Carolyn Connor is Professor Emerita of Classics at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Her teaching and scholarship in Byzantine Studies integrate art and architecture, literary texts, religious beliefs, and the historical record. She is the author of four books.
Carolyn Connor lays out the Constantinopolitan origins of one of the greatest achievements of Byzantine civilization, the mosaic programs of Middle Byzantine churches. Exploring the imperial, intellectual, and ritual contexts of their system, Connor provides a striking new interpretation of familiar monuments, viewing them as reflections of the ordering of medieval Byzantine society. -- Henry Maguire, Johns Hopkins University Saints and Spectacle represents a valuable supplement to the classic postwar work on Byzantine mosaic by Otto Demus. Told with sympathy, clarity, and care, it brings these multi-media performances back to life in ways not often seen in contemporary Byzantine scholarship. Anyone interested in the moving theatre of medieval ritual and art will find this text and its fine illustrations compelling reading. -- Glenn Peers, University of Texas at Austin Carolyn Connor lays out the Constantinopolitan origins of one of the greatest achievements of Byzantine civilization, the mosaic programs of Middle Byzantine churches. Exploring the imperial, intellectual, and ritual contexts of their system, Connor provides a striking new interpretation of familiar monuments, viewing them as reflections of the ordering of medieval Byzantine society. -- Henry Maguire, Johns Hopkins University Saints and Spectacle represents a valuable supplement to the classic postwar work on Byzantine mosaic by Otto Demus. Told with sympathy, clarity, and care, it brings these multi-media performances back to life in ways not often seen in contemporary Byzantine scholarship. Anyone interested in the moving theatre of medieval ritual and art will find this text and its fine illustrations compelling reading. -- Glenn Peers, University of Texas at Austin