Description
Apocalyptic Christ is one of the most solemn and visionary images within the decorative program carried out by Cimabue and his workshop in the Upper Basilica at Assisi. It belongs to the Apocalypse cycle and presents Christ as a supernatural sovereign occupying the absolute centre of an eschatological vision. Christ dominates the composition through frontality and monumental scale.
The mandorla surrounding him separates the celestial realm from the surrounding pictorial space, while his central position and halo reinforce his authority as the ruler and judge of history. The image retains essential features of Byzantine tradition, particularly its hierarchy, solemnity and symbolic conception of sacred space. At the same time, Christ possesses increasing bodily substance, and the drapery is modelled in ways intended to suggest physical volume.
