christianity

The struggle between good and evil. The battle between the sacred and the profane. These have been recurring themes in all societies and through art, populations were instructed in the principles of Christian religion. Clothing, costumes, music, and dance serve to teach people about the rules to follow as Christians. 

Sirarpie Der Nersessian (1896-1989) was an Armenian art historian. Born in Istanbul, she fled in 1915 to escape the persecutions that had erupted against Armenians in the Ottoman Empire. She lived for a time in Switzerland, then moved to Paris in 1919, where she obtained a graduate degree at the Sorbonne. By the mid-20th century, she was living in Washington D.C., working as a scholar at Dumbarton Oaks. In 1963, she published a book on the Freer Gallery of Art’s Armenian Gospel manuscript folios.

Although only about two percent of the population of India is Christian, it is common to find both Christian and non-Christian Indian artists who have used Christian themes in their art. The beginnings of Christianity in India are not well known but tradition has it that the apostle Thomas founded a number of churches in Kerala in 52 AD. Vasco da Gama (1469-1524), the Portuguese explorer, landed in Calicut in 1498 and by 1542 the Roman Catholic missionary Francis Xavier (1506-1552) had reached Goa. These contacts with the west brought examples of European art into the Indian subcontinent.