin to being inside an architectural reliquary, at the Menil Collection in Houston, Texas. Glenn Peers (Syracuse University) reflects on how the history of the Byzantine Fresco Chapel tells a story of nation-states in conflict, restitution and mediation, and the capacity of images to transform across time and environments.