The Hand of Angelos

Maria Vassilaki is Associate Professor in Byzantine Art at the University of Thessaly and a Research Associate at the Benaki Museum. She has curated several exhibitions and edited many catalogues including Mother of God. Her books include The Painter Angelos and Icon-Painting in Venetian Crete. She is widely published in many art journals. Angeliki Laiou was Professor of History at Harvard University and a member of the Academy of Athens. She was one of the world's leading historians of the Byzantine Empire and editor of the monumental edition The Economic History of Byzantium (2002). She died in 2008. Chryssa Maltezou is the Director of the Hellenic Institute of Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Studies, Venice, and Emerita Professor of History, University of Athens. She has published more than one hundred studies on the history of the Venetian occupation in Greece. David Jacoby is Emeritus Professor of History, Department of History, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel. He is currently writing a book on medieval silk production and trade in the Mediterranean region, while his Latins, Greeks and Muslims: Encounters in the Eastern Mediterranean, Tenth-Fifteenth Centuries, was published in 2009. Robin Cormack is Emeritus Professor of the History of Art, University of London; Research Associate at the Courtauld Institute of Art and Teaching Assistant, Faculty of Classics, University of Cambridge. He co-curated The Road to Byzantium (2005) and Byzantium 330-1453 (2008). Byzantine Art (2000) is among his many publications. Maria Kazanaki-Lappa is a Curator of Byzantine Antiquities at the Archaeological Service, Ministry of Culture, Athens. She is a specialist in Post-Byzantine art and has carried out extensive research of the Venetian Archives. Nano Chatzidaki is a Professor of Byzantine Archaeology and Art at the University of Ioannina. A leading authority in Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Art, Icons. The Velimezis Collection (1998) features among her publications.

A tumultuous period in history, the late Byzantine era bore witness to bloody power struggles that dramatically changed the geographical, political and social landscape of a region and its people.

Contents: Preface, Professor Angelos Delivorrias, Director of the Benaki Museum; Acknowledgements; Introduction, Maria Vassilaki; Lenders to the Exhibition; Contributors to the Catalogue; Part 1: Artistic and Historical Context; Before the fall: Political and economic conditions in Constantinople in the fifteenth century, Angeliki Laiou; Crete in fifteenth century on the basis of archival documents, Chryssa Maltezou; Candia between Venice, Byzantium and the Levant: The rise of a major emporium to the mid-fifteenth century, David Jacoby; The Icon in Constantinople around 1400, Robin Cormack; From Constantinople to Candia: Icon painting around 1400, Maria Vassilaki; Catalogue (entries 1 to 14); Part II: The Painting of Angelos; The Testament of Angelos Akotantos, Maria Kazanaki-Lappa; The Art of Angelos, Maria Vassilaki; The legacy of Angelos, Nano Chatzidaki; Catalogue (entries 15 to 56); Bibliography; Index; Photographic credits