Florensky's Theory of the Icon

If my experience running an iconography camp in the summer, and regularly being asked to give lectures on Eastern Christian iconography, are reliable indicators, then interest in Byzantine iconography remains high today on the part of Western Christians, as it has for well over a decade now. So too does scholarly interest in Florensky. Both themes meet in a new book: Clemena Antonova, Visual Thought in Russian Religious Philosophy: Pavel Florensky's Theory of the Icon (Routledge, 2019, ) 110pp.

About this book the publisher tells us this:

This book considers a movement within Russian religious philosophy known as "full unity" (vseedinstvo), with a focus on one of its main representatives, Pavel Florensky (1882–1937). Often referred to as "the Russian Leonardo," Florensky was an important figure of the Russian religious renaissance around the beginning of the twentieth century. This book shows that his philosophy, conceptualized in his theory of the icon, brings together the problem of the "religious turn" and the "pictorial turn" in modern culture, as well as contributing to contemporary debates on religion and secularism.

Organized around the themes of full unity and visuality, the book examines Florensky’s definition of the icon as "energetic symbol," drawing on St. Gregory Palamas, before offering a theological reading of Florensky’s theory of the pictorial space of the icon. It then turns to Florensky’s idea of space in the icon as Non-Euclidean. Finally, the icon is placed within wider debates provoked by Bolshevik cultural policy, which extend to current discussions concerning religion, modernity, and art.

Offering an important contribution from Russian religious philosophy to issues of contemporary modernity, this book will be of interest to scholars of religious philosophy, Russian studies, theology and the arts, and the medieval icon.