Morphou as Theomorphou

Morphou as Theomorphou. Yesterday, today and tomorrow.

Putting into effect its proclaimed objective to salvage and promote the cultural heritage of Cyprus, the Bank of Cyprus Cultural Foundation in collaboration with the Holy Bishopric of Morphou is setting up an exhibition entitled Morphou as Theomorphou. Yesterday, today and tomorrow. The exhibition will be inaugurated on March 22 2011, by his Beatitude Chrysostomos, the Archbishop of Cyprus and the Chairman of the Bank of Cyprus Board of Directors, Mr Theodoros Aristodemou. Staged in the premises of the Bank of Cyprus Cultural Foundation in the old city of Nicosia, the exhibition will last until September 11, 2011. The exhibition will feature more than 130 authentic specimens (icons, wood-carved items, holy vessels, canonicals, manuscripts, incunabula) – all valuable pieces of ecclesiastical art from the free areas as well as heirlooms belonging to refugees and repatriated or salvaged icons, books and wood-carved items from the Bishopric’s occupied area.

Authentic objects will be supplemented by informative entries as well as by audiovisual material featuring photographs of the monuments whence the objects originated. Also, rare editions by the Cultural Foundation Collections will bring forward documented information on lost and found objects.

Photographs depicting maintenance works on ecclesiastical monuments of the Holy Bishopric of Morphou from the past ten years will also be on display. Special reference will be made to the Bishopric’s occupied ecclesiastical monuments, damaged by the Turkish invaders, to the ongoing efforts to preserve them as well as to the investigations carried out with an eye to finding and repatriating portable ecclesiastical heirlooms of the Bishopric.

The exhibition aims at sensitizing the public, both locals and foreigners, about the preservation and safekeeping of cultural heritage as well as the tracking down and repatriation of stolen works of ecclesiastical art.

The Holy Bishopric of Paphos, the Byzantine Museum of the Archbishop Makarios III Foundation and the Department of Antiquities, Cyprus have also submitted exhibits or other material to the exhibition.