The Meaning of Icons by Ouspensky, Leonid and Vladimir Lossky - 1969

Boston, Massachusetts: Boston Book & Art Shop, Inc, 1969. Hardcover. G+/G (scuffs & scratches to cloth boards; edge-wear. pgs clean, with light toning. dustjacket has edge-wear; toning, tear to upper edge & back lower edge; various chips, scuffs & scratches). Coral cloth, gilt letters on spine, off-white and color illus. dust jacket, 222 pp., 50 BW illus., 12 color plates, 2 fold-outs. Photo is of a previous copy in our collection. "The art of icons is a sacred art in the true sense of the word. It is nourished wholly on the spiritual truth to which it gives pictorial expression. For this reason it is often inadequately and faultily judged, when approached from outside with criteria borrowed from profane and purely human art. ... A sacred art has, through its very content, access to a living and truly inexhaustible source. Hence, it is in its nature to remain true to itself, even where a particular artist has not fully realised the spiritual depth of a given subject, and so does not draw direct from the spring of holiness, but only reflects more or less of that light which is comprehended in sacred forms sanctioned through traditional rules." (foreword).