School to the Ionian School was seamless and it was not until the early 1700s that the art of the Ionian Islands gained its own distinct character .
Orthodox Greeks and Catholic Italians mixed freely on these seven islands at the western fringe of the Greek world . In time , many icon artists from these islands became painters plying their trade in Venice , and received commissions from rich patrons and from the authorities of the Serenissima itself . Orthodox Christians and Catholics venerate relics , the bodily remains of saints . The Ionian Islands are home to three incorrupt ( undecomposed ) relics of saints , one on each of the three largest islands : St . Spyridon in Kerkira ( Corfu ), St . Gerasimos in Kefalonia , and St . Dionysius in Zakynthos . These saints are considered protectors of their island , and the inhabitants pay respect to them . Icons of each saint were produced in prodigious quantities on “ his ” island . As the fame of the miracle-working qualities of their relics became widespread , large numbers of their icons were exported to mainland Greece and even to Italy . Specifically , with Saint Spyridon , the faithful attributed such miracle-working abilities to his relic that the image of his relic replaced the painted icon of the saint himself .
In the 19th century , the painting quality of Greek icons lost its vigor and direction . Icons acquired a provincial , often naïve , local character , with the notable exception of those painted by the Ionian School artists , who maintained a high artistic standard . However , even those icons lost the spirituality of the Byzantine originals . These artists worked in a variety of styles , some strictly Byzantine , some closer to Italian , and others in a purely neo-Renaissance style that presages the style adopted by Greek academic iconographers of the later 19th century . So it was the Ionian School that received the Byzantine pictorial tradition from Crete , shepherded it for more than 150 years , and delivered it to the newly reborn Greek nation at the beginning of the 19th century .
36 . Carved wood and painted effigy of Saint Spyridon , Greek , probably intended for use by one of the Catholic residents of Corfu .
The Argie & Emmanuel Tiliakos Collection of Greek Icons 27