In the field of art, the Orthodox Church, and in particular the Bulgarian Orthodox Church possesses priceless treasures - the icons.
The word icon has Greek origin (eikon), meaning Image or Portrait.
Iconography is an art originated in Byzantium during the 4th century and
spread in the entire orthodox world.
In the beginning every image of the Savior, The Mother of God and the Angels whether it might have been a sculpture or a painting was called an icon. Today the icon is more than just an image. It is an object, organically involved in the liturgy and it is why the Orthodox Church gives a special meaning to it. Its change with naturalistic or abstract paintings is inadmissible, because it carries spiritual peace and calmness and in most cases when the faith is involved, it is a cure for the body and soul.
The Bulgarian iconography was born almost a century after the adoption of Christianity as religion in Bulgaria, which happened officially in the middle of the 9th century.
Thanks to its backwardness in apostasy, Bulgaria - being unaware of it - happens to be the last fortress of the true iconography in the first half of the 19th century.
Many iconographic schools were founded in Bulgaria throughout the centuries. The most famous of them were Bansko, Tryavna and Samokov schools with their significant representatives - Dimitar Ikonomov, Dimitar Hristov from Samokov and Ioanikii Vitanov from Tryavna.
The iconographic art in north-east Bulgaria created from the 16th to the 18th centuries is diverse and at the same time controversial. This controversy comes from the collision of the conservative traditions with the spreading of the new influences which change the aesthetic criterion. The deviations from the style of the middle age masterpieces come in the form of miniaturization as in "Saint George and Saint.Dimitar" icon, 17th century, in the figures being more geometric which leads to more dry images, as in "Saint Atanasii" icon, 17th century. The new ideas in iconography are seen also in the calligraphic drawing of the hair - "Saint Atanasii" icon, 18th century, and in the plastic decoration of the nimbus.
The plating of the icons with silver comes in the Balkan countries from Byzantium soon after their adoption of Christianity. The altar crosses are made after the patterns imported from Constantinople, Aton, and Russia. Often they are ready made filigree details by which the inner wood cross is plated, ornate with miniature relief. The censers and the icon-lamps are part of the church plates which repeats the forms of ancient oriental torches and scent vessels.
In north-east Bulgaria mainly masters of art from the Tryavna school worked - Dosio Koiov, Zaharia Tzaniov, Dimiter Kanchov, etc. Plots with historical themes also appear - "St. Cyril and St. Methodius" icon - 1867 by Dosio Koiov; new aesthetical approaches also find its way - "St. 40 Martyrs" icon from 1849 by priest Dimiter Kanchov. New enlivened faces appear - "Virgin Mary" by Kancho Ivanchov, "Jesus Christ" by Zaharia Tzaniov - 1846. Gradually the golden backgrounds of the icons disappear and the strict canons remain in the past. Real people in real surrounding are painted.
In the 19th century less famous masters of art work in Varna. Not all of them signed their works. Unknown are also the masters of art of the wonderful wood-carved arks, the gates of the king and the cross above the iconostasis belonging to the churches of the Varna and Preslav bishops.
To understand the meaning of the orthodox icon worship one should know how each icon was born. Valuable sources for this are the lives of the saints. Today it is widely considered that the church creates an icon of someone only after one’s canonization. In fact, the first official canonization in Byzantium took place in the 14th century, referring to St. Gregory Palamas. He was proclaimed as saint by patriarch Philotei Kokinos several years after his death and, of course, his veneration was already a fact in Solon and the region. This does not mean, though, that the church had not proclaimed saints before that or that it had not represented them on icons. Until then, and even many centuries after that, the only criterion for someone’s sainthood was the unanimous worship on behalf of a clergy or people attesting by their unanimity for one’s pious and devout life.
Most of the icons were created spontaneously by grateful Christians during the lifetime of the saint or soon after that. The personal history, the sainthood of the particular man was the basis of each icon.
An example of a saint painted during his lifetime is St. Simeon Stulpnik who lived in Syria during the 5th century. Teodorit Kirski who writes his Church history 15 years before the death of the saint (459) tells that his glory was so big that many people from all over the Christian world came to visit him. And the craftsmen in Rome hung over the doors of their workshops a small icon representing him used for protection.