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Artist
Inspired by events said to have transpired after the armies of the Fourth Crusade sacked Constantinople in 1204, In one of the most shameful episodes of European history, soldiers of the conquering Latin armies are said to have ensconced a drunken prostitute on the Patriarch's throne in the Hagia Sophia. There, according to legend she either held a mock mass or gave a drunken song and dance routine. The Venetians among the conquerors, themselves historic and cultural heirs of the Byzantines, are said to have behaved better but they did not refrain from looting Constantinople's cultural, religious and artistic heritage (much of which remains in the treasury of St. Mark's Basilica to this day). I came across the story of the 4th Crusade when I lived in Istanbul for three years. Like anyone, I was always awed by the magnificence of surviving Byzantine treasures like Hagia Sophia despite the ravages of the 1204 sack. Nevertheless, I took personally the desecration visited on my adopted city--I still do. The treachery of fellow-Christians in the 1200s broke Byzantine power and made inevitable the Turkish sack in 1453 (which was far more restrained by comparison). Thus, in this image I have sought to popularize and capture the spirit of this unjust defilement--a warning that no treasure of human making, no matter how beautiful or revered, is safe when people abandon wisdom and restraint for greed, malice and ignorance.
