We ♥ Hou
Helen Mann finds a little bit of Houston heaven at the Byzantine Chapel
Helen Mann is an expatriate happily living in Montrose. Born in England, she is the former Vice Consul of Press and Public Affairs at the British Consulate General and says she fell in love with Houston after just three weeks.
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My little bit of Houston heaven is the spiritually refreshing oasis that is the Byzantine Chapel tucked between the University of St. Thomas and the Menil Museum.
The unprepossessing, concrete-bunker exterior hides an interior jewel. You enter a dimly-lit, dark-walled room – the lighting carefully designed to give a sense of indeterminate height and depth - and there, floating in the middle of this space, is the gently glowing ghost of a miniature Byzantine chapel.
Stumbling, eyes adjusting to the light, you sit on a darkly upholstered cube and absorb the two awesome frescoes for which this tiny gem was built. Sitting, gazing up at the concave painting of Christ Pantocrator, or gazing into the eyes of the Madonna above what would have been the altar, you cannot help but start to feel peace soaking into your soul.
Your mind provides an echo of Gregorian chant, your nose twitches to a phantom drift of incense. You begin a short contemplation of the incredible story of the rescue of these 13th century fragments from the hands of unscrupulous antiques thieves; of the painstaking restoration of brutally shattered shards of fresco into the glorious paintings before you. You are aware of the enormous generosity of spirit of Houston philanthropist Dominique de Menil, who saved the pieces, restored them, negotiated with the government whose patrimony they are for their loan and exhibition here, and then commissioned and built this exquisite housing for them.
That contemplation easily leads the mind to drift into its own free-form thoughts. The infinite eyes of the icons are bottomless wells, gazing both into the depths of the soul and out into infinity. I go in with jangled nerves, my mind a cauldron of cares and stresses, and after ten minutes in this spare, serene spiritual space I come out soothed, with a rare sense of perspective.
