Ethiopian Art Lecture Lalibala: from Dynastic Center to Pilgrimage Site

The site of Lalibala is a renowned architectural tour-de-force – churches carved from the living rock of the mountains of Lasta– created as the dynastic center of the rulers of the Zagwe Dynasty during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The architectural forms and the technical skills necessary for their creation demonstrate a cultural continuity with the Late Antique Aksumite kingdom, the capital of which was located farther north. The dynasty of the Zagwe kings was toppled in 1270, by a certain Yekunno Amlak, founder of the so-called Solomonic dynasty, which claimed that its founder descended from the last Aksumite king, purported to be descended from Menelik, son of the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon. At this time, the center of the Christian kingdom shifted to the south, and Lalibala was no longer a dynastic center. It became a pilgrimage site, regarded as a copy of the Holy Land in the highlands of Ethiopia, which is presently visited by pilgrims and tourists alike. By means of architectural plans and pictures, we will join pilgrims in visiting the rock-hewn churches, a monument to Ethiopian innovation as well as to the preservation of its Aksumite cultural heritage.

Marilyn E. Heldman’s art historical studies have focused upon the religious art of highland Christian Ethiopia, with an emphasis upon monumental painting, manuscript illumination and icons. Her research on the cult of icons in Ethiopia resulted in a monograph, The Marian Icons of the Painter Fre Seyon: A Study in Fifteenth-Century Art, Patronage, and Spirituality (Wiesbaden, 1994) and a recent article on the reception of imported Greek icons at the Ethiopian Court: “Saint Luke as Painter: Post-Byzantine Icons in early Sixteenth-Century Ethiopia,” Gesta, XLIV/2 (2005). She was curator of the exhibition entitled “African Zion: The Sacred Art of Ethiopia” and was primary author of the catalogue of this exhibition. More recently she was curator of an exhibition of icons of a twentieth-century Ethiopian painter, Alaqa Gabra Sellase, which looked at the continuity of iconographic traditions. A forthcoming article, “Creating Sacred Space: Orthodox Churches of the Ethiopian American Diaspora,” Diaspora (University of Toronto Press), focuses upon recent innovation in Ethiopian religious architecture and painting. Presently an independent scholar, she was a Fellow in Byzantine Studies at Dumbarton Oaks, Harvard Center for Byzantine Studies in Washington, D.C. and a Distinguished Visiting Scholar at the UCLA Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Los Angeles, California. She is presently a Visiting Scholar and Research Associate at the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of African Art, Washington D.C.

This lecture is presented in conjunction with the exhibit, “Glory of Kings: Ethiopian Christian Art from Oregon Collections,” scheduled for March 19 to May 22, 2011, in the Study Gallery of the Hallie Ford Museum of Art (co-curated by Dr. Ann M. Nicgorski, Faculty Curator and Professor of Art History and Archaeology, Willamette University, and Dr. A. Dean McKenzie, Professor of Art History emeritus, University of Oregon). The lecture is co-sponsored by the Center for Ancient Studies and Archaeology, the Hallie Ford Museum of Art, and the Hogue-Sponenburgh Art Lectureship Fund of the Department of Art History at Willamette University.

Sponsored by the Hallie Ford Museum of Art

Please contact Dr. Ann M. Nicgorski <anicgors> ex 6250 for more information.

Willamette University

Center for Ancient Studies and Archaeology

Address
Gatke Hall
900 State Street
Salem Oregon 97301 U.S.A.
Phone
503-370-6920

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