Fifteen aspiring iconographers recently spent a week at St Vladimir’s Seminary as participants in two iconography workshops. Under the supervision of Protodeacon Nazari Polataiko and Kh. Erin Mary Kimmet, students engaged in an intensive program incorporating instruction on the history and theology of iconography with the actual painting of icons of Christ according to two traditional methods.

Pdn Nazari Polataiko, who taught the egg tempera Russo-Byzantine style workshop, endeavored not only to teach the craft and technique of iconography, but also to have his students experience working on their icons "in prayer, through prayer and becoming prayer." He also instructed his students about the theology and the history of iconography, which his students felt gave them a more complete understanding of the process of painting an icon.

Kh. Erin Mary Kimmet, the instructor of the Cretan-Byazntine style of painting icons with acrylic paints, said that she hoped to introduce her students into the prayerful and spiritual depth of iconography. Cognizant that “the spiritual discipline affects what flows into the Icon”, Kh. Erin was very happy that her students were quick to grasp the prayerful aspect of painting icons.

Participants in both workshops worked late into the night to assure finishing their icon. One student described the experience as a "spiritual boot camp—very intense" and she said all her muscles hurt from concentration. Most of the students and the instructors said that they were very happy to meet other iconographers and to spend almost a week in the fellowship of like-minded people, in the beautiful surroundings of the seminary campus. "I have never experienced so many people with such a quiet sense of joy”, said one participant from Charleston, South Carolina. The students and instructors came from every part of the US and from Canada, and asked that these workshops be repeated again next year. Just before they left to catch various flights home, the iconographers displayed their newly completed works so that other members of the Seminary Community could come and see what was accomplished in one week.

“The Iconography Workshops went very well”, said Tanya Penkrat, Special Events Coordinator. “Everyone completed an Icon from start to finish and did an amazing job. It was awesome to see the face of Jesus Christ slowly developing from the basic earthy colors and gradually becoming more and more defined until it shone forth in its full glory.”

Click here to view a gallery of photographs from the iconography workshops.

"We understand life backwards, but we live it forwards." With these words from Kierkegaard, Fr John Behr introduced the SVS 2009 Summer Conference. The conference, which promised to examine "20th-century landmarks towards a 21st-century Church," devoted most of its time examining the past. But as Prof. Peter Bouteneff later pointed out, the study of the past is always undertaken in order to understand the present and shape the future, so the problem then lies in how to interpret or "spin" the past.

In presentations by Fr Alexander Garklavs, and later by Fr Hyacinthe Destivelle, Scott Kenworthy, and Vera Shevzov, the Moscow Council of 1917-18 and the vision of St Tikhon were shown to have direct influence on the shape of church life and its structures of authority. Looking to a more recent past, Fr Cyril Hovorun and Matthew Namee sought to critically examine the way in which aspects of 20th century Orthodox Church history in America have been presented. Fr Cyril noted that autocephaly has carried something of an aura - a mythical dimension, as he called it - which went far beyond its obvious canonical implications. Namee dismantled the what he saw as the simplistic notion of early 20th century Church unity under Russian auspices.

Fr. Leonid Kishkovsky discussed the reality of communion between the various Orthodox Churches that led to the proclamation of autocephaly for the Orthodox Church in America, as well as the varying states of communion between Churches since 1970.