Byzantium: 330-1453

Stunning exhibition at the Royal Academy bringing together objects from the Byzantine Empire.

As soon as you walked into exhibition you are struck by a sense of gold and richness. The first rooms presented the history and then they looked at themes.

Interesting themes included the way that the early Byzantine Christians set the iconic traditions for Christian art even till today. It looked at how the bearded image of Christ took precedence and how many of the now standard images developed. It was fascinating to see early Annunciations and to realize they were working out how to show this.

I was also fascinated by the room which looked at the relationship between Byzantium and Italy. As well as looking at the objects the Venetians stole from Constantinople it also looked at artistic elements which they took.

Best of all had to be the room of icons. There were all so luxurious but also had a real sense of peace.

However I will say that this is in some ways a very annoying exhibition. Many of the labels were at waist height and as they were in the case suffered from bad reflections. Also I went on day one and a number of exhibits had not yet arrived including the show piece at the end of the icons from Sinai.

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