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THE MONASTERY OF MATEJCE Considered to be "one of the most noble Byzantine monuments in the Balkans' region" in the travelogues from the distant centuries and investigated in the papers of the most respected researchers of Byzantine culture more than a century, the church of the Holy Virgin in Matejce is a representative of the leading artistic attainments of our ancestors from the distant past and it is a master-piece of Late Byzantine monumental painting. Originating from the tradition of Constantinopolitan architectonic models and being the largest painted ensemble from the XIVth century in the Macedonian territory and the second largest in the Balkans' region, the church of the Holy Virgin in Matejce, by the grandiose dimensions of the building and the extensive painted repertoire counts among the most distinguished monuments of the general Byzantine artistic production. Fourteen painted cycles and hundreds saintly figures decorate the walls of the temple, which, in the last fifteen months had lost precious pieces of the painted decoration, swallowed in the dark abyss of oblivion. The genuine iconographical patterns never seen in the history of Byzantine painting, testifying to the profound theological erudition of the creators of encyclopedically rich painted programme, as well as the appearance of the new style features of the court artistic expression through the aristocratic manner of the execution, speak in favor of the skillfulness and mastery of the best painters from the middle of the XIVth century. Their refined artistic expression ennobled the monumental interior of the church with one of the most poetic vision of our medieval artistic creation. For the first time in the history of Byzantine studies, on 524 pages, illustrated by drawings, 90 black and white as well as 57 color photographs, the monograph The Monastery of Matejce solves the mystical dimensions of the church of the Holy Virgin, offering:
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