Some aspects of Christian pictorial semiotics

Abstract

In this article, by highlighting some issues of the history of the emergence and development of Christian symbols since the beginning of Christianity, the Christian semiotic code, used in the visual arts, is investigated.
The subject of the study is pictorial semiotics, and the object is the study of Christian symbols and their changes caused by the strengthening and spread of Christianity.
In addition to general scientific methods of analysis and synthesis, the work used iconographic and iconological methods, as well as the method of formal stylistic analysis, as the most effective when working with art images.
The authors explain the reasons for the emergence of the first Christian symbols, their transformation during the spread of religious teaching, describe the stages and conditions of the heyday and decline of Christian art, and also clarify the features of Orthodox and Catholic iconography.
The work provides semiotic analysis of the most common techniques of Russian icon painting based on the description of individual elements of icons, deciphers some codes in Orthodox culture.
The conducted research allows us to conclude that the knowledge of cultural codes in iconography helps the correct "reading" of the message embedded in the icon, and therefore, understand the foundations of any religious culture.