Visual Piety in Ethiopia: Painting for a New Millenium Prof. Raymond Silverman, Professor Emeritus, University of Michigan

Visual imagery has played a vital role in the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church since Christianity was introduced in Ethiopia in the fourth century. Over the centuries, the idioms for representing the divine have evolved in response to a multitude of political, social and religious circumstances. My recent research has focused on a new aesthetic inspired by the introduction of two modes of visual expression, religious prints that circulate globally and social(ist) realism. Our brown bag will involve a discussion of the fourth chapter of my recently published book, Ethiopian Church Art: Painters, Patrons, Purveyors, that explores a new “religious realism” as an expression of visual piety in contemporary Ethiopia.