The Icon as a Ladder of Divine Ascent in Form and Color* (excerpt)by Archbishop Damianos

... We are called to ascend, to appropriate to ourselves that which has been wrought by Christ, to partake of the restoration that has been accomplished by His Incarnation and Resurrection.

It is the saints who have been completely filled by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and who are thus the closest human images of God. The pictorial world they inhabit in their representations is the created world, which, however, is transformed into its primordial glory through the grace of the Logos and the grace of their presence – a world, we may add, that is suffused by divine light surpassing by far the brilliance of the sun. 

This light is the Uncreated Light of Mount Tabor. The Byzantine artists’ choice to hint at that light, by means of the all-pervasive and scintillating gold background, is very sophisticated indeed. As the natural sun has been eclipsed by the rising of the Sun of Righteousness, so have cast shadows: their employment would create the illusion of a fictive pictorial space, which would be detrimental to the desired evocation of the transcendental. In the same line of reasoning, linear perspective is avoided, and elements of the natural world, such as landscaping settings or architectural backgrounds, are rendered with a fine sense of discernment. …

As a final observation, let us not forget, that what raises painting to an art and a creative act is its power to ”rephrase” the perceived reality, not in terms of what is fleeting and corruptible, but in terms of what is permanent and incorruptible. In other words, painting benefits from its inherent faculty to abstract, to add to cut and to align, until its outcome pleases our ingrained impulse to finally see the world in a state, that is more akin, more congenial, to our spirit. For the Orthodox Christian, this state is the world (both animate and inanimate) transfigured into its primordial beauty and comeliness … through the Incarnation of the Logos. And this has been successfully translated into visual terms in icons.

Indeed, by their captivating formal purity, transparency and clarity, icons create what we might call a resonance or an uplifting in the spiritual sense. They are statements of faith, milestones along man’s path to perfection, images of the invisible comeliness of the Kingdom of Heaven, and open channels leading to it. Their material presence in the context of the Church actuates the concluding prayer of the Divine Liturgy, … “sanctify them that love the comeliness of Thy House.” Their spiritual presence is as compelling as our Lord’s Incarnation, and their power is as transfiguring as the light of Mount Tabor. …

*From the Article "The Icon as a Ladder of Divine Ascent in Form and Color" by Archbishop Damianos of Sinai and Raitho, in the Byzantium Icon Album by the Metropolitan Museum of Art