Dura-Europos Synagogue Essay

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Interior of the synagogue at Dura-Europos, Syria- The Jewish house of worship has an expansive sequence of mural paintings. The main room contains a niche for the Torah in the middle of one long wall. Mural paintings including episodes from the Torah cover the rest of the wall surfaces. For the most part, the murals lack action. Stories are told through gestures, but the figures seem to lack emotion, volume, and shape. God (called YHWH, or Yahweh in the Torah) is not featured in the artwork except as the hand appearing from the crown of the framed panels. The Dura-Europos Synagogue once was a private house with a central courtyard, but it was remodeled into a synagogue. The medium used to make the interior was tempera on plaster.
Christ as the Good Shepherd at Mausoleum of Galla Placidia, Ravenna, Italy- This lunette is above the entrance of the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia. Jesus Christ is the main subject in this mosaic, he is seated among His flock wearing a halo and …show more content…

245-256 and the mosaic of Christ as the Good Shepherd was built in ca. 425. Christ as the Good Shepherd is more informal and loose than the Dura- Europos Synagogue interior. The Dura- Europos Synagogue lacks both volume and shadow, but Christ as the Good Shepherd showcases cast shadows. In most of the Dura- Europos Synagogue panels the subjects tend to stand in frontal rows, while in Christ as the Good Shepherd the subjects occupy the landscape from foreground to background. The artworks are made with different mediums, Christ as the Good Shepherd fashioned with mosaic and the interior paintings of the Dura- Europos Synagogue created with tempera on plaster. In both artworks, one of the subjects is wearing royal purple (Christ in Christ as the Good Shepherd and David in one of the Dura- Europos Synagogue panels). Both artworks also exhibit Biblical portrayals and feature