TIRANA, July 30 /ATA/ - The Onufri Iconography Museum, located inside the Church of the Dormition of St Mary in the historic city of Berat , southern Albania, continues to attract a growing number of visitors eager to explore its rich cultural treasures.
Minister of Economy, Culture and Innovation, Blendi Gonxhja, said in a social media post on Wednesday that the museum welcomes hundreds of visitors from around the world each day, offering them a spiritually and artistically enriching experience through its collection of rare icons and multilingual audio guides.
The Albanian national museum dedicated to Byzantine art and iconography in Berat, a UNESCO World Heritage site, has been named after Onufri, a famous 16th-century Albanian painter of icons and frescoes.
The museum is housed in the former Cathedral of the “Dormition of Saint Mary” - the largest church in the castle quarter. Historically, this cathedral served as the main ecclesiastical center of Berat and, together with the Metropolis buildings, formed an important architectural complex.
Of the original complex, only the church remains today. It was built in 1797, though evidence suggests it was constructed atop the foundations of an earlier church. Historical records indicate the cathedral functioned as a religious site until 1967, the year Albania’s state-led atheist reform repurposed religious properties under state administration.
The Onufri Museum houses over 200 artwork objects, icons and liturgical items dated from the 14th century to the 20th, brought together from several churches and monasteries in the region.
The icons are painted by renowned Albanian icon painters such as Onufri, Onufri’s son Nikolla, Onufër the Cypriot, David Selenica, Kostandin Shpataraku, the Çetiri tribe with Gjergji, Johani, Nikolla, Naumi, and his son Gjergji, as well as anonymous painters.
The iconostasis of the cathedral of the Dormition of St Mary was created in 1807. It is considered a finest piece of Albanian woodcarving. The iconostasis decorations feature some Baroque-style features and principles, a dominant and distinctive trend of churches built in the Balkans during the 18th and 19th centuries. All these motifs are intertwined with other elements of Byzantine tradition.
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